PPlog

On 11th November 2007 I posted this entry 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. I never did get an answer and after chasing it up a few times (see PPlog 22nd November 2007; 1st January 2008; 25th January 2008. And on 7th of February 2008, I posted this: ECHR prevarication ag...

I thought this Written Statement from the House of Lords yesterday (20.07.09.) merited posting for wider information: Social Care Statement The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Darzi of Denham): My right honourable friend the Secretary of State, Department of Health (Andy Burnham) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement. The General Social Care Council (GSCC) is the professional regulatory body for social workers in England and has statutory responsibility for investigating complaints against social workers. In June, the Department of Health became aware that a backlog of conduct referrals had developed at the GSCC and liaised with GSCC to determine the scope and nature of the problem. On 2 July, Ministers were alerted as the GSCC had identified a backlog in the management of 203 complaints against social workers registered with them. Ministers were very concerned about any risk to the public and met with the chair and chief executive of t...

Recently I had a brief e mail conversation with Martin Rathfelder, the Director of the Socialist Health Association (http://www.sochealth.co.uk ) about whistleblowing and I pointed him towards my pages on the subject (http://www.ppeyes.org.uk/whistleindex.html ) Martin then sent me an URL in exchange, suggesting that I include it in my pages but this really is too important in all its factors relating to whistleblowing - pertinent to the recent Margaret Heywood case and many others, to bury amongst my churnings. The URL is: http://www.sochealth.co.uk/history/Ely.htm It is the Inquiry into alleged malpractice at Ely Hospital Cardiff in 1969. Of special interest to me as it was published at the time of my entry into social work as a “Trainee Child Care Worker” in what was a child psychiatric facility which was termed a “Residential Clinic for Maladjusted Children.” This Clinic was itself to be one of the many subjects of the North Wales child abuse Inquiry in t...

Thank you Mike Consistent ethics and standards. Some..maybe many...would say I am 'obstructive and annoying'. I find it really hard to believe that so few of us, with blogs or anything that can get word out, are speaking out about what is happening. Okay so maybe some people don't need care and support...maybe some have families who provide that from within..and some are hardy enough to get on with it and don't see that others can't. I have this recurring Darwinian nightmare where the fittest kill off the weakest and others pretend it isn't happening. I don't think we are that far away from such happenings...when the second layer (Jo Public) of the more able have their backs against the wall what else would they do but fight for themselves? And you know I am most probably eroding whatever fight I have by dosing myself up with lorazepam but to see the bitter truth and realise I am totally helpless against it, really is too much to bare. ...

You Have to Laugh. After posting my piece highlighting the House of Lords’ debate on the “Right to Control” part of the Welfare Reform Bill, I received a circular e mail (from Debbie Roberts, one of the goodies, and Programme Manager from the Eastern Development Centre) about a consultation document (title below - comical in itself) on the “Right to Control” from the Office for Disability Issues. “MAKING CHOICE AND CONTROL A REALITY FOR DISABLED PEOPLE.” You have to laugh because this document is all about the government, the Office for Disability Issues and all the public authorities it addresses CONTROLLING the “Right to Control.” As is the fashion these days the pertinent government department has solidly decided the direction the consultation is to go in and which particular aspects of consultation it wants control of, so it herds the consultees into its predetermined framework, lulled by the waves-on-the-shore swish swi...

You’ll know Mandy by now from her keenly observed comments on PPlog. Mandy is a comparative youngster who lives in the Luton area. She’s my soul mate. We met several years back now on the internet discussion forum for NIMHE East (we’ve never, as yet, met person to person). She was then one of the most active members of the NIMHE East Experts by Experience group and her acute perceptions of the obscure dim corners of mental health’s distortions had an immediate impact on me. My respect and admiration for her soared. Mandy is certainly an ‘Expert by Experience’ and her expertise was put to good use early this year in a broadcast interview in the BBC Radio 4 programme, “All in the Mind.” She is both a user and a carer and her experience includes a welter of heavy buffeting from so called professionals. Here is one of her accounts of a recent ‘experience.’ What makes you happy? ... it's some kind of sick joke Ha! Ha! Am ...

To keep abreast of events I tend to register with as many health and social care agencies I can. This includes the Department of Health and latterly, they asked for people to register as ‘Dignity Champions.’ So I did (I’m old enough and cynical enough to sift the substance, if any, out of government propaganda). Since registering I’ve had a couple of very informative mails and in the latest they were asking for examples of age discrimination to be posted on the ‘Dignity Champions’ Discussion Forum which is a DH thing open to those registered. My posting is copied here on PPlog and if anyone has any other examples, please either register or send them to me to post on their behalf. But hey, I’m not suggesting for a moment DH will take any notice of them but the more written records of service user evidence there is on official sites, the better and maybe ULOs like Shaping our Lives and the National Survivors User Network (NSUN) could compil...

In a response underlining this little recognised issue. My mate Mandy puts some historical clothes on my last posting that’s worth posting on the face of PPlog. Here it is: So to the the main plot: I think your posting has relevance to the story I was sent in regards to The Norwich 'Mind' Day Centre being closed down. As in you have a mental health trust whose view on support seems to revolve around a 'Recovery Model'. Take me back a few years to my involvement in NIMHE and I remember attending some session on same thing. I ask now, what I asked at that session, "Whose recovery model is it"? I didn't believe it had any input from service users then..and was basically a government initiative that was being steamrollered out as the best thing since 'Prozac'. I guess the only difference between then and now was that then I strongly voiced my dissent and wasn't told that I had to keep schtum. And the relevance is that on the one hand you have a MH ...

Three or four weeks back I was invited at very short notice to a 'Recovery Plan' workshop by Norfolk County Council's 'Day Services Project Manager.' Why the invitation I don't really know, unless it had just become known to that manager that I am ingrained in service user involvement. Anyway, I went, and found the workshop comprised a majority of other mental health service users most of whom I didn't know but the large majority of these, I was later told by one who is a friend, were from the Norfolk and Waveney Mental Health Foundation Trust's Service User Council. First off, there was a basic elements presentation on 'Personalisation' which had a bias towards corporacy and 'this is what we will do for you.' I feared then that the workshop would be prescribed to us. We were all seated from the outset in predetermined groups: “You are in green, over there, Mr Cox.” And – I don't know if this will cause offence but it has to be said –...

Challenging the dementia skills gap The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Dementia have examined the readiness of the social care workforce to deliver personalised care to people with dementia. They found a large variation in the dementia skills of the social care workforce. This report sets out the scale of the challenge in training the caring professions in dementia, and how it may be met http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/downloads/APPG_Report_Prepared_to_care.pdf Copyright  Healthcare Alliances

MENTAL HEALTH 3. PATHS (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies)  This is an early intervention/prevention curriculum for use by educators and counsellors in mainstream or special schools. It is a comprehensive programme designed to: facilitate development of self-control, positive self esteem, emotional awareness, and interpersonal problem-solving skills; enhance social and emotional competence and understanding; and facilitate educational processes in the classroom. The curriculum provides teachers with systematic developmental procedures for enhancing children's social competence and understanding, addressing social and emotional development goals. Conwy Education Services have introduced PATHS to 55 primary schools in Conwy and provided the resources, training and ongoing coordinator support to implement the programme. http://www.conwy.gov.uk/doc.asp?cat=4677&doc=19439 © Conwy County Borough Council

Yes I know.... For the last five years I’ve been chasing the moving-target PCTs for information about people with mental health problems in primary care only to come up against brick walls. Look at Phil Hope’s don’t -care, throw-away statement highlighted below and tell me this isn’t scandalous!!. Depressive Illnesses Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people in (a) England, (b) the East of England, (c) Essex and (d) Castle Point have been diagnosed with (i) major depression, (ii) atypical depression (iii) psychotic depression, (iv) dysthymia and (v) manic depression in each year since 1997. [285921] Phil Hope: This information is not available. Most treatment for mental health problems including depressive illnesses occurs in primary care settings, where information on the number of patients treated for specific conditions is not collected. Approximately one in six adults in England has a common mental illness, including dysthymia, at any given time, with on...

Mental Health: Children and Young People Statement The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Darzi of Denham): My honourable friend the Minster of State, Department of Health (Phil Hope) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement. The Government have made two commitments in recent years on the treatment of children and young people aged under 18 years of age on adult psychiatric wards. I wish to report to the House on the progress made on these commitments. The first commitment, made in November 2006, was that within two years no child under the age of 16 would be treated on an adult psychiatric ward. The second commitment is to commence Section 31(3) of the Mental Health Act 2007 in England by April 2010. This provision, which applies to voluntary (informal) patients as well as formal (detained under mental health legislation) patients, places a duty on hospital managers to ensure that patients aged under 18 are treated in an environment in ...