Individual budgets and the wider personalisation agenda have been around for quite a while now. They have had a mixed journey, and at times they have been hijacked and presented as a panacea for the problems of the wide public services portfolio.

An influential group of MPs and Peers are calling for all staff working in social care to receive dementia training appropriate to their role after a report published today.

In a move to strengthen social work management, the Children’s Workforce Development Council is part funding a national pilot Graduate Recruitment Scheme to help attract high calibre graduates into a career in social work with children and families.

AN inquest will take place in Huddersfield tomorrow into the tragic death of a woman in a care home. The hearing will look into the death of an 87-year-old Alzheimer’s patient who died two months after suffering four per cent burns while living at the West Yorkshire care home.

TWO social workers have been arrested amid claims that one of them tried to sell cocaine to cops at a police party. The women – who were employed by Manchester council – are alleged to have openly used cocaine in front of officers.

The current system for accessing and funding adult social care is overly complicated and financially unsustainable, London Councils warned today.

The elderly could be asked to pay an ‘inheritance levy’ of up to £12,000 to help fund a revolution in old age care. Proposals will be unveiled within weeks in an attempt to end the scandal of an estimated 60,000-plus pensioners a year being forced to sell properties to pay for care home places.

Police are searching for two young girls who went missing from separate care homes over the weekend. Natalie Mustafa, 12, who had run away earlier in the week, was last seen leaving her care home, Ingleside Children’s Home in Mayfield Road, South Croydon at 10.05am on Tuesday 11 June.