tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-49743734033474606592024-02-20T01:58:05.757-08:00Going PublicNeil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.comBlogger102125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-19200365946016388132012-05-05T14:03:00.002-07:002012-05-05T14:03:48.949-07:00Thank you and goodbye<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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'If you've said all you've to say..'</h2>
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After some consideration I've decided to bring this blog to an end. It's been around three years since I left my job in social care to embark on my masters in social policy and research. I have now completed my masters and am currently job hunting. Initially my interest, what in fact led me to the course, was in social policy, but during the course I developed a much greater interest (and got better marks) in social research. This backs up my theory that you simply just can't plan life!</div>
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I still have a passionate interest in social care and social policy, but as Cast put it I feel that over the course of this blog I have said all I've got to say. I've set out my position on Individual budgets (cautiously pro), on carers pay (far too low and as a consequence detrimental to quality) and on the state of local government (that unbeknownst to most of us it's disappeared in a tangled web of outsourcing and is a fundamentally different beast.)</div>
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It is one of the frustrations of social care that the same issues seem to be going round with no resolution. Three years ago it seemed to me that the system was not fit for purpose and the funding arrangements unsustainable yet despite much talk change doesn't seem to be arriving anytime soon - in fact after some interest around the last election it's slipped back down the agenda.</div>
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If I could change one thing it is this; I believed that all people working in social care need to look at the whole system and take a stand. I saw many colleagues apathetically shrug their shoulders when it came to things like carers pay and status, or residential care funding arrangements, yet they would bemoan the slipping in standards of care. We should not be afraid to debate these things in the open.</div>
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I have contributed my opinions, formed from my five years on the frontline, from being a 'receptionist' answering the phone to a care manager drawing up care plans, but now I am out of touch and feel I can no longer effectively contribute.</div>
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I urge you all to now make yourselves heard and leave it to Cast to play me out.</div>
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Farewell.</div>
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P.s</div>
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It feels wrong to go without thanks to all who have read, contributed, and subscribed to this blog.In particular CB of Fighting Monsters, one of the best Social Work blogs out there. CB was for me the model of a thoughtful, reflective professional and the end of Fighting Monsters</div>
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was a sad moment indeed. CB also encouraged me to stay on my masters at a time when I had doubts and I am so thankful for this and the support they gave my blog through links and tweets.</div>
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a particular mention to Rentergirl too. An excellent an essential blog. Like social care housing policy has been marked by decades of inaction and mounting crisis Rentergirl is therefore a much needed voice and has also been a great friend of this blog.</div>
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I wish you all the very best.</div>
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<br />Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-90560884641957613912012-03-30T00:09:00.006-07:002012-03-30T00:11:03.156-07:00ONS Data - Trends in Local Government Confirmed.For a while now I've been banging on about the future of local government. Being involved with an authority at the time it entered an outsourcing deal with Capita whilst simultaneously looking to jettison leisure centres, road maintenance and street lighting I saw a trend which would leading to a new kind of organisation appearing.<br />
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What I saw was a kind of 'slimeline' local authority not dissimilar to a what has been perhaps more fashionably referred to as a 'virtual council.' This organisation consists of a rump of professionals primarily concerned with the functions of strategic management, contracting and enforcement.<br />
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Strategic management and contracting are in many ways combined and if
anything these areas will grow in our new local authority. Contracting
involves the business of drawing-up, tendering as well as administering
contracts on a day-to-day issue-by-issue basis whilst strategic
management involves the setting of the over-arching priorities for
outsourced departments and providing a link with elected officials. <br />
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'Enforcement' includes functions, such as environmental health, licencing and planning. These areas stay under the umbrella of the Local Authority due to the conflicts of interest which would clearly be present if they were carried out by a contractor. Also included is high-end social work. I say high-end meaning not routine work such as assessing for meals-on-wheels, day care, or even home care, but work such as safeguarding investigations and dealing with more complex cases as well as children's services which require the involvement of qualified social workers. This will stay in-house for two reasons; firstly the strength of the profession, but most importantly it is the sensitive nature of these activities which would make it politically problematic to outsource them. <br />
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Outside these areas everything is up for grabs. Medium to long-term all authorities are heading towards this new model in various stages. It is also a process of one-way drift as bringing services back 'in-house' would prove costly and infinitely complex as whole sections have been handed over to the private sector along with all the systems, experience and knowledge they encompass. Unless this were handed back the cost alone would be prohibitive in many cases.<br />
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But what evidence is there of this? Much of it so far has been simply been anecdotal. My experiences of being up-close to this process and having the opportunity to ask questions on the inside have given me a sense of what is happening, but still this is in one area.<br />
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The latest <a href="http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171776_261716.pdf">ONS data on public/private sector earnings</a> however has provided some clear evidence of this process. In their analysis they find that making a straight comparison of median earnings by sector is difficult as the skill levels are different.<br />
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Over time the public sector has outsourced some jobs to the private sector. While some of this<br />
outsourcing has involved contracting out higher skill jobs to the private sector, for example,<br />
Information Technology (IT) support, much of the outsourcing that has occurred has been in lower skilled jobs, for example, cleaning. The result of this outsourcing has been to take many of the low skilled jobs that would have been carried out in the public sector and transfer them to the private sector.</blockquote>
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This is of course a finding which is highly consistent with the 'streamline' hypothesis. If the trend is for local government, or indeed the public sector in general, is to recede to this professional rump then this is what we would expect to see - a higher concentration of high-skilled 'professionals.'<br />
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Anyone fancy funding a PHD?Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-1177094912437975352012-03-07T15:49:00.002-08:002012-03-07T15:49:48.246-08:00Remploy - A step forward or a step back?Sadly its far from unusual these days to read a story about 1 700 being put out of work, but it is a little strange to be asking whether this is in fact a good thing, but so it is in the case of <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/mar/07/remploy-factory-closures-disabled-workers">Remploy</a> who employ a workforce comprising mainly of disabled people.<br />
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Remploy is in many ways an eerie crystalisation of the eclipsing of what academics refer to as a 'Fordist' welfare state; one characterised by one-size standardised services, overwhelmingly provided by state buracracies. <br />
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In a 'post-fordist' welfare state services provided not by a bulky and buracratic state monolith, but by a range of providers usually in the private or voluntary sector and are tailored, personalised and customised to meet the needs of individuals who themselves take a much greater role in planning their support.<br />
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The Remploy model, of subsidised factories belongs therefore to a time which is passing and maybe we should be glad of this. <br />
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On one hand it arguably serves to segregate disabled people from mainstream society into a box with limited horizons. Why shouldnt a disabled person have the right to career aspirations beyond whats on offer in a Remploy factory? Whatsmore if the reported 'average subsidy' of £25 000 a year is anything to go on then Remploy hardly seems to represent value for money. Certainly that amount could buy a lot of support for individuals and educate a lot of employers about the benefits of adopting more disability friendly practices.<br />
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Small wonder then that some sections of the disability movement seem to be welcoming the axe which looks set to fall, but at the same time is their are a number of issues. <br />
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The practical issues are will personalised support deliver better outcomes? Will it free individuals, or will it isolate and trap them either in unemployment, or in unsuitable, demeaning, or degrading employment. <br />
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The most crucial question however, is how do the 1 700 affected individuals feel about this? Have they been consulted and listened to in the debate about their future, or in the rush to create a brave new world of welfare are the same mistakes being made by those who critique the past for its failings in this respect.<br />
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<br />Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-35014082260532077162012-02-25T04:56:00.000-08:002012-02-25T04:56:32.870-08:00Experience - worth more than pay?About 10 years ago emerging optimistically from the closeted world of education for the first time I became aware of something rather dispiriting. Its ink barely dry my shiny new degree certificate suddenly seemed to be rendered worthless by one simple word.... 'experience'<br />
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It seemed I possessed none, or at least not enough for a junior position temping in an office. I was told this again and again that I needed 'experience' usually by some suited and booted person my own age who had the nous to get straight out into the workplace rather than mess around doing something as pointless as a degree in sociology.<br />
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Eventually I managed to get a break, courtesy of my local council's temp bank, but only after a long time doing things from weighing out bags of onions to stuffing junk mail in sacks. At the time I reflected that for people in my position experience was the new pay. The internships which became a rite of passage for many graduates were symptomatic of this logic, the logic which decreed that experience in itself was now a valuable commodity and therefore its own reward displacing pay.<br />
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Strangely we had the whole debate on internships not so long ago, which concluded that they were in fact a bad thing being just a touch exploitative now we have another debate over unpaid work this time at the opposite end of the scale. <br />
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Watching the debate on the news media it seems no one has really linked the two, possibly as internships represent privilege just as much as they do exploitation. A number of those who can afford to work for free ultimately get rewarded with a passport to sought-after jobs that their less-well-off, or less well connected peers become shut out of.<br />
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whilst this social divisiveness doesn't seem so much an issue at the other end of the scale, in fact you can even argue that by providing opportunities to the least well off it is closing the gap the big problem with both schemes is that they accept the logic that for those without, or lacking it 'experience' is worth more than pay.<br />
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If these schemes really did take root then the expectation will be that if people will do them for free, for experience, then there is really no need to pay for other people to do the jobs. Like internships the expectation that a period of unpaid employment is required before an offer of paid work is made can then become de reigeur.<br />
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This is all the more problematic with entry-level jobs as it is not a case of exploiting the children of elites who are financially well off, but who wish to climb to the top of the ladder, it is exploiting the poorest and most vulnerable. It is this which leaves a sour taste and if someone is making a profit from the free-labour then it is even more distasteful. <br />
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I should point out here that I once flirted with SWP ideals, even going as far as accepting a SWP sticker of a clenched fist from a freshers fayre in 1998 proudly sticking it on my guitar alongside a Terrorvision sticker. However, only a few years later I could be found vigorously scrubbing both off.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-82430762340042628382012-02-09T09:05:00.000-08:002012-02-09T09:05:31.259-08:00What has become of the public sector...Nice to see that <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/feb/08/government-outsourcing-private-sector">some sort of research</a> (albeit very imperfect research) is finally being done on the scale of outsourcing in the public sector. The fact remains however, that we still don't actually know the extent to which what was known as the public sector has been impacted by outsourcing.<br />
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Fully determining this is an enormously complicated business, and one which will get even more so. For instance take someone employed by Capita who is assessing Housing Benefit claims on behalf of a Local Authority. Sure they're not a public sector worker, but neither are they a private sector worker in the traditional sense - after all the way they do much of their job and the funding for it is still provided by the LA. Even more complicated if the person in question is working for multiple clients across the sectors, or who is not providing services directly, but is providing auxiliary services to those who do...... <br />
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What's happening is a more complex hybridisation than a simple public/private, or even public/private/third dichotomy. In fact I'd go as far as saying that our understandings of the word 'sector' need to be thrown away.<br />
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<br />Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-79854444817461804452012-01-19T06:59:00.000-08:002012-01-19T06:59:34.657-08:00Personalisation Risk and ResponsibilitySome interesting reportsFollowing on from my last post I've just happened across some reports from the <a href="http://www.jrf.org.uk/work/workarea/rights-responsibilities-risk-regulation">Joseph Rowntree Foundation on the topic of rights an responsibilities</a>. There is a particularly interesting<a href="http://www.jrf.org.uk/sites/files/jrf/personalisation-service-users-risk-full.pdf"> discussion about risk in one paper</a> which has actually pushed me a little closer to the pro camp on personalisation. Interestingly the paper draws a conclusion that under a system of personalisation;<br /><br /><blockquote>Risk should be shared between the person who takes the risk and the system that is trying to support them. This has probably always been the case and in many ways the personalisation agenda simply makes this more explicit, shifting the balance of power and making genuine risk sharing more likely in future.</blockquote><br />What of course is missing from the discussions is what such an overt cultural shift would be likely to mean. As I mentioned in the previous post the logical end-point is that there is a much reduced role for 'social services' as we know it today - particularly as a large part of care management is concerned with assessing for and managing risk.<br /><br />Perhaps in terms of complex cases and at times of crisis there will still be some role, but for the rest of the time it is much diminished even possibly redundant.<br /><br />Is this a good, or bad thing? In some respects it is good, it empowers individuals to make their own decisions and choices and yes, social care needs a cultural change. When I returned to university to study social policy I remember being sat in the canteen and seeing a social work student - discernable by the hoodie they wore. It is something of a fashion for people to wear hoodies with some kind of subject related double entendre on the back i.e 'Lawyers do it without briefs' or somesuch thing, but in this case it was a rather earnest 'Social Work; Be the difference.' Maybe I'm wrong, maybe its a noble sentiment, but for me it had a smack of arrogance and seemed to re-enforce the view of professional/service user divide. We should also not lose sight of the fact that the system is there to meet a need, i.e it is a means, not an end - therefore we have no interest in protecting the current system for its own sake. <br /><br />On the other hand though there is an issue of the balance between rights and responsibilities which personalisation makes more clear. If we take a long-term view then it is possible to see a future in which it is the assumption that social care in most cases is largely a private matter, for individuals- a view which provides a platform for further retrenchment of the state from the social care sector. Maybe this too is a good thing; are private services more responsive to individuals needs, would the voluntary sector better anticipate needs and be better at providing innovative services, or would such a change be merely to abandon those in need to the vagaries of the free market?<br /><br />I make no judgement on any of this at present. The debates are many, complex and fragmented (as my own dissertation on organisational mission across the three sectors finds), the key point though is that the debate on the future of social care needs to pay far more consideration to the likely implications of changes in assumptions around rights and responsibilities particularly around the movement of responsibility from the state to the individual.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-41418674257497239062012-01-17T15:32:00.000-08:002012-01-17T15:32:26.394-08:00Social Care: Rights and ResponsibilitiesSo this week brings a few more stories about the search a funding solution in social care. We all agree(and have done for quite a while) that the present system is not the best, but often as is the way with these things there seems to be less appetite for proposing real alternatives.<br />
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When it comes to alternatives and reform of the system there is a clear direction which debate has been taking over the past two decades, consisting of two interrelated dimensions these being; just how much are we expecting people to A.) take responsibility for their care and B.) contribute financially towards it.<br />
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In terms of A.) the popular policy term these days used across all aspects of the welfare state is 'co-production'- one of the best examples of co-production being individual budgets where people take an active role in managing services, not just the passive role of recipient.There are, it is to be said, lots of good things about individual budgets, but I always felt this policy agenda amounted to a much bigger cultural change than most of my colleagues ever really acknowledged, one involving a fundamental rewriting of the contract between service user and the state (or social services department).<br />
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Having just read Tony Blair's autobiography it seems co-production fits snugly with the emphasis on 'rights and responsibilities.' Ultimately in social care we're not just in effect handing over rights of control of care packages to individuals, but along with it all the responsibilities in terms of managing risk and ensuring the appropriateness of services to meet needs.
Whilst the state still funds services, particularly for those without the resources, the logical end-point is for it to play only a limited role in assisting individuals with making choices from the mixed economy of welfare - in other words guiding the purchase, or accessing of services from the private and voluntary sectors.<br />
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I was even involved a few years ago in a pilot self-assessment project which had the aim of cutting out the middleman completely - imagine a system where a person completes an assessment form this is then approved by the social services department and a budget allocated which is paid into the persons bank account allowing them to source their care individually.It was for many reasons a failure (though these were little to do with the principle of the plan) and eventually it ran out of steam, but it was I felt ahead of its time.<br />
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So we have here a future where we have moved from a pre 1990 ACT situation where Local Authorities controlled every aspect of care from funding, assessment, management, provision of and to an extent regulation of services to a fully post-90 world where it funds care (in some cases) but to which all other functions have been delegated to individual service users, the private and voluntary sectors and an external regulator.<br />
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It may seem something of a distraction to discuss all this in terms of funding, but the way in which social care is organised and funded are more closely aligned than has been credited. For instance in a system like the one set out above where individuals are agreed to have greater responsibilities and where social services departments play a limited role in facilitating choice, rather than actually assessing for, regulating and providing services this allows a greater scope for the development of private insurance as social care becomes largely a financial issue with individual budgets also providing fertile ground for the growth of a much more extensive market in care services to replace what were local monopolies of state provided services.<br />
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The question increasingly asked will be should individuals plan for care needs in the same way as they are expected to for retirement? should they for instance take out private insurance. If so what should be the role of the state in facilitating this - should it make such insurance compulsory (such an idea was in fact mooted a few years ago), should it subsidise, incentivise or regulate this market? Most importantly would such a market function? We know the case of pensions is just as problematic with many being unable, or unwilling to save.<br />
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It seems the debate is simple, but the answers are not.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-35493868032867508132011-11-15T12:10:00.000-08:002011-11-15T12:23:17.225-08:00Why the purchaser/provider split is failingWell, It's been quite a while since I've posted anything.. my excuses...life has been quite busy starting a new job and am finishing a dissertation among other things.<br /><br />I've just spotted an <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/joepublic/2011/nov/15/care-sector-needs-cash-not-lawsuits?commentpage=last#end-of-comments">excellent article on the Guardian</a> which seems to hit the spot over just what is wrong in social care - in fact it echos a lot of what I said today to a new colleague who as it turns out his wife used to do some of my training when I was still in Social Services. It has led to me to post a response which I'd like to share here... <br /> <br /><br /><br />This is the real scandal in social care<br /><br />The purchaser/provider split which came in in the 1990 act (but which has really come to maturity in the past 5-8 years as LAs ditched functions like in-house care providers and res. care homes) allows LAs to focus on driving down fees without having to worry themselves about the details of how this is achieved, or what corners are being cut to do this.The problem as pointed out is that lack of money in the system turns the purchaser/provider split into a destructive force which eats itself; it's not about getting quality care for a competitive price, but just about securing the lowest possible price to protect the diminished budget.<br /><br />What we have is a failing market which is seeing a race to the bottom in terms of care standards.<br /><br /><br />A massive, massive issue to me, as I was only talking about someone to today is that the purchaser/provider split allows LAs to delegate responsibility and accountability. For instance if there is a scandal in a care home operated by a LA then the head of service and cabinet member are directly accountable... if it's with a private provider then they can simply blame a greedy owner, or bad management and point to the role of CQC.<br /><br />Being able to escape this direct acvcountability means LAs can turn a blind-eye to just how margins are being cut and the impact of real cuts in the cost of care.<br /><br />And being cut they are. I can't speak for now, but I began in Social Care in 2004 when providers were being paid £15 per hour for care...... when I left in 2009 the avearage was more like £10-12 per hour.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-65958967156150541062011-10-04T07:53:00.000-07:002011-10-04T08:15:44.117-07:00The real scandal in social careI've always thought that an essential in any good system of social care provision is content staff. <br /><br />Too often we ignore their needs and treat them as if they are invisible even if we're in the same room and I'll admit here that I've been as guilty as anyone else on a social services training course when the room divides into carers on one side and 'professionals' on the other. A few ex-colleagues of mine had worked, or even continued to work as carers, but this aside there was always to my view an element of snobbishness and power imbalance present in the many interactions between ourselves and carers. <br /><br />Though a few of us did speak out about the conditions faced by carers it was a topic well down the list for us, far below issues like personalisation, or even the personality politics of the department.<br /><br /><br />But the treatment of carers is so integral to the system it should be the only issue we're talking about. Why? Well we really need to look at this holistically. If we want a system based on dignity and respect then that standard needs to apply to everyone. If care staff are treated with dignity and respect then we can in turn expect service users to be treated the same. Turning an indifferent eye to <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/oct/03/social-care-workers-pay">care staff being paid below the minimum wage</a> endangers our ideals as much as mistreatment in a care home.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-69806094634694182112011-09-23T04:55:00.000-07:002011-09-23T05:10:46.059-07:00Can the welfare state withstand the global storm?Blimey! What is going on in the global economy? All this talk of double dips and lost decades (<a href="http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5h3-V8SvwVikEYzTRJNGpXt1Uxitw?docId=N0526221316681573779A">or is that just Shaun Ryder</a>)is actually starting to make me worried now. No better make that terrified.<br /><br />I'm also beginning to look for a job and have been astonished at the sheer number of people competing for positions. One recent post I applied for, nothing glam at all, had 180 applicants eagerly snapping away like some tabloid feeding frenzy. <br /><br />What makes me worried is how will the welfare state, weakened by three decades of neo-liberal attacks hold out? Will it be shown to be woefully inadiquate and as easily overrun as the Maginot line? <br /><br />Is the big society rhetoric like some eerie harbinger of a return to when Victorian liberal capitalism smashed its way unrestrained through lives as nonchelantly as the wind whipping autumn leaves into a swirling menace.<br /><br />I suspect we'll be finding out soon.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-71415261943659892622011-09-22T00:53:00.000-07:002011-09-22T01:05:15.115-07:00PFI - Who didn't see this one coming?I've just read a piece on the BBC website about the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15010279">strain repaying PFI projects</a> is putting on the budget of NHS Trusts.<br /><br />There is of course some political point-scoring going on, but honestly who can say that they didn't see this coming? PFI was obviously an ill-conceived idea from the beginning with controversy engulfing one of the first PFI's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skye_Bridge">the Skye Bridge project </a> which George Monbiot pointed to in his widely read 2001 Book <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Captive-State-Corporate-Takeover-Britain/dp/0330369431">'Captive State; The Corporate Take Over of Britain'</a><br /><br />Now the doubters have been proved right, but governments and local authorities still shock in their ability not to take heed of the facts when it comes to policy.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-89781566449482782972011-09-13T16:57:00.001-07:002011-09-13T17:12:33.017-07:00RIP Local GovernmentI've just read in my local rag today that my local authority will be joining forces with another local council to provide services. Is this an issue? The reason is to save money, presumably through economies of scale so win-win?<br /><br />What about local democracy though? The Authority I worked for only a couple of years back is barely recognisable today. Yes there's still a grand old building slap bang in the middle of the City, but it's emptying out fast. In Social Care the in-house provider has been scaled down and care homes sold off to BUPA, Housing benefit claims are now administered in Bromley, legal services and licencing are shared with a neighbouring authority and now there's plans on the table to merge services with yet another authority.<br /><br />All this means people just don't know who runs what or who is responsible for what. In these new organisations opaqueness replaces transparency whilst democratically elected councillors seem increasingly irrelevant, just how much influence can they have over services in these public-private-voluntary sector hybrid super-councils? How much say do we have as voters? Or are we no longer voters, but simply customers?Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-60523070287810570942011-08-31T15:27:00.000-07:002011-08-31T15:55:25.465-07:00Another care agency bites the dustMy local rag reported this week that a care provider went out of business leaving clients in the lurch. Admittedly it was a small one with only about 20 clients in my area who were the story indicated fairly easily accomodated by one of the big providers (though no doubt a few people made a lot of phone calls, sent a lot of faxes and stayed in the office very late) so no real crisis, but could it be a canary? I'm not on the inside anymore, but I can take a guess that the trend of squeezing providers is still going on - probably even more so. Due to the strategy of our commissioning team the money we were paying for care fell about £5 an hour from £15 to around £10 in my time which was 2004-2009, but how sustainable is this system and who is paying the price? Being a labour intensive inustry the bulk of the £5 an hour will probably be wages so where does this leave care staff and what effect does it have on recruitment and retention?
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<br />Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-68109576405911143492011-08-18T06:05:00.000-07:002011-08-18T07:04:30.512-07:00The London RiotsI was glued to the coverage in the way I used to be only on election nights, following the Guardian’s Live blog, flipping over to the BBC, waiting on every new development. The next day I was equally transfixed by the aftermath, the politicians posturing and discourses emerging; on the right it was about parenting, fecklessness and ‘criminality pure and simple’ and on the left it was about the cuts and alienated youth.
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<br />Facebook was also aglow with debate raging through the night and into the next morning. One ex-coursemate from my Sociology degree years posted a theory that the panoptican effect of CCTV has been shown for the sham it is. I personally weighed in with the view that it was all connected to Saskia Sassen’s global cities theory which states that key global cities have been shaped by global capital flows and money markets into highly unequal and polarised places. I reasoned that this created underlying tensions which have possibly been exasperated by the financial crisis. The question I pondered was; is it a coincidence that as the money markets meltdown, so a key point in the global financial system burns?
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<br />One thing which struck me especially as a particularly opportunistic bit of behaviour (not unlike that shown by many of the looters I must add) was the attempts by some associated with the police to take back what they see as lost ground with some talking heads complaining about how the ‘force’ is now regarded as being hamstrung by human rights considerations and is now more a ‘service’ now neutered and ineffective. What was needed they insinuated was a force unafraid to get out there and crack some skulls as this extract from the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/12/world/europe/12police.html?pagewanted=all">August 11th edition of the New York Times </a>shows:
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<br /><blockquote>A former senior riot police officer with knowledge of current operations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that the most recent riots were allowed to rage, in part, because police officers felt constrained. They operated, the former officer said, in the shadow of the case of a newspaper vendor, Ian Tomlinson, who died after being shoved by a riot officer guarding against protesters at a Group of 20 economic conference in 2009. The police officer, Simon Harwood, will go on trial for manslaughter in October. </blockquote>
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<br />I find this whole argument particularly difficult to swallow for a number of reasons. Chiefly the whole notion that police officers cannot tell the difference between reasonable force and what constitutes an illegal action is laughable. If they cannot tell the difference then what hope is there for the rest of us?
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<br />More specifically with regard to the Tomlinson case. My reading of the case was that the Officer PC Simon Harwood who was assigned to be in effect ‘in the rear with the gear’ by his own admission became 'bored' and then <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/interactive/2011/may/03/ian-tomlinson-last-minutes-video">went walkabout with disastorous effect</a>. This was not disciplined policing and in fact <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/g20-summit/7905549/G20-riots-Policeman-who-struck-Ian-Tomlinson-faced-two-previous-aggression-inquiries.html">questions had been raised about Harwood's 'aggressive behaviour'</a> long before the G20 protests.
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<br />The police are not the only ones using the smoke of the riots as cover for a political agenda as Cameron's attempts at turning the welfare state into a more punative part of the criminal justice system testfies, but the arguement that cases like the Tomlinson case have stopped them doing their job does the police a disservice. I hope that PC Harwood is not representative of the majority of officers who can tell the difference between doing their job and breaking the law.
<br /> Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-7011852116152511652011-08-07T04:30:00.000-07:002011-08-07T05:13:19.846-07:00Losing touchIt's surprising how quickly we can lose touch with things. It's coming up for two years since I left social services to enable me to study for a masters in social policy and whilst for the first year I kept in touch with the department and the wider world of social care this year has been different. I've lost touch with all but one former colleague and also feel out of touch with developments in the field as I no longer have a view from the ground. Incidentally I'm sure this is also something which is experienced by many senior managers.<br /><br />So amongst all this it was nice to catch-up with an old colleague last week. They themselves left last year to pursue a social work degree after a number of years as an unqualified care-manager. I was curious about what they made of their experiences so far as in the past I've questioned just how well a social work degree prepares someone for what is a hugely demanding and complex role.<br /><br />Their view was suitably mixed. They felt that there was indeed a gap between the ideal of the theory they were taught in the classroom and what actually happened in practice, but they also felt that what they had learnt had been valuble in enabling them to improve upon their practice.<br /> <br />Overall this left me feeling much better about the relavance of the social work degree, but it does illustrate what a strange area social care is more than any other as it is caught between idealism and pragmitism. As a worker the course of action which you feel best meets the text-book ideal must always be balanced against the limitations imposed by the availability of funds, the amount of time available to work on any one case, or the state of the local care market.<br /><br />I was surprised to hear though that many newly qualified social workers have found it difficult to secure a job. Being out of touch I just don't know how the cuts are affecting my old department, but always thought that we had been running with unfilled vacancies for so long that it wouldn't be possible to cut anymore. As I said to my old colleague, as we well knew from experience, the job doesn't go away no matter how few people there are to deal with it the work never ever dries up. It's not as if it is a factory which can just slow-down it's production line. Just how are people coping I thought, is staying behind until 10pm becoming more routine than extraordinary I asked? I just can't imagine how it would work with less people. <br /><br />My friend was also unsure, but one thing they did know was that the uncertain job market meant that the competition for the best placements was intensifying. They told me that you really need a placement with a local authority unless you want an uphill struggle to find work once you qualify.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-25280502569478261422011-07-12T08:20:00.000-07:002011-07-12T08:53:08.299-07:00The end of the council care homeMy big break in care management came as a result of care home closures. Having been in a junior role doing phone assessments I was seconded to cover a colleague who was in turn seconded to assess and arrange new placements for residents at two council run homes which were earmarked for closure. Initially it was for a six month period, but legal wrangling led to me providing cover for another three months before I finally left to study social policy.<br /><br />The closures were fought against by the local rag and residents relatives, at one point a hot-shot lawyer who had fought another authority on the issue of care home closures appeared on the scene seeking to halt the process. I remember the colleague I replaced telling me that she felt all this was counter-intuiative as the authority was so keen to close the homes had been exceedingly generous in allocating funds for the residents who were to be moved. <br /><br />The homes in question were typical of council residential homes built as part of a post-war council estate its homes and care homes founded same impulses of idealism and universality. One was well regarded, the other not so. In my dealings it seemed the issues were typical ones down to not having enough staff and there had been a spat the year before when the authority decided to bring in agency staff to avoid paying overtime breaking a tacit agreement that low pay would be compensated by opportunities to work long hours. <br /><br />In any case the authority got its way and shut the homes. To the cynic it seemed the authority just didn't want the hassle of trying to run homes on a progressively tightening budget, far better to outsource this problem and any ramifications to the private sector. To my ultra cynical eye I felt that senior management were concerned about the escalating potential for a safeguarding case to crop up at a council run care home, something that would be much worse for them professionally than an equivalent one in a private-sector home. <br /><br />Maybe this wasnt the case, the official line was that demand was declining (in the short term at least) and that the private sector had ample capacity, there was now simply no need for the homes they said. That they set up a new safeguarding team specifically to deal with institutional safeguarding cases suggested that their faith in the private sector was however, not absolute.<br /><br />I wonder what their thoughts are this week?Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-65841621869816968372011-06-07T12:17:00.000-07:002011-06-08T10:54:14.189-07:00Winterbourne View: Deja-vuIn social care it seems to feel as if we were in a world of never ending change, departments and organisational structures come and go, shifting around, merging and splitting like amoebas. People come and go and new ways of doing things come in vogue before being replaced by the next big idea which older colleagues usually observe is the very idea which the last big idea was meant to replace. <br /><br />Despite this continual flux some things seem to remain the same even when we don't want them to. This week I've been reminded of a course I attended, maybe as long as 6 or 7 years ago. The course was titled 'Adult Abuse Awareness' which perhaps dates it as the professional terminology has long since evolved so the course is now named 'Safeguarding Adults Awareness'. The course ran for three days and was attended by staff from across the authority; carers, social workers, care managers and people like me who at the time just answered the phone.<br /><br />As part of the couse we watched part of a documentary which had been recently aired and where adults with a learning disability in a care home in a neighbouring authorities area had experienced abuse which had centered around the totally unjustified use of physical restraint. The footage also included a scene where one resident had had water thrown over them. I'm reminded of this by the reports of the abuse at Winterbourne View, where according to the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jun/07/ed-miliband-talks-future-social-care">Guardian article</a><br /><br /><blockquote>The BBC's Panorama programme used an undercover reporter to film patients being pinned down, slapped, doused in cold water and repeatedly taunted.</blockquote><br /><br />Unfortunately dspite a google search I cannot find any details of the programme we saw on the course. Any Google search is foxed by the sheer weight of similar cases (just type in 'care home closed down' for a litany of cases), but the thing which troubles me is that despite the publicity and furore over that now forgotten case we are once again hearing the same story years later despite the best efforts of numerous professionals.<br /><br /><br />For the person running my awareness course, a former front-line Social Worker, the problem was the type of people attracted to jobs in care homes were those who 'enjoyed having power over other people'. Problems like the ones we've seen at Winterbourne were according to this view the result of something deeply embedded. I acually heard a similar kind of arguement made in a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b011p7sw">Radio 4 interview</a> by the authour of a book 'scapegoat' who suggested that 'institutional violence' was a longstanding problem going back hundreds of years and for adults with a learning disability the stark choice is between abuse either in institutions or in the community. <br /><br />The problem therefore is one which the whole of society needs to face. Our attitudes to disability, in particular to learning disability need to be transformed. My trainer all those years ago was optimistic about the prospects for the future beleiving that the greater incidences of adult abuse were the result not of increased prevelance, but of a greater willingness of staff and various others to report abuse which would previously have gone undetected. In other words attitudes had begun to change.<br /><br />Hopefully this optimism wasn't misplaced.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-49232224660904882202011-05-30T02:36:00.000-07:002011-05-30T02:54:33.743-07:00Social Care is Failing..... this is according to some Age UK research which has just been published and reported in <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/may/30/social-car-failing-disabled-pensioners-says-report">the Guardian</a> today.<br /><br />This isn't news to me and probably isn't news to any of you either. It's painfully obvious to anyone who has been involved with the sector in recent years that things need to change.<br /><br />In fact my, and I'm sure other peoples main opposition to Individual budgets, was that for all the positives around the policy it never dealt with the core issue which was lack of funds - which as the article points too is really the key issue.<br /><br />It seems that on this issue (and not dissimilar to university funding) there have so far only been sticking plaster soloutions; Politicians ducking out of the big debates. These debates are chiefly who pays and how? It seems that paying for anything from general taxation is out of vogue so we have what I call the 'making a contribution' society - that is responsibility for social risks (i.e poor health; unemployment etc) being increasingly placed on inividuals.<br /><br />Some time ago a kind of insurance model was mooted for social care this it seems has dissapeared from the agenda, but as the Age UK research shows things need to be addressed sooner rather than later.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-60213636266924217662011-05-19T06:27:00.000-07:002011-05-19T07:07:51.890-07:00The Military CovenantThe relationship between the military and the welfare state has always been close. In fact its closer than close - the Welfare state owes it's existence to what we are now beginning to term 'the military covenant'. Historians of social policy will tell you that out of the first world war emerged one of the first real attempts made by the state to provide mass housing fit for the troops returning from the trenches; the 'Homes fit For Heroes' scheme - the snappy giving away the political currency it was hoped the project would bestow on its sponsors. Ultimately 'Homes fit for Heroes' was criticised along with other attempts at post-war social reform for not going far enough and It was not until the destruction reaped by a second global conflict, world war two, that Western governments instituted much more ambitious plans, the full-blown welfare-state a conscious and determined effort to build a 'new Jerusalem' a society worthy of the sacrifices made in its name. <br /><br />Gradually the post-war settlement of 1945 has been eroded, weathered by the harsh winds of time. The idea of the state guaranteeing social rights to its citizens has been overturned to the point where more and more individuals are asked to make a more of a contribution whether this is an 18 year old student being asked to pay £9k a year to cover fees or an 88 year old grandmother being forced to sell her home to pay for the cost of residential care.<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/may/16/military-covenant-law"> It is in these terms which the current debates around instituting the military covenant into law are couched</a>; <span style="font-style:italic;">Priority</span> in housing, <span style="font-style:italic;">priority</span> in NHS treatment. Gone is the commitment to universal citizenship and universal social rights, gone is the commitment to honour sacrifice by building a worthy society. No one would deny troops who have made so many sacrifices the best medical treatment, decent housing, or any other social right but we must not forget these are rights which extend to all and to which others can justly make claims to; the firefighter, the nurse, the teacher, the mother. Does a soldier returning from conflict wish to receive the very best whilst watching their parents receive an appalling level of care from an underfunded system? Only by recognising this need to create a fairer and more just society for all as we did in 1945 do we properly honour their sacrifice.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-34311589350429686112011-04-29T05:05:00.000-07:002011-04-29T05:27:36.245-07:00Delivering careImmediately before working in social care I spent a long summer working for Royal Mail. Most of my routes were in a semi-rural area and despite my anxiety that I was wasting my newly achieved 2:2 it was looking back probably the most relaxing enjoyable job I have ever had; even the occasional rainy days weren't so bad. <br /><br />Hearing stories about Royal Mail these days I wonder how much the job has changed, in particular I wonder about one of my former colleagues who was always cheerful and always smiling as he simply loved the job. I hope that's still the case, or else he's somewhere else where he's enjoying work, but reading <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/apr/29/mail-privatisation-second-class-delivery">this article in the Guardian</a> about the poor conditions and low-pay within the privatised and liberalised postal service in Holland I do worry what the future holds for employees such as my old colleague.<br /><br />I mention this all, not by means of reminiscence as I currently grind out a day-time living in the call-centre and nocturnal existence writing essays on research methodologies, but because the conclusion of the article struck a chord: <br /><br /><blockquote> In this competition the power lies with the few, whose priority is cheapness, rather than the many, whose priority is regularity and universality; cheapness wins, and it is the postal workers who suffer.</blockquote><br /><br />Such a passage could easily be applied to care workers. Since the NHS and Community Care act created the purchaser/provider split local government commissioners have prioritised cheapness driving down the cost of both residential and non-residential care. In a labour-intensive industry it has been workers who have paid the biggest price.<br /><br />Should we worry? Yes. Well-paid and well-respected staff members contribute to a better service. Another reason is that social care is up there at the vanguard having for a combination of reasons moved furthest, fastest when it comes to liberalising welfare markets. The question we really need to ask is do we want to see the social care model replicated in the NHS?Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-47030934198332595112011-04-20T15:24:00.000-07:002011-04-20T16:03:34.670-07:00Mutuals: A blueprint for the future?According to a <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/19/mutuals-take-over-public-services?commentpage=last#end-of-comments">recent article in the Guardian </a>the Government are very much in favour of 'mutuals' this is the process where public servants can club together and effectively opt-out of the public sector.<br /><br />As a former public servant I must say I always felt that myself and my colleagues could do a better job than our senior managers who seemed to be handpicked for their ability to lurch from crisis to crisis whilst maintaining a veneer of optimism.<br /><br />The idea of mutuals trouble me though. Much of my interest at university (in fact I'm currently in negotiations about a potential Phd on this very topic) is around how organisational characteristics impact on the public service ethos; in other words is the profit motive found in the private sector inconsistent with public service ethos of the voluntary and public sectors? The answer you may be surprised to hear is that it is not necessarily the case, in fact the opposite may be true; that is in some circumstances for-profit organisations may contribute the public good more effectively that the private or public sectors.<br /><br />This view is against conventional wisdom, but a great example is provided by the Body Shop. Seen as left-field and pioneering when they were first set up the virtues they champion have been absorbed into the mainstream. All that within a for-profit model which would have been inconceivable in the voluntary or public sector. I am aware that I have defended the public service ethos of the public sector in the past and my views have not necessarily changes, I still beleive that the public sector possesses a particular strength in this aspect, but rather I am more pragmatic about which sectors should deliver services. the way I see it is very much a case of 'horses for courses'; in some instance the public sector is best, in others the qualities of the private or voluntary sectors can be better. <br /><br />The problems however, centre around the pressures such 'mutuals' may find themselves under. It appears they will be a hybrid of all three sectors and will need to balance public service with profit making. The example given in the article of Cleveland Fire Brigade presents one example; on one hand the organisation has a public service committment committed to providing services to the public, but this will need to be balanced against profit making activities. This means decisions will need to be made in the future as to how best to allocate resources, should a fireman be on standby in case of a fire, or would it be better if he/she was off conducting a paid consultancy to bring in extra cash. This is not far fetched speculation, but a real issue as in the voluntary sector the issue of 'mission drift'; that is abandoning an organisations core mission to chase the funding on offer has become a real and recognised issue in the voluntary sector, first through a glut of funding opportunities and latterly through a scarcity of funding. <br /><br />The answer to these dilemmas is that there should be a level of accountability, but accountability to who? Local councillors perhaps, but what if an organisations area of operation overlaps several authorities boundaries then who takes the lead and is local government really an effective tool for this? In addition the more mutuals there are, the harder it is to trace accountability. In the NHS and public services as they stand there is a clear chain of command. Numerous mutuals operating in different areas may well be hard to keep track of and their opaqueness could prevent accountability from the public and local media. <br /><br />I do beleive that there is a case for challenging the monopoly of the public sector, but any moves need to be done with extreme caution and lessons learnt from the experience of transferring services from the public to voluntary sector.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-39776747786982342862011-04-15T16:30:00.000-07:002011-04-15T16:55:48.682-07:00The rotten state of residential careWell it seems a Social Care story has finally appeared...<br /><br />Southern Cross Healthcare who own and operate 31 000 residential homes are in serious financial difficulty. The chairman has quit and the firm is threatened with possible insolvency.<br /><br />According to the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/apr/12/southern-cross-chairman-quits">Guardian article</a> Southern Cross came unstuck due to greed: <br /><blockquote><br />The company's problems stem from heady expansion when it was owned by the US private equity group Blackstone, which undertook the sale and leaseback of homes to bankroll a number of expensive acquisitions. Many leaseback agreements included upward-only rent reviews of up to 2.6% annually.</blockquote><br /><br />As the article also explains whilst this may have seemed like a good idea at the time it doesn't seem so good in the face of local government cutbacks. I know my old authourity a couple of years back went with a 1% increase in the maximum funding levels two years in a row, and for all I know this situation probably continued after I left. What this means is that as far as local authority clients went a company like Southern Cross could only expect the price they received per resident to rise by 1% Makes those 2.6% rent reviews seem like a very bad idea indeed.<br /><br />But, isn't that the way markets work? Risk and Reward. Southern Cross won't be the first firm to have collapsed after overstretching itself to meet ambitious targets. Maybe we could shrug it off if it wasn't for the following passage of the article:<br /><br /><blockquote>Paul Saper, chief executive of LCS International, the healthcare consultants, said that the cash-strapped group had not "invested properly in some of its homes, with doors falling off the hinges at some properties". He added that, a year ago, about 40 of the company's homes faced embargos from the regulator and that several had been the target of enforcement orders linked to issues such as hygiene and standards of safety.</blockquote> <br /><br />This is the crucial difference. The state of the residential care sector affects lives; the lives of residents, of staff and of families. This episode serves as a reminder of just how rotten things are in the sector and just how thoroughly rotten the whole system is.<br /><br />I don't think many people in social care would rush to defend the status quo. In the one corner we have the capitalists seeking to make a profit, in the other we have local authorities keen to cut costs.<br /><br />Between these two implulses the standard of care in the sector, particularly for those least able to top-up with their own resources, is being driven down. Residents are put at risk and staff are expected to do a tough and demanding job for a pittance and without the right support and training. <br /><br />There is an irony here that in the event of Southern Cross folding Local Authorities, most of whom have spent the past few years closing down their own homes to a great deal of local resistance, may well end up taking on responsibility for the homes.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-12643279557166828112011-04-11T12:10:00.000-07:002011-04-11T12:27:10.158-07:00A quiet timeA hectic schedule and a problem with internet access have conspired to prevent me from posting anything really meaningful over recent weeks, but is it just me or is the world of social care a rather quiet one right now?<br /><br />The media is a fickle beast; like a channel-surfing teenager it has a short attention span rapidly flicking between channels to create some sort of post-modern collage. One second we're getting all worked up debating the big society, individual budgets and disability benifits and suddenly the channel is changed. A complete break. We're now talking about NHS reforms. The rest will have to wait patiently until events; a speech, confrence, report or scandal lead the media to return with our collective attention once again.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-4347631857404774832011-04-03T00:55:00.000-07:002011-04-03T01:14:28.244-07:00Just how well thought through is Government policy?Just how well is policy thought out. If the current <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/apr/03/tuition-fees-university-charge-access">Tuition fee debacle</a> is anything to go by then the answer has to be very badly if at all.<br /><br />Just take one paragraph from the guardian today which tellingly says:<br /><br /><blockquote>The number of universities declaring that they wish to charge students the highest amount from next year has caught ministers by surprise, with the majority of institutions planning to charge more than £7,500 a year.</blockquote><br /><br />Now, I clearly remember government representatives on television stating that there would be a wide range in terms of fees charged by institutions and that students would be able to then make a choice from this range. Let me just say that the commodification of education is not something I condone at all, in fact it is something I vigourously oppose, but also worryingly it seems that if ministers have got it this wrong on what is comparitively a rather simple market to analyse then what does this say about the basis of policy in other areas such as around social care a much more complex entity.<br /><br />And the reason why universities are charging high fees... It's because they know demand will still be there even if they charge students extortionate rates. Why? Because university still represents chasing the dream to most young people. It is still seen as virtually the only the route to a career, home-ownership and the middle class. Universities know, even if ministers don't that with few alternatives, people will be prepared to pay for this dream.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4974373403347460659.post-24683393375814633772011-03-19T07:37:00.000-07:002011-03-19T09:18:35.769-07:00Communication strategies.I've been planing to write about technology and social care for a few weeks now. I'm still formulating that one, but once again something written on the topic (in the Guardian as ever) has caught my attention and forced my hand. It was a<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/joepublic/2011/mar/17/internet-administration-personal-care-budgets"> call to harness the power of the Internet </a>to aid communication between organisations and service users more of whom the article assumes will be using individual budgets.<br /><br />The crux of the article is summarised neatly in one paragraph:<br /><blockquote><br />Complimenting this is the interaction between organisations and their clients, cementing online communication as superior to other mediums. The modern Internet holds the potential for service providers to reassure people by offering easy, quick and cheap methods of communication. Being able to receive and respond to feedback, offer online advice and allow vulnerable people to apply for help from their homes are now basic communication requirements in an inter-connected world.</blockquote><br /><br />As the commenter's (myself included) point out there are many issues around using the Internet, not least the fact that certain groups have greater access to it than others; Though the article suggests that more people, particularly in the older persons bracket are getting online, the phrase 'digital divide' still seems apt. Another issue is that in my experience for social care email is quite possibly the worst form of communication. Mainly because the conversation is one sided making it very hard to make a quick assessment of a situation. Much more preferable is a telephone call allowing you to get much more info in a shorter time as well as judging a persons state from their tone of voice; scared, upset, confused? Not so easy to tell by email. Top of the tree is a face-to-face visit where you can read a whole set of non-verbal cues and see a person in their surroundings.<br /><br />The one thing the article does get right is that email is a cheap method of communication. I know a few years ago some authorities still visited almost everyone who asked for assistance to carry out a face-to-face assessment, but it became increasingly common to find 'contact centres' being set up where initial assessment was done by telephone, with some being 'screened-out' so never receiving a visit. Undoubtedly this trend was driven by a need to stretch resources so its quite possible that email or self-assessment via a website will prove hard to resist for cash strapped authority's and rather than helping "people feel closer to those who provide key services" it erects yet another barrier between them.<br /><br />It's not that I'm some kind of Luddite. I believe that the Internet and email does have a valuable role to play in social care however, as usual I have a number of concerns. Just a couple of years ago for instance my authority announced it was phasing out information leaflets; those ones you see in racks on the wall of a GP's surgery waiting area, or just inside the door of a community centre. It reasoned that they were a costly and inefficient way of communicating with people, so save for a couple they were to be only available on the website in PDF format. In part the authority had a case, keeping the leaflets up to date was a costly exercise (also arguably environmentally unfriendly) and there was no control over the numbers of out-of-date leaflets in various locations all with the wrong information and old phone numbers belonging to teams which have since been re-organised at least 5 times. They also decided to pahse-out the leaflets in various languages, again they could well have had a point as in the office we did have a filing cabinet bursting with leaflets in Polish which never saw the light of day due to there being no demand for them. The councils proposal was that instead translations of all the leaflets would be carried out on request. <br /><br />Clearly, apart from the cash saving, none of this been thought through. What if people don't have Internet access, and will people at possibly the most vulnerable time in their lives manage to navigate the complexities of a councils web site to find the right leaflet, or is it more likely that they'll spot it in a GP's surgery? Yet again an assumption has been made that the service user is an informed consumer just like someone shopping around for the best car insurance deal when often this is not the case. As for the language issue the situation is even worse. The piles of unused leaflets were not the problem, rather they were the symptom of a wholesale failure to engage with minority communities, particularly the most vulnerable among them; making leaflets only available on request (along with pulling funding from the jointly funded post of a sensory services minority outreach worker and cutting funding for neighbourhood advice centres - where face-to face advice and information leaflets both in a range of languages were easily available) would make matters much worse than they already were. <br /><br />Fortunately I did notice a leaflet recently in a GP's surgery so unless its an out of date one there may well have been a u-turn on the leaflet policy. I hope so as for all it's promised advantages we need to be careful that new technology does not mean people are left behind.Neil80http://www.blogger.com/profile/07327090565101437836noreply@blogger.com3