Monthly Archives: July 2014

More puzzlement

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Bill Mumford resigned from the Winterbourne JIP today after a second incident of abuse was discovered at a MacIntyre school. Media coverage of this largely focuses on the impact on the (failing) Winterbourne JIP. Abuse schamuse really. No flicker of interest.

Odd, given this is what sparked the setting up of the Winterbourne JIP.

Why is this? Why’s the discovered/alleged abuse of learning disabled kids or young adults largely irrelevant in the reporting?

Naming these incidents ‘safeguarding issues’ probably contributes. It sounds so benign compared to the graphic images portrayed in the Panorama documentary. Combined with the swift shutting down of any discussion about it. Only a few days ago, Mark Lever, Chief Exec of the National Autistic Society wrote a moving piece about the importance of providers’ sharing occasional failures openly for #107days.  He pledged to convene a roundtable with providers to explore this further. Openness has to be the way forward. Bill Mumford today said that MacIntyre have been asked not to make any further comment while the police investigation is underway. Bill published a similar statement on the Local Government Association website about the first incident in which he discussed stepping down from the JIP.

I’ve been thinking about this whole keeping schtum while investigations are being done recently. We’re blanketed by investigations at the mo. Staff (possibly though still haven’t been informed), police and a serious case review. You’d think my posts would be looking like the set of redacted emails from Sloven. Or my blog would have been disappeared.

Nah. Seems like I can say quite a lot about what happened without the earth caving in. Not everything. But quite a lot. So I’m left thinking (and please, lovely legal eagles who stumble across this blog, feel free to send me a short, sharp ‘shut the fuck up tedious, raging woman‘  if necessary) that the ‘can’t possibly say a word till after the investigation/trial/inquest/’ is a bit of a tool used to control and silence people. And contain the truth.

More than happy to be put right on this.

That there are continued instances of abuse, over decades now, seems to call for a bit more openness and transparency. And something else. The traditional processes clearly ain’t working.

Beyond sanction

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I read the latest Sloven minutes properly today. As always, large chunks of incomprehensible guff and spin. For example: Simon Waugh asked for further clarification as to the reference to the use of “appreciative enquiry”, as stated in the Director of Quality’s report; Chris Gordon explained that this was a tool used by the CQC which looked to triangulate sources of information and used a framework of support and challenge to develop learning organisations. Eh?

Further on was a screeching brake moment. Page 16. A  glitzy pink table refers to the investigation that cheeky David Nicholson committed to, back in the day. One of the objectives of the Connor Manifesto.  As the Real DN outlined in his letter to us in March;

We are also asking that Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust provides the NHS England Area Team with details of all the patients who have died whilst receiving mental health and learning disability services since the trust was formed in April 2011. An independent panel, commissioned by NHS England, will then be formed to review all of the information, including the cause of death, and make a
recommendation as to whether further investigation is required.

All good. An independent panel and all that. Given both LB and Nico Reed were whizzled to the ‘natural cause’ pile before you could say Slovenshite (and the broader shocking statistics around mortality among learning disabled people) it’s crucial to have a good look at the premature deaths of learning disabled people (sob) and make sure failings/issues aren’t being overlooked or ignored.

The Slovens clearly have a different take on this review. Bit like their response to the recent Monitor enforcement action against them which was presented almost in a comedic way (er, just making a few plans with current bezzy, Monitor, over tea and cake…) The pink table states the ‘current position’ as:

Chief Operating Officer & Deputy  Chief Executive informed the Board that Thames Valley LAT was coordinating this review, which was comprised of two phases. The first related to looking at benchmarking and comparative data to determine whether the Trust was an outlier; she noted that if there were any areas of concern, a second phase would be commissioned, which would be a deep dive review.

The final column in the table states that the review is ‘proposed for closure’. Proposed for closure. Before it’s even started.

Wowser. What happened to the independent panel? And review of all information?

What a breathtaking example of what? I don’t know. Spin? Gobsmacking arrogance? Stupidity? Denial? Of ‘too big to fail’? Certainly how Sloven don’t get people. Well not learning disabled people. Benchmarking and comparative data? We’re talking about patients who have died unexpectedly.

And how can they dilute a serious review into a bit of number crunching? When it ain’t even their fucking review?

I’m out of ideas. A year on and there has been no sanction against any individual/s or the Slovens/Local Authority or Clinical Commissioning Group. And now it seems we have to police the small steps (we think) we’ve achieved.

The system stinks like a Stinky Pete leather tannery in Morocco. And the Slovens seem to have a unlimited supply of mint leaves to stuff under their noses and pass through. Unaffected. And seemingly unconcerned.

LB

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I watched a montage of home movies made by LB’s granddad Pat yesterday evening. He put it together from over 9 hours of footage in the weeks after LB’s death. I couldn’t get beyond the first moments till yesterday. When I wanted to re-capture insights/memories … I dunno. What are they? Precious moments that add texture to a shortened life…?

I saw LB as a babe. That beautiful face. Seriously, seriously cute. I mean, seriously cute. That laughter. Pure delight. That bounciness. Waiting and expecting and receiving the spray with the garden hose, the circuit of granddad’s garden on the sun lounger. The infectious laughter. The repeated Christmas rituals, unwrapping a truck/bus or lorry that needed full on package removal. More bouncing. Joseph in the nativity play. Joseph? I’d forgotten that. And what a serious Joseph he was. An exercise in concentration among the typical, noisy, joyful chaos of a John Watson school performance.

I was reminded of LB’s mannerisms, his character, his intense quirkiness. And that ease in lying on the floor, pretty much anywhere. Completely immersed in moving a bus/lorry backwards and forwards. Time and place irrelevant. A completeness of being. Magical and remarkable rule breaching.

Watching him now, on these fading home movies, I’m winded by indescribable loss. And enraged at the vile system that defined him as deficient. That muddied who he was for us for a while. And ultimately killed him.

My beautiful, beautiful dude. One year on, I carry you around in my heart and think of you every moment I step outside and look up at the sky. And with each bus, coach and Eddie Stobart lorry that passes. You were, and always will be, a bloody legend.

xxxx

A coating of what?

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Rich and I went to the All Party Parliamentary Group on Learning Disability this afternoon in the Houses of P. Reporting on progress from Winterbourne View. Lord Rix chaired. Phil spoke movingly about his young son Josh being so far from home. Hazel Watson from NHS England talked about what was being done (as ever, being done, rather than done) about closing assessment and treatment units (ATUs). Viv Cooper from the Challenging Behaviour pulled up the Winterbourne Joint Improvement Programme for non-action across three years. The Executive Director from the LGA (who?) said words. I was reminded of washing LB’s hair. Water bouncing off with none penetrating his thick and unruly mop. Words. Bouncy bits of water. Doing nothing.

I stopped listening and thought about bath times.

Norman Lamb, Minister of State for Support and Care talked the talk. Passionately engaged with trying to get people out of ATUs. What are the obstacles Norm?

  1. Absence of information about who is in them. [in hand]
  2. A lack of senior people in NHS England responsible for the programme. [changed since March with Jane Cummings/Hazel Watson taking responsibility]
  3. A reliance on psychiatrists making clinical judgements about placements when they are paid by the service providers. [brain melt]
  4. Problems around funding and funding flows. [an apparently insolvable problem]
  5. An ingrained culture in which learning disabled people aren’t seen as equal citizens. [It’s up to all of us to change this one].

Ok. We know the issues. What’s going to happen? Er, fuck all by the sounds of it. Norm has his hands tied apparently. Hugely frustrating n’ all, but those local clinical commissioning groups/local authorities are a plinking law to themselves (paraphrasing a bit here). There are no local services to support the release of people. People aren’t released because a) containment is a cash cow for providers and b) local authorities can’t suddenly stump up the costs for newly released people.

Eh? Sorry Norm, but if you can’t do anything to change things, who can?

*tumbleweed*

In the room were a largish group of parents. A group of parents who, between them, had enough atrocity stories to sink a battleship of pointless talk and no action. And that’s without chucking in the fact that LB died [he died?]. In the small amount of time left for questions, completely harrowing experiences were lobbed at the panel in Committee Room 4. Overlooking the Thames and the London Eye. Each story should (and would) have led to criminal proceedings if they had occurred outside ATUs. Stories of abuse/assault/neglect and fear. Against people who are not listened to or able to fight back.

This being a British affair, the atrocity stories were comfortably absorbed without visible shaking of etiquette. LB’s death even popped up in the discussion as something unspeakable but at the same time, a little bit of a ‘fable’. A work in progress version of a horrific event acknowledged but, at the same time, written out of the landscape. Our dude has made it to the parliamentary table, but with a particular coating. A ‘move on and thankfully not mainstream news’ coating.

We went to the pub. And chewed over next steps with Mencap and the Challenging Behaviour Foundation. A shared recognition of the scandalous/untenable position that is.

Yep. And?