How self directed support is failing to deliver personal budgets and personalisation

Copyright © Social Services Research Group 2012. This article is available open access from the publisher’s website at the link below.Over the past five years, social care has been experiencing a period of change described as 'transformational'. It has largely been based on a model initiated by the organisation 'In Control' (Poll et al., 2006), variously called 'personalisation', 'personal budgets' and 'self directed support'. The drive to create personalised services through self directed support and personal budgets was implemented before the model was fully tested. Indeed, its implementation was announced before completion of a national evaluation set up by the Government. One advantage of such speedy, widespread implementation is that we are now beginning to have substantial evidence regarding its efficacy. At the same time, we are the on the cusp of new legislation likely to shape social care for the foreseeable future. It is essential that legislation takes on board what the evidence says about this model – its strengths and weaknesses. The following discussion shows why the underpinning notion of self directed support seems to have failed in its ambitions. However, the concepts of personalisation and personal budgets associated with it may retain value if interpreted in an appropriate way, delivered through an appropriate strategy. Then even so long as resources fall short of needs, they are likely to ensure the best possible outcomes for service users are secured. If and when adequate levels of funding are also provided, there may be the real prospect of enabling all to live their lives on the same terms as others who do not need social care support

Segmenting and Profiling Visitors to the Ulaanbaatar Naadam Festival by Motivation

The analysis of visitor motivation for attending festivals, as a basis for segmentation, is an important prerequisite for targeting markets, planning festival programmes and product positioning. This study identified five motivation dimensions for visitors attending the 2005 Naadam cultural festival in Mongolia, using factor analysis. A cluster analysis on the five factors produced five stable motivation segments: multipurpose seekers; indifferent; culture and sport seekers; togetherness, socialisation and sports seekers; and socialisation and local event seekers. Significant associations between motivation clusters and visitor age and type were identified, although there was no significant interaction between the clusters and visitor type with respect to overall satisfaction. The results are generally consistent with the outcomes of previous research on festival and event motivation in Europe and North America, suggesting universality of core themes. However, unique combinations of motivation dimensions suggests that further research is required to develop understanding of variable interaction

An experimental laboratory bench setup to study electric vehicle antilock braking / traction systems and their control

This paper describes the preliminary research and implementation of an experimental test bench set up for an electric vehicle antilock braking system (ABS)/traction control system (TCS) representing the dry, wet and icy road surfaces. A fuzzy logic based controller to control the wheel slip for electric vehicle antilock braking system is presented. The test facility comprised of an induction machine load operating in the generating region. The test facility was used to simulate a variety of tire/road μ-σ driving conditions, eliminating the initial requirement for skid-pan trials when developing algorithms. Simulation studies and results are provided

Application of Fuzzy control algorithms for electric vehicle antilock braking/traction control systems

Abstract—The application of fuzzy-based control strategies has recently gained enormous recognition as an approach for the rapid development of effective controllers for nonlinear time-variant systems. This paper describes the preliminary research and implementation of a fuzzy logic based controller to control the wheel slip for electric vehicle antilock braking systems (ABSs). As the dynamics of the braking systems are highly nonlinear and time variant, fuzzy control offers potential as an important tool for development of robust traction control. Simulation studies are employed to derive an initial rule base that is then tested on an experimental test facility representing the dynamics of a braking system. The test facility is composed of an induction machine load operating in the generating region. It is shown that the torque-slip characteristics of an induction motor provides a convenient platform for simulating a variety of tire/road - driving conditions, negating the initial requirement for skid-pan trials when developing algorithms. The fuzzy membership functions were subsequently refined by analysis of the data acquired from the test facility while simulating operation at a high coefficient of friction. The robustness of the fuzzy-logic slip regulator is further tested by applying the resulting controller over a wide range of operating conditions. The results indicate that ABS/traction control may substantially improve longitudinal performance and offer significant potential for optimal control of driven wheels, especially under icy conditions where classical ABS/traction control schemes are constrained to operate very conservatively

Phenomenological Transport Equation for the Cuprate Metals

We observe that the appearance of two transport relaxation times in the various transport coefficients of cuprate metals may be understood in terms of scattering processes that discriminate between currents that are even, or odd under the charge conjugation operator. We develop a transport equation that illustrates these ideas and discuss its experimental and theoretical consequences.Comment: Replaced with journal ref. Latex+ p

Jeremy Bentham on Utility and Truth

Jeremy Bentham has two very strong commitments in his thought: one is to the principle of utility, or the greatest happiness principle, as the fundamental principle of morality; the other is to truth, as indicated, for instance, in his opposition to falsehood and fiction in the law. How, then, did Bentham view the relationship between utility and truth? Did he think that utility and truth simply coincided, and hence that falsehood necessarily led to a diminution in happiness, and conversely truth led to an increase in happiness? This article addresses this issue through two bodies of material: the first consists of Bentham’s writings on religion under the heading of ‘Juggernaut’ and dating from 1811 to 1821; and the second consists of the writings on judicial evidence dating from 1803 to 1812 and which appeared in Rationale of Judicial Evidence

Drive systems for operation on deep-sea ROVs

Power systems for thruster actuators and other auxiliaries employed on work-class deep-sea ROVs subject to 300bar ambient pressures, are considered. Emphasis on 3×3 matrix converters for thrusters and 3×2 matrix converters for system auxiliaries, is given, along with experimental results showing operation during pressure cycling consistent with typical operational duties