ACCESS TO INFORMATION:
Everyone has an equal right to “come to our door”, irrespective of income, status, language or belief and be treated with dignity and respect. People should be able to find and access information about their rights in the most convenient way possible. Equal access requires reaching out to those most in need as a result of having a modest income or being in vulnerable situations because of a disability, social exclusion or other reason.
ADVICE:
Citizens must find a free, personal, independent, confidential and impartial service they can trust. This can take the form of self-help manuals or interactive tools to resolve an issue through preventative action. In certain circumstances, however it is necessary to go into individual circumstances to find a solution face-to-face. In all cases, citizens should receive the same high level of service and care.
ACTIVE HELP:
Citizens should not be left in situations of impasse, or having to start the whole process over again each time they seek assistance. In a small number of cases it is necessary to go further often in cooperation with more specialised services (i.e. in debt, housing or social entitlements), pro-bono legal support or assistance towards preparing an ad- ministrative or judicial appeal. There is consensus that the one-stop shop is the right approach since many citizens have a range of interrelated questions, i.e. about housing, social benefits, their wages or pension and expect to find at least a first answer without being sent from one service to the next. This is also the approach favoured by funders, particularly at a time of cuts in public expenditure. The trend is to encourage more advice services to come together and also for smaller ones to merge into larger units with wide geographical scope in order to achieve economies of scale.