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The Guardian - UK

Politics

Clare Horton

Society daily 17.01.11

Emperor Penguins in Antarctica — Birmingham councillor Len Clark reckons social workers have a 'penguin complex'. Photograph: © Paul Souders/Corbis

Full coverage of the coalition's public sector reform plans

David Cameron is today discussing his plans to overhaul public services, including the NHS, in the run-up to Wednesday's publication of the health and social care bill. My colleague Andrew Sparrow will be following the day's debate, plus Nick Clegg's speech at the launch of a Demos report on parenting, on the Politics live blog.

Meanwhile, Paul Corrigan's Health Matters blog predicts trouble ahead for both the health service and the coalition:

"... if the NHS is not successfully reformed in the next decade, the rising demand for health care with a limited public resource to meet that demand will lead to a combination of long waiting times, rationing and co-payments. This would signal the end of the NHS. One alternative is that the government's reforms work. But I don't think I would want to hang the future of a major part of my society on the chance of the current secretary of state's reforms all 'working'. Therefore if the debate is between these reforms and doing nothing, the country may decide, unless there is another choice, doing nothing is a safer bet."

And Chris Ham lists 10 questions to ask about the health and social care bill on the King's Fund blog.

Today's top Society Guardian stories

• NHS bans on operations gamble with patients' health, senior surgeon warns

• Child sex trafficking in UK on the rise

• Parental leave system puts unfair burden on mothers, says Nick Clegg

All today's Society Guardian stories

Other news

• The number of people working in the voluntary sector fell by 2% in the third quarter of 2010, according to Third Sector. Analysis of the Labour Force Survey by Third Sector Research Centre and umbrella body the National Council for Voluntary Organisations in partnership with Skills – Third Sector reveals that the sector employed 793,000 people during the third quarter of 2010, down from 806,000 in the previous three months.

• Health officials have ordered doctors to shelve a vaccination programme which was under way to protect children from swine flu, reports the Telegraph. Doctors in north-west England began giving jabs to healthy schoolchildren earlier this month, but last week bosses at North West strategic health authority ordered doctors and nurses to stop providing the jabs.

• Teachers, parents, youth workers, young people and trade unions in Haringey are hosting a day of action today ahead of tonight's full council meeting which will discuss buget cut plans, reports the Haringey Independent. Haringey council has blamed the closing of youth centres, day centres and axing of 1,000 jobs – more than a fifth of its workforce – on the government, which has cut the authority's annual budget by £50m.

On my radar ...

• Quote of the day on the Enabled by Design blog as part of the weekend's One Month Before Heartbreak blogswarm against disability living allowance cuts:

"This is NOT a lifestyle choice! Do not treat it that way..."

• This interesting experiment in online services which goes live today. MyPolice, as previewed in SocietyGuardian last year, allows people to send their feedback - positive and negative - on local policing and discuss local issues with officers. During its three-month pilot, eight officers will communicate online with members of the public living in the south Perthshire area of Tayside. It is hoped the service will eventually be rolled out nationwide.

• Clare Short, who is "interested" in running in the Birmingham mayoral election, according to LCG [paywall].

• This guest post on the Fighting Monsters social work blog, in which a social work student writes about her experiences on placement:

"The web of student, practice assessor, workplace supervisor, and practice tutor still seems very confusing. They all seem to know what they're doing but it's a lot of people to be on your best behaviour for. Being assessed constantly does make me nervous, and wondering if every little thing I say and do is going to end up on an assessment or worse is actually quite a lot of pressure to live under for 100 days. I have a wave of empathy for service users who go through this process, especially when they need to impress people who can gatekeep
services a bit more key to their lives than just a good grade."

• Conspiracy or cock-up? That's the question posed by Colin Talbot on the Public Finance blog on Manchester council's job cuts announcement as voters went to the polls in the Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election.

• Croydon council, which has earned plaudits for its smart use of social media.

• This interesting blogpost from Primly Stable, which charts the Daily Mail's changing stance on flu vaccines for children.

• Toilets, the latest battleground in the DCLG's war against local authorities. Last week local government minister Bob Neill declared the "age of vanity makeovers" was over, as a BBC FoI request revealed London's councils had spent £30m on refurbishments. But the We Love Local Government blog asks Does working in the public sector mean that I should expect a lower level of comfort?

• Penguins. According to Birmingham councillor Len Clark, social workers have a "penguin complex":

"They live in a different continent to the rest of us, like Antarctica, and at the slightest criticism they all go into a huge huddle, turning their backs and shield each other."

• Games for all the family as proposed by comic Oliver Double on the Diabetes UK blog, including Hypo:

"This one's a bit like Cluedo, only instead of working out who killed Dr Black, which weapon they used, and where they did it, you have to work out why their blood sugars are suddenly down to 2.1. Was it a wrongly carb counted meal in the kitchen? Was it an over-enthusiastic game of Wii Sports in the lounge? Or was it a nasty bug they've picked up in the school library?"

Latest from the Guardian Professional Networks

• Live Q&A today from noon - Sustainable housing: what will happen to the green agenda.

• How smaller charities can benefit from using focus groups.

• Why, when faced with cuts, internal communication in local government is even more important.

• Banks and construction companies are racheting up vast profits from public private partnerships, according to a new report seen by Public.

In case you missed them ... SocietyGuardian weekend highlights

• Private sector poised to soak up services after massive jobs cull

• Polly Toynbee: This year's savage local cuts will unite Tories and Labour

• A hugger or a tiger mother: battle of the baby-rearing strategies

All yesterday's SocietyGuardian stories and comment

All Saturday's SocietyGuardian stories and comment

Do you work in public sector HR?

The XpertHR benchmarking survey of public sector HR practitioners and employment professionals wants to hear from you about the employment implications of the coalition's public spending cuts. It will look back to what happened in 2010, and forward to the implications for 2011, covering topics including

• Cutting wage bills, use of outsourcing to reduce wage bills, use of shared services to reduce wage bills;

• Voluntary and compulsory redundancies;

• Closure of offices or sites;

• Relocation of staff or offices;

• Schedules and outcomes of cost-cutting measures.

The survey, in association with SocietyGuardian, is running on the XpertHR benchmarking surveys website until 18 January.

Events

HR Summit, 18 January, London

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Public Services Summit New models, new relationships, a new era. 10 & 11 February, St Albans.

Join leading thinkers, practitioners and policy makers for discussion and debate about the future of our public services.

Mobile and Wireless Healthcare Enabling access to care at the point of need. 16 February, Birmingham.

This conference is aimed at ICT and service delivery teams in the NHS to give them practical advice and guidance at a time where all we can be certain of is a reduction in public sector budgets. 2 for 1 delegate place offer available.

Public Sector Procurement 17 February, Manchester. Only £99 to attend.

A one-day conference for public sector buyers and suppliers, exploring new policy and innovation from across the north of England.