Contents

1 Social security and income maintenance

2 Health care

3 Education

4 Housing and environment

5 Personal social services

6 Law and the treatment of the offender

7 Unemployment and the labour market

8 Race relations

9 The voluntary sector

10 Local government

11 Gender

12 Demography

In 1979 the House of Commons Select Committee system was reformed with a view to strengthening the powers of the Legislature over the Executive. The Social Services Committee is one of fourteen new Select Committees and has the responsibility to scrutinize the performance of the DHSS, to evaluate policies which are relevant to the Department and to publish the results of its investigatory enquiries. Thus, by reviewing policies and by making recommendations for reform, the Social Services Committee has the potential to play a significant role in the development of existing policies as well as in determining the shape of future ones. This article begins by providing a brief account of the reformed Select Committee structure in order to set in context the functions and performance of the Social Services Committee. It then examines the role and contributions of members, the chairman and the specialist advisers before proceeding to look at some of the Committee's activities. The article concludes by considering the impact of the Social Services Committee upon current DHSS policies and assessing its contribution to the wider policy making environment.

The European Commission in Brussels ran a Poverty Programme of action projects and cross-national studies from 1975–80. An evaluation agency was set up by the Commission and carried out an evaluation of the Programme during 1979–80. This paper draws upon the experiences of that exercise in order to examine the concept and the practical implementation of a cross-national evaluation. It explores the political context of evaluation and the dilemmas and obstacles this poses for the evaluator. An evaluation exercise is an intrusion into the existing pattern of relationships among the various participants in the programme concerned. They will typically see it as an attempt at improved scrutiny and political control by its instigators – and the evaluator will therefore face a diplomatic as well as a technical task, particular vis-à-vis those participants upon whom he is dependent for the preparation of his report. This diplomacy will not take place in a vacuum, however, and its course will depend crucially upon the wider political context within which the future of the programme is being decided.