Background on PSA
Prioritising the most disadvantaged adults
The 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review includes a Public Service Agreement (PSA) aimed at reducing social exclusion amongst the most vulnerable adults. The PSA will help to ensure that the most at-risk individuals are given the opportunity to get back onto the path to success, and sets out some key outcome targets that the Government and its partners are committed to achieving over the coming three-year spending period.
What is a PSA?
Public Service Agreements reflect the Government's high-level priorities. They set out the specific improvements that the Government wants to achieve and the performance indicators which will be used to measure progress. Each PSA is underpinned by a Delivery Agreement which outlines how improvements will be achieved, and who will be accountable for delivery.
The Socially Excluded Adults PSA is one of only 30 agreed across the whole of Government, and is the first agreement that has focused specifically on the needs of the most vulnerable adults.
The Socially Excluded Adults PSA Delivery Agreement can be found at: Socially Excluded Adults PSA Delivery Agreement [PDF 364KB, 32 pages ].
More information on the 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review can be found at: Pre-Budget Report and Comprehensive Spending Review [External website].
The Core Vision
The PSA aims to ensure that the most socially excluded adults are offered the chance to get back on a path to a more successful life, by increasing the proportion of at-risk individuals in:
- settled accommodation; and
- employment, education or training.
A home and a job are the core foundations of normal, everyday life which the majority of people take for granted. The Government wants to extend this expectation and aspiration to the most excluded, for whom a settled home and the opportunity to work can often seem out of reach.
The PSA focuses on four client groups who are particularly vulnerable to multiple forms of disadvantage, and who may be negotiating a difficult transition such as leaving prison or long-term care. These two factors make them particularly at-risk of falling into persistent exclusion, but also means that they are in contact with the services that could and should make a difference.
The four groups are:
- Care leavers
- Offenders under probation supervision
- Adults in contact with secondary mental health services
- Adults with moderate to severe learning disabilities
Adults with multiple needs are typically in contact with a range of services, but tend to benefit less from the support they receive because their lives and engagement with these services are too chaotic. Effective inter-agency working is therefore crucial in ensuring a more coherent and personalised response to their wider needs.
How will the PSA help?
- Encourage prevention and early intervention, by focusing on transition points when individuals can be helped to avoid long-term exclusion
- Promote joint working, by setting out a shared cross-Government commitment to tackling exclusion
- Focus resources, by sending a clear signal that helping these groups is a Government priority
- Incentivise and drive delivery, through a clear performance management framework for tackling social exclusion amongst adults and for monitoring and managing progress
The 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review and disadvantage
The Socially Excluded Adults PSA is part of a package of measures agreed across the CSR aimed at tackling disadvantage and ensuring fairness and opportunity for all.
The CSR includes Public Service Agreements which aim to:
- Narrow the Gap in educational attainment between children from disadvantaged backgrounds and their peers
- Improve the heath and well being of children and young people
- Halve the number of children in poverty by 2010, on the way to eradicating child poverty by 2020
- Promote greater independence and wellbeing in later life
- Increase the number of young people entering adulthood on the path to success
- Reduce the harm caused by illegal drugs and Alcohol
- Reduce crime and anti-social behaviour
- Maximise employment opportunity for all
Short leaflet on the PSA: The Socially Excluded Adults Public Service Agreement [PDF 95KB, 4 pages].
Presentation on the PSA: The Socially Excluded Adults Public Service Agreement and Local Area Agreements [PDF 68KB, 11 pages].
More information on these PSAs can be found at: PBR CSR 2007: public service agreements [External website].
For any questions or more information on the PSA, please contact the Social Exclusion Task Force at:setaskforce@cabinet-office.x.gsi.gov.uk.
