Outlines of Law for Social Workers
- Author:
Morrison, C.B.E., and E. L. Thackray, LL.M., with chapters by other contributors. Butterworth & Co. Ltd. 10s. 6d.
A handbook on this subject bringing up to date the facts about current social legislation, has been hopefully anticipated by the bewildered social worker, faced with the rapid changes of the last twelve months which have swept away so many familiar landmarks. Pre-existing reference books are obsolete and pre-existing Acts of Parliament so transformed that they can no longer be used as reliable sources of information but have become merely confusing.
Such a book has now appeared, and its twenty chapters deal with legal knowledge of a kind which experience shows is most needed by the social worker. These include : Adoption, Juvenile Employment, Hire Purchase, Landlord and Tenant, Loans and Debts, Husband and Wife, National Assistance, Social Insurance, Family Allowances, and the Health Service.
The present reviewer, however, is concerned chiefly with the chapter on ” Lunacy and Mental Deficiency “, and this is?it must be confessed? disappointing. We realize that the subject is so full of technical complications that, if only five pages are to be allotted to it, no really satisfactory treatment is possible; moreover, difficulties inevitably arise from the attempt to deal in one and the same chapter, with mental defect and mental disorder.
We would specially urge that in a subsequent edition the terms used for distinguishing between these two conditions are revised, for, although no doubt the author himself clearly realizes the distinction, the impression he leaves with the reader is that the determining factor is whether or not a patient is under 18. It is, of course, true that a diagnosis of mental defect cannot be made if no evidence is forthcoming as to its existence before 18, but it is emphatically not true that under that age mental disorder (as distinct from mental defect) cannot occur, and it is this implication which will inevitably be understood by the uninitiated. Moreover, the phrase ” those who have lost their mental faculties ” is unscientific and inadmissible.
May we also suggest that in a new edition, more emphasis is laid on the duty of Local Authorities to provide defectives under supervision in their own homes, with training and occupation ? This is referred to in the introductory paragraphs, but no mention is made of Occupation Centres or Home Teaching, though it is these things about which a social worker is sure to be questioned in her contacts with the parents of defectives. The necessity of obtaining the consent of the parent (except in cases of flagrant neglect) before a defective can be sent to ah institution, is another important point on which a social worker should be able to give assurance, and this is also omitted. A.L.H.
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