Efficacy of information & advice on welfare: housing for older people

Within the welfare state and often outside of it, successive UK governments have pursued a marketised approach to welfare. A more recent addition to this marketised policy agenda is the acknowledgement, through the Care Act... [ view full abstract ]

Within the welfare state and often outside of it, successive UK governments have pursued a marketised approach to welfare. A more recent addition to this marketised policy agenda is the acknowledgement, through the Care Act (2014), that consumers (patients, service users etc) require information and advice (I&A) in multiple and accessible formats. On this basis, central government have funded third sector agencies to provide I&A and have also made it an obligation for local authorities to provide I&A services. However, local authorities are in a transitional and austere period, and anecdotal evidence outlines that there is a tendency for local authorities to signpost people to existing third sector services rather than provide it themselves.

In theory, I&A acts to inform and enable quality decision-making in the pursuit of welfare related outcomes. However, welfare is characterised by information asymmetries, instances and circumstances that make it hard to act like mainstream consumer. There are significant ambiguities around how, considering the wider uncertain conditions of different fields, why, for whom and in what circumstances I&A can be deemed efficacious.

With a forthcoming paper outlining the appropriateness of a realist evaluation approach (Harding et al. 2016), and using a doctoral study on a national third sector telephone housing options service, this poster will outline i) key considerations when applying realist evaluation to this increasingly important area of research and ii) findings of the aforementioned study.
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