The Wiltshire Learning Disability Team

The current way the Team operates is very different from the past, in which most people had their “own” social worker.

Some of the key points are
• It is now a County wide Learning Disability Team, no longer called the CTPLD. The Team Leader is Carol Harper.
• Across the County team there are 4 local hubs of which Salisbury is one.
• For social work the Team has 20 social workers and 4 unqualified support workers (5 of these based in Salisbury).
• For health there is a Specialist Health Team Manager for North and West Wiltshire and one for the South and East, and a Psychologist for each of the four hubs. Across the County there are four Specialist Nurses.
• The only people eligible for services are those who the Council says have “critical and substantial unmet needs” (this change took place in 2006).
• The reduction in overall resources means that the specialist learning disability staff members are only able to work with the more complex and challenging cases.
• Less complex cases may be dealt with by an Adult Care team member who are “generic”, ie not specially trained in learning disability.
• Help is given on the basis of “episodic support” – this new piece of jargon means that people are helped through a particular crisis or issue but do not have ongoing support.
• All enquiries need to use the new Wiltshire Council referral system. The customer advisor is the first point of referral through freephone contact number 0300 456 0111. Depending on the enquiry the advisor will put you through to a generic adult care team member or one of the specialists.
• Some of our more profoundly disabled people will have access to health funding. The fundamental criteria for this are:
- IQ of 69 or less
- Impaired social function
- A history of learning disability from childhood