Kathryn Mackay and Mary Notman
The purpose of this paper is to outline the duties and powers of the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act (ASPSA) 2007 and place them in the wider Scottish adult protection…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to outline the duties and powers of the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act (ASPSA) 2007 and place them in the wider Scottish adult protection legislative framework. It considers the potential value of a standalone adult safeguarding statute.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw upon their research and practice expertise to consider the merits of the ASPSA 2007. They take a case study approach to explore its implementation in one particular Scottish local authority, drawing on the qualitative and quantitative data contained in its annual reports.
Findings
Skilled, knowledgeable and well-supported practitioners are key to effective screening, investigations and intervention. Protection orders are being used as intended for a very small number of cases.
Research limitations/implications
The lack of national statistical reports means that there is limited scope for comparison between the local and national data.
Practical implications
Adult support and protection requires ongoing investment of time and leadership in councils and other local agencies to instigate and maintain good practice. Aspects that require further attention are self-neglect; capacity and consent and residents in care homes who pose potential risks to other residents and staff.
Social implications
ASPSA 2007 has helped to raise awareness of adults at risk of harm within the local communities and as social issue more generally.
Originality/value
The authors provide a critical appraisal of the implementation of Scottish adult safeguarding legislation over the last six years. They consider similar developments in England and Wales and argue for comparative research to test these out. Finally, they signpost future directions for bridging separate policy streams.
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Kathryn Mackay, Mary Notman, Justin McNicholl, Diane Fraser, Claire McLaughlan and Sylvia Rossi
This article seeks to explore the difference that adult support and protection legislation may have made to work with adults at risk of harm in Scotland.
Abstract
Purpose
This article seeks to explore the difference that adult support and protection legislation may have made to work with adults at risk of harm in Scotland.
Design/methodology/approach
The article is based upon findings of a joint academic and practitioner qualitative research project that interviewed 29 social service practitioners across three local authorities.
Findings
The legislation was seen as positive, giving greater attention to adults at risk. Views about the actual difference it made to the practitioners' practice varied, and were more likely in new rather than ongoing work. Three differences were noted: duties of investigation, protection orders and improved shared responsibility within the local authority and across other agencies, but to a lesser extent NHS staff. Overall it gave effective responses, more quickly for the adults at risk. Whilst the law brought greater clarity of role, there were tensions for practitioners in balancing an adult's right to autonomy with practitioners' safeguarding responsibilities.
Originality/value
The paper demonstrates that a dedicated law can improve safeguarding practice by clarifying the role of social work practitioners and the responsibilities of other agencies. The right to request access to records and banning orders were seen as valuable new measures in safeguarding adults at risk. As such the study from the first UK country to use dedicated adult safeguarding law offers a valuable insight for policy makers, professionals and campaign groups from other countries, which might be considering similar action.
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Bridget Penhale, Alison Brammer, Pete Morgan, Paul Kingston and Michael Preston-Shoot
Michel Foucault and Max Weber dominate contemporary organisation theory. At least in part, Foucault can be read as an extension of Weber's concepts of bureaucracy and…
Abstract
Michel Foucault and Max Weber dominate contemporary organisation theory. At least in part, Foucault can be read as an extension of Weber's concepts of bureaucracy and rationalisation. Or, more profitably, Weber can be read through Foucault and vice versa. Central to the development of the bureaucracy was the construction of the career as a life-long project of the self. From the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century, British banks developed extensive forms of surveillance predicated upon the career. Not all clerks satisfied the banks' close inspection of the individual's personal life. Here, we use Weber and Foucault to tell the story of William Notman, a Scottish bank clerk who successfully sued his employers for dismissing him because he married against their wishes.
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Megan Tschannen-Moran and Christopher R. Gareis
– The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships among faculty trust in the principal, principal leadership behaviors, school climate, and student achievement.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships among faculty trust in the principal, principal leadership behaviors, school climate, and student achievement.
Design/methodology/approach
Data from 64 elementary, middle, and high schools in two school districts formed the basis of the study (n=3,215 teachers), allowing for correlational and regression analyses of the variables.
Findings
The authors found that faculty trust in the principal was related to perceptions of both collegial and instructional leadership, as well as to factors of school climate such as teacher professionalism, academic press, and community engagement. Student achievement was also correlated with trust, principal leadership behaviors, and school climate. The authors found that both of the composite variables, principal behaviors and school climate, made significant independent contributions to explaining variance in student achievement and that together they explained 75 percent of the variance in achievement.
Research limitations/implications
Limitations of the study include the use of a single form to collect participants’ responses that may have elevated the degree of correlations, as well as the exclusion of rural schools from the sample.
Practical implications
The findings of this study suggest that principals must foster and maintain trust in order to lead schools effectively. Importantly, trust has both interpersonal and task-oriented dimensions. Thus, principals must be prepared to engage collegially with teachers in ways that are consistently honest, open, and benevolent, while also dependably demonstrating sound knowledge and competent decision making associated with administering academic programs.
Originality/value
Situated in a conceptual framework of systems theory, this study explored the interplay of faculty trust in the principal, principal behavior, school climate, and student achievement. The findings suggest that it is necessary for principals to evidence both interpersonal and task-oriented behaviors in order to be trusted by teachers. Furthermore, the strength of the relationships suggests that schools will not be successful in fostering student learning without trustworthy school leaders who are skillful in cultivating academic press, teacher professionalism, and community engagement in their schools.
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Joyce Payne and Aurelia Stephen
If you are 30 or older, you are middle‐aged by someone's criteria. When the college students of the 1970s declared “Don't trust anyone over 30,” did you think they would be…
Abstract
If you are 30 or older, you are middle‐aged by someone's criteria. When the college students of the 1970s declared “Don't trust anyone over 30,” did you think they would be someday talking about you? And what about those who say “Life begins at 40”? Did you ever believe them?
In the present European crisis every intelligent individual of British birth must feel that a tremendous debt of gratitude is due to the British Navy, which, by keeping open the…
Abstract
In the present European crisis every intelligent individual of British birth must feel that a tremendous debt of gratitude is due to the British Navy, which, by keeping open the lines of traffic across the seas, has ensured the supply of daily food to the country. Although this journal does not concern itself with political matters, it does concern itself with the question of the maintenance of an efficient food supply in this country at all times, and the one question is indissolubly bound up with the other. Few people probably have any idea of the enormous extent to which they are dependent for the very food which nourishes them upon the ships that enter London and other ports of the English coast. Every day in the year nearly three‐quarters of a million pounds' worth of provisions are imported into this country, in addition to what we actually produce ourselves, and last year no less than two and a quarter million tons of grain, 360,000 tons of chilled and frozen beef and mutton, 170,000 tons of tea, 250,000 tons of sugar, and many other foods in proportion, were landed in the port of London alone. These figures, in view of the present crisis, completely shatter the absurd position of the “Little Navy” nincompoops.