Cllr Paul Bell | Working for Telegraph Hill

I've decided to trial using Audioboo for latest my news. Being dyslexic adds many additional steps to writing articles, e.g. checking, rechecking and checking again. Therefore, given that I have very few problems opening my mouth, this method may result in more articles in a regular timeframe.

Thanks to Delores for introducing me to it.
You can access my Audioboos from my home page or by clicking on the QR below.

Here is what I said at full council last night to support my motion (in red)...

“In light of the serious concerns regarding the care provided by some private providers, this Council calls on the Executive Directors for Community Services and Children and Young People to advise on the measures being taken to ensure the quality of care provision in all care homes used by the borough and calls upon the Care Quality Commission and OFSTED to implement a programme of non-announced inspections of all care homes providing residential care facilities for people with disabilities and older people.”

Furthermore, it calls upon the Healthier Communities Select Committee to undertake a review of Lewisham's commissioning, monitoring and the arrangements for the inspection of these services.

Because commissioning is a political and not just a technical issue, the involvement of elected members is critical. Councillors have a statutory duty to put in place arrangements that will result in the continual improvement of service delivery with reference to economy, efficiency and effectiveness (Local Government Act 1999).

However, the recent cases of two private sector providers has shown how fragile some parts of the private sector is and as Lewisham commissions these services it has a duty make sure that the residents are benefiting from the best possible care.

The recent outing of Castlebeck to the media by Panarama, a company that Lewisham places two residents out of the Borough and its sister company Barchester which runs Westwood House in Sydenham, has demonstrated the pitfalls of some larger private sector providers. Furthermore, the example of Southern Cross is particularly bitter to swallow as for executive short term gain they sold their profit portfolio and leased it back, thereby potentially destabilising the group…but why would they care, the public sector will always pick-up the tab. Right?

However, the inhumanity in the Winterbourne View unit [Castlebeck], near Bristol made me sick to my soul and it is not acceptable for the private sector to simply wash its hands of its responsibilities, by apologising. But as with all things in life, bad practice has to be discovered and cannot simply be found. The Winterbourne unit is purportedly an assessment hospital for adults with profound learning disabilities or autism, but most of the patients had lived there for more than a year – each at a cost to the public purse of £3,500 a week.

For those here who did not see the programme, here are some of the recorded incidents:

In one scene in the programme, a male support worker seems to goad a female patient to throw herself out of a second-floor window. He says: "Go on, do it now I'm here. I'd love to see you try it: you will go flying. … When you hit the floor, do you reckon you will make a thud or a splat?"

In another scene, a second male support worker is seen to act as a Nazi camp commandant, repeatedly slapping a patient across the face with a pair of leather gloves and saying: "Nein, nein, nein!"

Staff, sometimes with qualified nurses watching, used forms of restraint that an expert described as closer to martial arts rather than any approved technique.

A female patient is seen pinned beneath a chair for more than 30 minutes with one support worker sitting in the chair and keeping his foot on her wrist, while a second worker kneels on her legs.

So what of my motion? Well I am told that the Care Quality Commission is responsible for the inspection of care homes, but this organisation has recently been rolling back its inspection and monitoring provision.

The Care Quality Commission conducted 2,008 site visits between the beginning of October 2010 and the end of March 2011, compared with 6,840 for the same period 12 months earlier – a 70% fall. [Community Care May 2011].

In February 2011, Adult care directors sought "urgent" talks with the Care Quality Commission over concerns that a new ratings system for providers will reduce scrutiny of services, to the detriment of users.

The government has proposed replacing the quality ratings system, under which the CQC graded all registered providers as poor, adequate, good or outstanding, with a voluntary "excellence standard" for the best providers, in consultative plans to overhaul the adult care performance system.

However, the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services warned that the proposed system failed to provide the same degree of "assurance" and transparency as quality ratings.

CQC is also now under more scrutiny since the Panarama programme; critics have seized on the fact that the CQC's annual budget of £164m is 30% less than the combined funding of the organisations it succeeded in 2009, even though it is being expected to do more. As well as NHS trusts, care homes, care agencies and dental practices, the body is due next year to start regulating GP practices. According to Dame Jo Williams, chair of the Care Quality commission each of the full quota of 900 inspectors – and until recently there have been up to 130 frozen vacancies – handles a mixed portfolio of some 50 different provider units and makes judgment calls, based on evidence of relative risk, about when and how often to visit. Bad practices can therefore be missed.

Even in the unlikely event of the CQC receiving a big boost to its budget, Williams emphasises that the primary responsibility for safeguarding the welfare of people in the care system will always rest with the care provider. "My challenge,” she says, “is to every provider who watched that programme is: 'How do you know that the people you are offering services to are getting a service that protects them, promotes their welfare and helps them develop and enjoy a quality of life?' However, all commissioners have a role to play.

So how do we make sure that Lewisham residents have confidence in a private sector, whose motivator is profit. Well that is where Lewisham has the responsibility. It is worth noting that the CQC has admitted inspecting Winterbourne View three times in the past two years.

The examples of Southern Cross and Castlebeck do not fill me with confidence; but more importantly, if the council commissions services it has a responsibility to make sure the private sector is performing not just for best value, but the quality of the care. Making profit out of the care needs of older people or people living with disabilities I believe to be wrong, but that is the society we live in. What we should not do is let the pursuit of profit undermine the quality of care.

Date: Tuesday 5th July

Time: Assemble 5.30pm March depart 6pm

Starting point: Savoy Street, Strand, WC2E

Route: The Strand, past Trafalgar Square down Whitehall, Finishing point and Rally: Old Palace Yard, opposite the Houses of Parliament

Capitalism always talks about choice...well choice depends on the freedom to choose and when you are shackled to debt, you don’t have the freedom to choose.

Debt is in many forms: mortgage, tuition fees, credit cards and loans...so don’t go thinking you are free.

People in debt become hopeless and hopeless people don’t vote.

Keeping people hopeless and pessimistic is a way of controlling them. In fact there are two ways of keeping people controlled:

•             By fear
•             By demoralising them

An educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern. And deceive. That is why the Condems are attacking education and the NHS to make us less confident and less engaged in democracy. Democracy and the enfranchisement of working people has brought social advances that the wealthy would never give through "choice" or a social duty.

Why is it that people put up with 1% of the world’s population owning 80% of the world’s resources?

The poor and demoralised think perhaps the safest thing to do is take orders and hope for the best.

How do you think the NHS campaign is going? What do you think we should do together next? Did you agree with the summary below – that together we've had a big impact but that there is definitely more to do? Or do you think it's now time for 38 Degrees to focus more on other issues?

38 Degrees works because we take decisions together. The poll closes on Sunday evening. Please take 2 minutes now to have your say:

http://www.38degrees.org.uk/nhs-what-shall-we-do-next

Following an urgent request from concerned parents in her constituency, Joan Ruddock Labour MP for Lewisham, Deptford has written to the Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove, asking him to delay approval of any change in Tidemill School‘s status, pending independent scrutiny by the LEA of the school’s existing arrangements for managing its finances. The school’s accounts were last audited in early 2009.

The year-long Deptford Says No campaign was started by parents of children attending the primary school in Deptford, South London, in response to ‘SuperHead” Mark Elms’ plans to turn the school into an academy. Last year, they succeeded in obtaining an extension to the consultation period and uncovered a significant miscalculation in the financial figures upon which the original proposal was based; however, a reworked application was recently approved by the school’s governors and now awaits Gove’s consent to proceed.

A spokesperson for Deptford Says No explained that the campaign has been struggling to achieve the sort of transparency and clarity about the background to the move to which she felt parents and the wider community were entitled. When information was not forthcoming directly from the school, the campaign enlisted the help of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Commissioner in order to gain access to the minuted records of the school’s Board of Governors and Finance Committee meetings. In their letter to Joan Ruddock, they report that, on the basis of the documentation so far provided:

There would appear to be no audit trail of the decision to award Mark Elms substantial bonuses in 2009 and 2010. Given the increased budgetary autonomy enjoyed by academies, [...] there is significant cause for concern that the current arrangements for the school’s governance may not be fit for purpose.

In fact the school’s Chair of Governors, Keith Geary, has recently informed the FOI that the decisions in question were taken by a select group of governors and not minuted. One parent commented:Although there has been a consultation process, I don’t think that our views have been properly listened to. Our concerns as parents have still not been addressed. We are struggling to get the answers we need, especially in respect of the money involved. Tidemill is an outstanding school already, with a great mix of kids from all parts of the local community, so who exactly is going to benefit if it becomes an academy? Whose interests are being served here? It’s a big step, and as far as I can see, once it’s happened it will be irreversible.

Please come along...

Now the debate around the cuts has quietened down apart from the impact they will have on workers and residents in Lewisham, I thought I would write about my perspective of the process and the past year as an elected councillor.

At public meetings, I do get asked about why the council did not vote for an illegal budget and defy the government. My answer is always the same: there was no desire within the Labour Group and the Mayor to do it. Party politics is about consensus and the Labour Group on Lewisham Council debates and votes for particular policy directions. Despite having an elected Mayor, he listens and adds to the debate and then we vote on the group view. This is hard and is probably the biggest difficulty, as I end up voting for things, as a lay member of the Labour Party, I would be campaigning against. During the process, I questioned everyday and at every debate as to was I doing the right thing? I will not specify the answer here, but suffice to say I was uncomfortable with my responses in the council chamber. I made speeches advocating discomfort but the vote you place is the one that defines you.

Any political group is a broad church of opinion. I make no apologies for the fact that I am a more left wing member. I am a trade unionist and I set about trying in my own way to defend public sector jobs and fight outsourcing, along with other members. However, there is no doubt that the former Labour government did embrace the market in a way I opposed at every opportunity and not because I am a “Trot” but because I believed allowing the private sector to run services in the public sector would be a mistake. An example of this is Medirest, part of the Compass Group, who have catering and cleaning contracts in the NHS. This company along with similar companies do not pay sick pay, i.e. an occupational sick pay scheme to their workers; workers who are low-paid are therefore forced to make a choice between coming into work sick or staying at home and not getting paid. These workers clean intensive care wards; children’s cancer wards and we wonder why hospital viruses are in the news almost on a weekly basis. This is the supposed efficiency. Workers terms and conditions, numbers and quality of service make way for profit.

So the past year has been compromise and heavy debate. We have some excellent councillors who care about services to our community and whom hate tearing down progress made by Labour. Setting an illegal budget would have been pointless and futile, except to pamper to our own ideas of self-worth. While it appealed to my radical side, my progressive left-wing politics recognises the practical application of decisions made based purely on belief and ideology.

We can still make progress, as this is one of the ways we can resist this ConDem government taking us back into the past. We must continue to fight for every social advancement at whatever level, small or large. I still hold the same beliefs and will not sacrifice those for anyone but have to realise I am not the Mayor or know everything.

Being a politician is a tough job, as you are pulled in various directions. It is easy having one position on a belief and to stick to it, when you don’t have to convince others with power. I envy that. My father always uses the expression, “I have a tongue in my head,” and I use mine quite a lot. Nearly a year of being a councillor has taught me some valuable lessons which I shall use during the next year.

Below is what I said at Full Council on 1st March.

I hate having to do this and I have thought about voting for no cuts…this will be of no surprise to my Labour colleagues. But there are so many uncertainties about what that would achieve.

Yes, it would make me popular with protestors;
Yes it would give me the badge saying we are part of the “official” resistance;
And yes I can hold my head-up high knowing that I have done the popular thing for some today.

But in reality it would be theatre. If all my colleagues did the same then would we achieve anything other than an uncertain future?

I have been agonising over this question for the last few months. Would civil servants run the council if we set an illegal budget?

Would Whitehall appointed bureaucrats cut more services to the poorest?

All are uncertainties…but it is a serious risk.

I am reminded of the film the Wizard of Oz…for it seems a parallel world exists in some peoples minds where we are all on the yellow brick road trying to find the grand old Wizard of Oz, to send us over the rainbow and away from making cuts.

To get there people shout we need courage, a heart, a brain to remember our home all metaphors for resistance, fighting against oppression levied out by the wicked witch and her minions.

The reality of setting an illegal budget is unfortunately somewhere over the rainbow…. though a part of me would like to do it; but our brains and courage in the Labour group have to take us on a journey of protecting as much as we can from the scoundrels that now inhabit the Ministries of State.

We have no house to drop on the wicked witch today….as there are three wicked witches; Cameron, Osbourne and Clegg, who have an army of flying monkeys, though I somewhat doubt Eric Pickles could ever fly.

I’m not being flippant….but as a Labour Councillor, melting the wicked witches is going to take more that one illegal budget.

We as Labour Councillors are not the enemy. For 10 months, not a day has not gone by without today weighing heavy on our collective minds.

We take no pleasure – we have no desire to do this and I for one feel sick to my stomach. However, I have no mood to be told I am the enemy….examine who we are, what we believe and in what we stand for before condemning us.

I call upon all members of our community to come together and unite with our leader….in Lewisham that is the Mayor Steve Bullock. We are not all going to agree on methodology but we can resist together.

Over the last 10 months, the Labour Group and the Mayor have secured services to the most vulnerable, resisted the worst examples of Condem arrogance, like taking away working people’s trade union representatives, seen again in the Lib Dem alternative budget.

We’ve reduced consultants and this will go down further…I have been fighting for this since I was elected, along with colleagues like Cllr Foxcroft and others.

We have created a view that we should have the lowest possible number of compulsory redundancies of any council hopefully, by redeploying people and valuing the staff of this authority not just as employees but also as people.

So I will not be condemned and let the Labour Group be condemned by loud protestors, as we are all part of the resistance…. this government is the enemy of the people.

And while there is no place like home, namely a social democratic and socialist future for the people of this Borough and country, the 26th March demonstration is the Yellow Brick Road and the Emerald City is the NHS and public services,

Resistance is not just for protestors but for all decent people who care and want to create a fairer society.

So get off our backs and fight the real enemy: Cameron, Osbourne and Clegg. For dividing the opposition makes us weaker and plays right into the hands of government.

I would like to wish everyone who celebrates Chinese New Year a prosperous and happy year of the Rabbit.

A special mention to my partner!