The previous legislative scheme
8.24The statutory basis for assessments of adults was section 47 of the National Health Service and Community Care Act 1990 which provided, inter alia, immediately before its repeal:
Assessment of needs for community care services
47(1) Subject to subsections (5) and (6) below, where it appears to a local authority that any person for whom they may provide or arrange for the provision of community care services may be in need of any such services, the authority–
(a)shall carry out an assessment of his needs for those services; and
(b)having regard to the results of that assessment, shall then decide whether his needs call for the provision by them of any such services.