PPlog

An updated, rebuilt http://www.ppeyes.org.uk is now on line with completely new sections on: Advocacy Whistleblowing The Disability Equality Duty Local Involvement Networks (LINks), and Service User Involvement

Tina Walton, the Norfolk LINk Host Manager and one of the “goodies” in my opinion has responded to my last posting ‘Slippery Syntax.’ I have a lot of respect for Tina and believe this kind of exchange can only be healthy so I have posted her comments below: “Dear Mike   I am quite alarmed at the content of this blog, and the inaccuracies within   Firstly the Norfolk LINk Host was not employed until October 08, and a number of staff left due to uncertainty of post and took up posts within the PCT, two of which were PPI engagement posts.   I have only on Tuesday this week received the email from you regarding the Older Peoples working group and the access to the website, which I may remind you was only launched 9 days ago.   Firstly I have been in touch with the website designer to find out why the email link was not working as before the launch it was, this has been rectified by the IT engineer at Voluntary Norfolk (This I am...

Norfolk LINk must have been having training sessions from the Blair arch-spinmaster Alistair Campbell. I’ve just been looking at their new website again and it’s a minefield of gelatinous truths and fine and painted but vaporous words. Let’s have a look at some of the things they say set against my own recent experience of working with them: “This group has a wealth of knowledge and experience and brings together individuals and organisations such as Age Concern, Help the Aged and the Older People’s Partnership.” In my recent role as a voluntary advocate for Age Concern Norfolk, the last meeting I attended was a get-together of all the voluntary advocates and the two supervisors. Not one of these people knew about Norfolk LINk and when I pointed out there is supposed to be a partnership I was told by a supervisor it is not connected with Age Concern Norfolk and must be another Age Concern organisation (it isn’t, it is Age Concern Norfolk)...

The website is up and running at last at: http://www.norfolklink.org.uk I have been in touch these comments: Nice website on the whole but I see the centrally important comments made by a member with sensory disabilities (“ I cannot read the majority of the text”) haven't been taken on board. The website needs to be disability friendly or it breaches the NCC disability equality standards which, as a commissioned organisation, you are bound to observe. I'm also disappointed there is no provision for users and carers to contact the working groups with concerns. I have case examples of adult social services bad practice which, as a LINks Participant (see Definitions in Getting Ready for LINks, DH) I would like to pass on to the Older People's Mental Health Group but I know not how to do this.”

Norfolk LINk has announced it is to launch its new website this coming Thursday 14th. At the same time there is to be a “Public Meeting” to celebrate the 1st anniversary of the LINk on that day “...a chance to meet the newly elected members” they say. Sick joke! For members of the public to attend that meeting from here they would have to travel in a good car for more than an hour to reach Swaffham which is about 60 miles away. And it is more for other ordinary people (the “public”) from Norfolk. This effectively means this forthcoming meeting in Swaffham socially excludes and discriminates against disabled people. The government paper “Planning your Local Involvement Network” said: 3.0 The primary role of a LINk is to provide a stronger voice for local people in the planning, design or redesign, commissioning, and provision of health and social care services. 3.1 Although LINks have flexibility about how they undertake their r...

This is my response to the Boundary Committee proposals for Norfolk. I make no excuses for its length. Norfolk Boundaries As an ordinary citizen/service user living in a rural area of Norfolk I would like you to consider this contribution to your decisions about possible unitary authorities in this area. A major problem here has long been the all prevailing centralist mindset in Norfolk County Council and the other public authorities with a county wide remit. This has evolved into a majority concentration of services, facilities and activities (meetings, presentations etc.) , even those with a rural focus, on Norwich. The consequences of this in terms of social exclusion are substantial, with people who may wish to avail themselves of a service or contribute to a public debate or consultation being unable to do so because they are unable or unwilling to travel the 25+ miles to get into Norwich. Let me give you some examples: 1. I asked: “What provisions a...

I’m being shoved in the direction of believing these things are more about Norfolk attitudes than anything else. Am I right? I was delighted at the beginning of the year when I was approved as a voluntary advocate for Age Concern Norfolk. At last, I thought, here is something I can do which can’t turn out to be tokenism. Early on, at an induction group, I was a bit phased when the ‘Development Manager for Advice and Advocacy’ argued that it is perfectly alright for an advocate to give advice but the moment got shuffled away with time demands. As I began to work with my advocacy partner, a person with a diagnosis of early dementia who was looking at Lasting Power of Attorney, I phoned the office and asked if they had a hard copy of the Mental Capacity Act Code of Practice (I have it on PDF but it’s too long for me to print). The answer from admin was “no” but shortly after I had a phone call from an advocacy supervisor asking why I wanted ...

I make no apology for extensively quoting this contribution from Parliament (Westminister Hall) on 6th May 2009: Richard Taylor (Wyre Forest, Independent) Link to this | Hansard source I am delighted to be having this debate at such an appropriate time, and I am very pleased to see the Minister , with whom I often exchange shots across this Chamber. I am also very pleased to see, behind me, the hon. Members for Stafford (Mr. Kidney) and for Cannock Chase (Dr. Wright), who have been, and are, closely involved in whistleblowing issues. The debate is absolutely relevant. First, the country was staggered by the revelations from mid-Staffordshire, after which people inevitably asked why no doctor or senior nurse appeared to have spoken out. Then, at almost the same time, we got the answer with the case of the whistleblower from Brighton. She admitted that she had done wrong in breaching confidentiality, but felt that she was doing good by exposing publicly and effectively the standard of...

This news clip is of interest to our Gt Yarmouth and Waveney and Suffolk LINks: The Care Quality Commission has begun an investigation into out-of-hours services being provided by a company called Take Care Now which supplies out-of-hours doctor services through four contracts in Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, Great Yarmouth and Waveney, and Worcester.. The concerns have arisen about the company after it emerged that it had hired a German doctor who gave a patient a lethal overdose accidentally.  The Care Quality Commission is currently deciding on the scope of its investigation.

One of the elements of last night’s programme hit the six-inch oval smack in the place to drive it straight home. With the OFSTED inspections of Haringay and other child protection teams, with Healthcare Commission inspections of all UK trusts there has been a huge flaw in their inspection methods (I pointed this out to the Healthcare Commission in my response to their initial strategy consultation - to no avail!). That flaw is an all but complete reliance on the managers of organisations being inspected filling in forms and reporting on themselves. Instead of the inspectorates talking to the people who use the services and the people who actually do the work. And again we had evidence of the equivocality of such managers in the file fiddling exposed last night. In PPlog of February 3rd this year, writing about the new Social Work Task Force set up to look at what’s wrong with social work I said: “To make any sense whatever the members of that task force should b...