rural domiciliary care

The publication of a key report on the quality of life of many vulnerable individuals living alone stimulated some interesting reflections in my mind. There is no excuse for people in a caring profession neglecting people in their care. I was however reflecting on a completely different topic, the furore over the relaxation of border checks, whether the underlying issue was not about ministerial authority, but a simple crisis brought on by the fact that the impact of big public sector cuts is starting to bite. I wonder if some of the issues here have a similar root. It seems to me that we need to think very differently about how we support the vulnerable elderly in their homes in rural England.

I have been banging on about the potential to create local employment and more sustainable care approaches by forming village social enterprises to look after clusters of the rural elderly in this context. Lets face it there are no longer going to be the resources available there once were to maintain a whole range of traditional service models. I was at the RSN AGM on Monday and heard Brian Wilson speaking about a case study he identified in Wiltshire (thorugh the new State of the Rural Services Report) , where on a different theme again, the engagement of local people in helping with the provision of library services had resulted in longer opening hours with fewer paid staff. Lest anyone think this is simple or that I underestimate the challenge of re-engineering services to build on local social capital then I am keen to assure you I do not. The challenge is that if we don’t get our sleeves rolled up and start to think differently about service models based more on localities and communities doing more for themselves more stories like the sad ones portrayed in this article will continue.

It states:  “Following reports that have painted a devastating picture of the care of elderly people in hospitals and care homes, a new inquiry by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has uncovered a catalogue of cruelty, indifference and wrongdoing by carers who visit people in their homes to help them with washing, eating and dressing.

Yesterday the Care Quality Commission (CQC) attempted to pre-empt the report by announcing a programme of inspections of 250 companies providing home care services starting next April.”