PPlog

I’ve just sent this mail which is self explanatory. The reply should be interesting. “Hello Mr Lambert. On 19th September I received this response to my FoI request. Hence this mail to you. 1) The Norfolk County Council named contact for LINks is Ian Lambert, Head of Democratic Services, telephone 01603 222620, email ian.lambert@norfolk.gov.uk The DoH have been notified of this information. In Norfolk we wanted to wait to receive the draft specification before we started to develop LINks. Work is now underway to appoint a project officer and organise a reference group of key stakeholders to determine what we need to procure, and how to arrange things so that there is no disruption to patient representation. We will be inviting PPI Forum Chairs to be part of the group and plan to organise a conference in the early Autumn with partners and stakeholders  to map current activities and take an initial look at how LINks could work in Norfolk. Can you please tell me: 1. Now the specificati...

I contacted CEHR again today to say. “On 11.11.07. I sent you the following enquiry: 1. The Norfolk and Waveney Mental Heath NHS Trust has a practice which excludes service users not in receipt of secondary mental health services from membership of its Service User Council and from the Service User Section of its prospective foundation trust membership. I think this is discriminatory and a breach of the Disability Equality Duty. Can you please advise. 2. Similarly, I am of the opinion that the use of eligibility criteria for the provision of services may also be a breach of the Disability Equality Duty. Can you also please advise on this.” A few weeks before that I enquired if the new Commission will pursue prosecution of public bodies in breach of the DED as the DRC did. I have heard nothing from you. Please treat these inquiries now as Freedom of Information Act requests.“ On the face of it, it looks like the government may have, by concentrating its quangos, succeeded in diluting th...

The Jonathan Naess mental health article in last Wednesday’s Guardian Society stirred up a flurry of responses on the associated Guardian blog that I thought it worth copying my entries here. Go to the relevant blog My mate Mandy Lawrence who lives on Dunstable Beach - see our associated blog Mandy Lifeboats Ahoy (http://mandylifeboatsahoy1.blogspot.com)! - wrote in to the Mental Magazine forum ( mentalmagazine@ yahoogroups.com ) angry that the article was about a high flyer with mental health problems who easily got media coverage because he is a high flyer while ordinary users are disregarded. I said on the blog: “I subcribe to a mental health on line discussion forum called Mental Magazine. One of our regulars posted the following on the forum today: "I can't believe that the Guardian would give this word space. I wonder if there will be a section where nare do well nutters get a chance to have their say. Cos I think it is a disgraceful deception of the public and once...

I sent this inquiry to the Equality and Human Rights Commission and to Monitor (the body which awards and monitors foundation status) today. “1. The Norfolk and Waveney Mental Heath NHS Trust has a practice which excludes service users not in receipt of secondary mental health services from membership of its Service User Council and from the Service User Section of its prospective foundation trust membership. I think this is discriminatory and a breach of the Disability Equality Duty. Can you please advise. 2. Similarly, I am of the opinion that the use of eligibility criteria for the provision of services may also be a breach of the Disability Equality Duty. Can you also please advise on this.” It will be interesting to see what they say.