helps explain the frustrations of frontline workers, and those they support, who are contending with dynamics beyond their control.
Despite some sobering findings, there is good reason to feel hopeful about the way severe and multiple disadvantage could be addressed in Scotland in the future. There is a determined policy environment and some promising initiatives including investment in Housing First, Community Planning Partnerships, the Poverty and Inequality Commission, the Independent Care Review and Rights, Respect and Recovery, the new alcohol and drug treatment strategy. This report creates an acid test for these and other initiatives: can they combine to ensure everyone in Scotland has the opportunity to live a good life?
Hard Edges Scotland makes a renewed case for taking a whole system approach to severe and multiple disadvantage, with sustained and deep collaboration and coordination required at all levels. Individual services are contending daily with its impact, but individually they cannot provide the solution. It is also a compelling argument for involving people facing severe and multiple disadvantage, and their support workers, in work to change systems. It is they who bear daily witness to the dysfunctions that arise from even the most well-intended policy. It is they who have learnt to navigate and survive the complexities of the systems we have created. And it is they who stand to gain or lose most from the results.
