SABP Board Agrees to Apologise to Workers & Reinstate & Backdate Payments
The Bourn Hall Venue in Ewell Surrey. Big thank you to Jill, Tim , Rose and Kim for turning up to support the campaign at the Board meeting or AGM and also to David and Stuart who also raised questions about reinstatement of payments or on other important matters involving service users. It would be great to get your feedback and take on developments yesterday and to use the blog to decide what we should do next to monitor how SABP proceeds with its work services modernisation process. All thoughts, ideas and opinions welcome.
How the issue of Therapeutic Payments was dealt with at the Board Meeting
At the tenth Surrey & Borders Partnership NHS Trust Board meeting today in Bourn Hall , Ewell , Surrey the issue of Therapeutic Payments was the first item on the agenda and the Trust Board unanimously backed Chief Executive Fiona Edwards recommendations that the Trust offer a written apology to all service users affected by the £3 pay cuts and reinstate and backdate payments in a way that did not compromise people's benefits.
Fiona openly admitted that the Trust had made a mistake in its treatment of the garden centre workers and Board Chairman Graham Cawsey was equally open and forthright in describing the embarassing situation the Trust found itself in as ' a problem the Trust had created for itself .
On entering the Board room I overheard another Board Member quietly tell someone else that the Trust had 'made a terrible PR blunder and needed to be more careful about its image ' however as the Board sat silent and sullen as the Chief Executive set out the reasons for her recommendations - re-posted below at (1) - without flinching from taking full responsibility for the mistakes it was clear that the Trust's problems ran far deeper than merely exercising more control over its corporate image.
The Trust had betrayed its own stated values and visions , what was not so clear from Fiona Edwards responses to our questions - see below at (2) was WHY it had done this. This will be discussed later after we have time to digest all the information we got at the meeting and cover exactly how Fiona answered our questions , question by question, in a dedicated Q&A piece once we've had time to compare notes for clarity . Obviously having the minutes would help but its going to be some time before they are agreed so we just have to be careful that bureaucracy isnt allowed to dictate the pace of our campaign as well.
The Chief Executive did make it clear though that the Trust was now seeking to clarify roles based on an objective and proper assessment of service users needs and circumstances in line with the Trusts stated values and visions and that interim Director of Operations Chris Carter , Peter Kinsey's replacement, would be responsible for overseeing this. Fiona also informed the Board that Jo Young, Work services, would look into how this was to be done although no deadline was given, and that the confidence and help of service users, carers and even members of our campaign would be sought to that end.
Unfortunately, Fiona was not so forthcoming on whether the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health would continue to be involved with the modernisation of SABP's work services and this would seem to be a matter we need to take up with the PCT.
Lastly, thanks to Stanley Rissborough and Fiona Edwards for greeting and making people from the campaign feel welcome and valued at the Board meeting.
(1) Therapeutic Payments
1 Background
Changes to the way that Work Services are provided were subject to consultation
(‘Building on the Best’) during January to April this year.The results of the
consultation confirmed the move to more individualised, locally based employment
and social support services and the importance of offering a range of training and
community based activities, with most of the services moving to Richmond Fellowship over the course of the year. The programme is on schedule, with around half of the centres having transferred from the Trust. Alongside this transfer, the Trust Board agreed (in January 2006) that the practice of awarding ‘therapeutic payments’ would cease on 31st May 2006. Therapeutic payments (usually totalling £3.00 per day) were given as recognition to those attending.They were not intendedto represent payment for work.
In reviewing the impact of ceasing therapeutic payments, the main consideration given was to the impact of National Minimum Wage (NMW) legislation. NMW is currently set at £5.05 per hour (reviewed every October). Applying NMW to the hours for those attending work service activities could adversely impact upon the benefit that people receive. Further, it is unclear where NMW would apply, as people do not attend in order to provide significant output but to undertake training(most work service activities include NVQ assessment), to participate in therapeutic and social activities and, where possible, to prepare for employment. Work service activities are not reliant upon those attending undertaking work and the centres do not create a profit for the Trust.
Other day centres across the Trust have ceased therapeutic payments in line with
the Trust Board decision, although the implementation has been phased over a
longer timescale.
2 Areas of Concern
2.1 Impact on People attending Work Centres
The cessation of therapeutic payments, especially at the garden centres, has caused considerable concern to some people attending and their families, as well as members of the Trust’s Forum for People who Use Services and their Carers (FoCUS) and members of the public. Further, no assessment has been undertaken to ensure that people attending the Work Services activities are either undertaking paid work (for which NMW would apply) in line with benefit regulations or are attending on a voluntary basis for therapeutic or training activities.
2.2 Impact on Service Delivery
Concerns being raised could bring into question the viability of transferring services to external providers, who will not wish to take on any potential liability. Failure to ensure that a proper assessment of activities and individual assessments for people attending could mean that the modernisation in line with the wishes of people we serve (as identified through the consultation feedback) and the commissioners of the service is unable to proceed as agreed.
2.3 Advice to the Trust Board
In reaching the conclusion that therapeutic payments should cease, the information provided by the Trust’s legal advisors was not interpreted fully for the Trust Board. All work service centres were treated in the same way, but the legal advice regarding
four centres (the two garden centres, the printing activity and the travel agent) indicated that some people may indeed be undertaking work in a similar way to
people employed in those centres by the Trust.This cannot be determined without further assessment of the activities undertaken and the purpose of attendance at the
centres.
The option recommended to the Board to cease therapeutic payments had not been discussed with the Trust’s legal advisors.Further, the advice to the Trust indicated
that any decision made by the Board should take into account that the people concerned were very vulnerable and therefore the normal principles of risk management were not appropriate to the decision-making process.
2.4 Wider Impact on the Trust
As a result of the decision to cease therapeutic payments, there is considerableconcern that the Trust has not treated people well.
3 Recommendations
The Trust acknowledges that the decision-making process and its outcomes have been far from satisfactory and adversely impacted on people who attend work services and their families and carers. The Trust is very sorry that this decision was made and apologises unreservedly for the distress and anxiety caused to those people who have been affected.
The Board is recommended to:
(a) Re-instate therapeutic payments across the Trust with effect from 1st June 2006 (or the date on which the payments were stopped).
(b) Write a letter of apology to every individual affected by the cessation of
therapeutic payments
(c) Require the Director of Operations (Mental Health Services) and the Director of Services for People with a Learning Disability to develop an action plan
which will:
• Assess activities undertaken and develop guidelines to differentiate
between ‘work’ (for which the NMW or higher will apply), ‘therapy’, ‘training’ or ‘voluntary work’ (for which no payment, other than expenses,
will apply).
• Undertake individual assessments on those attending in order to ensure that payment for attending ‘work’ does not adversely impact on benefit.
• Ensure that the work centres remain viable with any increased cost associated increased payments for work undertaken. Any change will be subject to further consultation.
The plan will be developed in conjunction with people using the services, their
families and carers and care workers. Legal advice will be sought on the action plan prior to its implementation.
Fiona Edwards
Chief Executive
September 2006
Questions
Dear Mr Cawsey ,
I would like you/the Board to answer in public the following questions relating to the 'modernisation' of Surrey & Borders Work Services.
1. Former Director of Operations Peter Kinsey and 'externalisation ' project Manager Dr Helen Lockett of the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health (scmh) both claimed that the modernisation process , particularly scrapping payments to the garden centre workers, had been undertaken to more clearly define and distinguish roles. Mr Kinsey made this statement to a local newspaper , Dr Lockett in response to a critique made by Jill Goble of the Justice for the SABP Garden Centre Workers Campaign.
The Chief Executive's recommendations to the Board make it depressingly clear that the roles and rights of service users involved with SABP's work services have not been made any clearer so would you please explain why the modernisation process a) failed to achieve this stated objective and b) why Mr Kinsey and Dr Lockett were allowed to make deliberately misleading statements representing the clarification of roles as a fait accompli.
2. The Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health whose academics project led and advised the modernisation process was presumably paid to provide the Surrey and Borders Trust with expertise yet the sensible and realistic recommendations the Chief Executive now makes to the Board came about because of the actions and advice of unpaid service users and carers so I think its fair for members of the public to ask if they have been short changed here by SCMH and by how much.
So, a) how much money did the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health's 'experts' receive for bungling the clarification of roles and b) why should the public go on paying for their 'expertise' when service users and carers , who should have been more meaningfully consulted in the first place , have freely provided more professional and appropriate advice which even your Chief Executive is now urging the Board to act upon ?
3. The Richmond Fellowship has declined to respond to patient and public concerns about the modernisation and externalisation process .This unhelpful attitude and lack of accountability is clearly inappropriate from a party set to benefit from the transfer of public resources from the public to the voluntary sector.
Would the Board please explain what steps it intends to take to ensure that the Richmond Fellowship listens and meaningfully responds to the concerns of service users and carers rather than, as it has been doing, just assuming that the flawed ' externalisation ' process is a done deal .
4. How many service users is the Trust currently paying the minimum wage or above to for manual work? I'm assuming this figure would have been made available during the "comprehensive review " of work services. If this information isnt available because that review wasnt as comprehensive as the Trust claimed it was , please say so and address and answer this question as a FOIA request elsewhere.
5. Would you please clarify in public that service users subjected to the £3 cuts are going to receive apologies and have the payments reinstated and backdated or explain the Board's objections to doing this.
posted by simply human @ 11:47 pm
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Very well done Des and Jill. The leaflet produced by Jill is excellent and I hope it appears on the blog.
A good point that:
"The evidence is that disabled workers all over the country are not being paid the minimum wage for their hard work. This is ILLEGAL."
As you know, I only arrived when you had finished and were leaving. So I was present for most of the actual business of the Board Meeting and the AGM.
At the AGM, the Annual Report and Summary Financial Statements 2005-2006 was distributed. I am assuming you don't have a copy. But it is now online at
http://www.sabp.nhs.uk/foi/annualreports/AR_A4_Final290906.pdf/view
I spoke to Christine Carter at the meeting and will be going to the PPIF public meeting in Redhill on 3 October when Christine, Jo Young and Tom Chan will be answering questions from the public.
There were three PPIF members present at the Trust meeting -
Jane Owens, Team Leader Mid & East Surrey (where the Garden Centre is)
Robert (Bob) Marshall, Team Leader South Surrey
Stuart Craig, member North Surrey
I'm very impressed with your leaflet, Jill, and will be including it in the Notice for my October meetings in Addlestone and Woking.
Thanks for all you've both done.
Rosemary in Surrey
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine
Thanks for your comments on the leaflets Rosemary.
The point that disabled workers all over the country are not being paid the mimimum wage and that this is illegal is still true with the Surrey and Borders garden centre workers even though their £3 a day is now going to be reinstated. They are still no nearer to being treated as real workers with employment contracts who get paid at least the minimum wage. The promised review says they will assess each case to see if the minimum wage should be applied but I believe most of the workers will just be reasessed as 'volunteers' who are only entitled to expenses like their travel costs. So they will be no better off than when we started this campaign. Another issue is that if the transfer to the Richmond Fellowship goes ahead the whole place made be turned into a 'training centre' where noone of the disabled workers get paid anything.
Although we saw SABP apologise yesterday and agree to reinstate the £3 a day payments I felt it was more out of a need to rectify their bad public image as a result of this episode than because they are really taking on the issues of inequality and disability discrimination and their own role in needing to employ more disabled service users in positions which pay at least the minimum wage or above.
People also keep using this so called problem about paying people who are on benefits but if you pay people properly to do a job then they don't need to be on benefits. If you give people part time work there are ways of arranging that which best suits the benefits regulations as well. What I don't like is when these so called problems with benefits are used as an excuse not to employ disabled people at all.
Anyway all in all yesterday was a good day for this campaign and I hope we can build on this kind of progress.
Also thanks to the woman with the shortish dark hair at the board meeting who helped put out the leaflets and gave us cake from the directors buffet... 'Let them eat cake' she said. And we did!
I think your assessment is right, Jill, that it could end up with the people being no better off. There are so many vested interests at stake here and the drive to privatise the services through the "charities" is going at a pace.
I am very pleased with what you have done but feel quite depressed about the general situation and what can actually be changed. We have to try though.
Rosemary in Surrey
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine
Good follow through . I'll help out in some other ways regarding looking at who paid SCMH to involve them in their advice to "externalise" services..
I am not sure about the situation of paying all patients involved in "therapeutic work" the minimum wage however. Rather I feel certain patients ought to be assessed of worthy of extra payments for some activity because they cannot be like others and would still need human incentives and rewards nonetheless .
Socially engineering services which patients must somehow be made to fit is what happened at SABPT...And it was deeply perverse.
Its that perversity and where it originates that must be tracked and challenged.
As far as some rewards given for bits of work , that must be continued because its simply human and kind ...
The philosophy behind this problem locates in SCMH and NIMHE . There are ways to go after this and that will take a little time to develop.
.
I appreciate your concerns about the disabled workers being treated kindly according to their individual needs. Noone who does not want to be employed and paid the minimum wage needs to be forced into that role. The point is that at the moment none are given the opportunity to be treated as other workers are and given the minimum wage as well as contracts of employment and the other securities that having a real job brings. They are in a no mans land where they do hard manual labour which is labelled as 'therapeutic work' or 'voluteering' and are not rewarded in the way non disabled people are rewarded for such activities. They are being exploited. Yet the evidence shows when disabled people are given the opportunities and responsibilities of work they rise to the challenges.
If you are saying that you would prefer the £3 a day payments to real jobs and the minimum wage I think it is incompatible with the minimum wage legislation to pay anything but expenses and avoid being liable to pay the minimum wage. That is why I think after this review we will see a few of the disabled workers assessed as being eligible for the minimum wage and most reclassified as volunteers who only get expenses. In the law as it stands I don't think there is any in between kind of payment allowed.
Personally I'd rather campaign for everyone to be paid the minimum wage (and even if for some people this was only for 3 hours a week that will still only mean roughly the same pay as the £3 a day) than to put up with a situation where there is blatent disability discrimination and inequality being perpetuated by this systematic and illegal refusal to open up the opportunities and choices available to the disabled workers.
Hi Mandy
Nice to see you here.
The report 'Paying a real wage in Work Projects' which was edited by Helen Lockett from that well known charity 'The Sainsbury Centre of Mental Health' does go through all the options for paying people who are on benefits the minimum wage. It includes letters that need to be written to to the various benefits agencies and so on. I can copy out the details for a blog entry later on as it isn't on the www and is the only document in this campaign I have had to send for by snail mail so far. Anyway I think that will help sort out the issue of how the minimum wage affects benefits as far as part time and full time work is concerned.
Another factor is that workers recieving the minimum wage even if it is only for 3 hours a week are also protected by contracts of employment, conditions of work, union rights and so on while the rights for 'volunteers' are very limited even though they may be expected to work just as hard or even harder than employees. For example we have a clear case against the Disability Discrimination Act already in the fact that the disabled workers have been treated differently to non disabled workers by having their £3 a day taken away but because they have no official status and rights as workers with employment contracts the case cannot be taken to tribunal. Now that their £3 a day is being reinstated their status either as 'workers' or 'volunteers' or 'trainees'is equally uncertain and their protection from things like bullying and harassment is not covered by employment protection laws.
Like you I agree that the best interests of the workers is of the greatest importance. And of course all workers whether they are disabled or not need to be protected from bullying and harassment in the workplace. And I do believe as well as recieving at least the minimum wage for their hard work they would be better protected under all the various employment laws designed to protect workers than they are as underpaid or unpaid 'volunteers' or trainees' or whatever the bosses latest category for them is called. Besides that it is not a case of all or nothing. Some workers may still only wish to be volunteers and others may wish to be given full time jobs and others may wish to do a mixture of part time work and part time volunteering and some prefer not to anything or do not feel able to do either. It is a matter of personal choice. But in order to have any real choices and equality the opportunities for disabled people having real jobs which pay at least the minimum wage or above need to be increased and opened up and the systematic discrimination that is going on now needs to be and campaigned against. At the moment unemployment rates for disabled workers are running at least double that of non disabled workers and the opportunities are just not being made available. Instead we see a load of 'volunteering' schemes and 'training schemes' but no real opportunities that non disabled people take for granted. For example none of the highly paid directors at the board meeting on Thursday was disabled and yet they are working for a Trust which is only there to represent and provide services for disabled people. And they did not answer the question about how many service users does the Trust employ either. My guess is that it is very few and mainly only in these dreamed up 'user representative' type roles which do not benefit service users as a whole.
This is straying from our initial aim to get the disabled workers their £3 a day back but as we have investigated the issues and the campaign has developed we can see the systematic inequalities that are being perpetuated and which need to be tackled and addressed.
This whole issue has opened up many angles indeed I note from the recent Board's own papers :
"In reviewing the impact of ceasing therapeutic payments, the main consideration given was to the impact of National Minimum Wage (NMW) legislation. NMW is currently set at £5.05 per hour (reviewed every October).
Applying NMW to the hours for those attending work service activities could adversely impact upon the benefit that people receive.
Further, it is unclear where NMW would apply, as people do not attend in order to provide significant output but to undertake training (most work service activities include NVQ assessment), to participate in therapeutic and social activities and, where possible, to prepare for employment.
Work service activities are not reliant upon those attending undertaking work and the centres do not create a profit for the Trust.
Other day centres across the Trust have ceased therapeutic payments in line with the Trust Board decision, although the implementation has been phased over a longer timescale. "
My comments to events are there are still things to get on the record . How many Service Users did in fact have payments withdrawn over the periods mentioned ? I think it should be known .
And clearly the Service Users have been seen in a "crossover" or transitional way ie. they are Service Users with the potential for becoming functionalised into work .
Now that the broad blasting Skintsey paradoxically stigmatising approach has gone i.e. "Equal rights for all whether you like it or not"
Fiona Edwards wants to reassess each person , Service User to see where they can fit into a "recovery-work orientated model " - all over again ...
There are some real problems here . One at least is the benefit system with its mean collision and punitive ethos applied and it needs to set some higher disregards which allows for more than £20 permitted work per week and does so where settings are both therapuetic and partly patient bound ..
There are some rules surrounding Incapacity Benefit which allow for up to a year (put me right if I am wrong) of therapeutic work at higher rates whilst still in receipt of benefit but these do become subject to curtailment in the second year as far as I know ..
It appears then if the Minimum wage is applied it would need to have taken into acount any contradictions currently embedded in the benefit systems and how they apply to vulnerable Service Users..
The other angle of importance is perhaps embedding questions about these concerns over SCMH's involvement and asking the DWP secondee Dr Bob Groves some pertinent questions .
This SABPT mess is partly down to them and DWP ethos being pushed and stretched too quickly as a model ..
If this has succeeded in SABPT no doubt NIMHE and CSIP would have been spreading knowledge of it across all its Regional Development Centres misleading people into what to think. Which is often what they have been doing ..
Bearing mind that is one of their central and prime functions to spread "good practice" and "anti stigma" messages across the nation .
So lets go in at complimentary angles of enquiry not forgetting there is a web here of arching ideology over what should become practice ....
Service Users Dupe-ment is still all out in the community of "Service User Involvement" that needs to be turned into criticality ..
Incidentially information which reached me shows a DWP secondee alongside a certain SCMH figure and the Benefits advisory Groups (set up by DWP) was drawn from NIMHEe-ites who were NOT experts at all , were a small group and may well have been paid for their involvement..
The full measure of vision around all of this is still developing for sure .
From the figures Peter Kinsey provided before he left 179 disabled workers across the trust were affected by the £3 a day cut.
I don't think the service users have been seen as being 'functionalised into work' as you put it. They were already expected to work hard in manual labour jobs for which they were paid the very low £3 a day and then when this was cut they have been expected to work hard for nothing. They have been exploited and used as slave labour.
Yes there are rules which allow for work on benefits over and above the £20 a week disregard. They are quite complicated and I will write them up to go on this blog another time. Applying the Minimum Wage has already been done sucessfully in some work projects and I have the details in that report that was edited by the one and only Helen Lockett of SCMH which I can also write up on the blog another time. Alternatively the details of one of the cases are in the reply I wrote to Helen Lockett which is already on this blog.
Jill I've no doubt the rationale of the NHS services at SABPT was to conditionalise some Service Users into work based functionality , except that an unneccesary broad brush approach was applied very quickly. That latched into advice from SCMH on externalising services.
SABPT say in their notes (Item 4 of the Board Papers):
"Further, it is unclear where NMW would apply, as people do not attend in order to provide significant output but to undertake training (most work service activities include NVQ assessment), to participate in therapeutic and social activities and, where possible, to prepare for employment. "
I am not sure the Kinsey figure 179 is more widely accurate and it may have been downplayed to include only the Service Users that were affected by the £3 a day cuts in the merged SABPT Trust . Dare I suspect this £3 a day might well have been taken off others from the pre-merged Trusts that preceded the SABPT arrangements
I dont know with the picture in Surrey but Fiona Edwards can be asked no doubt ..
Getting back to the "Top-down" "conditionalising" of Service Users for functionality.. Its one of the specialist areas of a certain SCMH secondee to the DWP ... I've no doubt social engineering ideology is at work through the whole of what happened at SABPT and it would have been used by NIMHE to advise others on "good practice"..
This campaign has a number of angles now...
SABP have called the disabled workers lots of things like trainees and volunteers instead of workers and the work they do everything from therapeutic activitoes to training but they won't call it work because that would mean they have to pay the workers the minimum wage. Since we called in the Minimum Wage Investigation the trust now think that some of the workers up at the garden centre may be entitled to the minimum wage because they are doing the same work as other salaried employees but they don't know /won't say yet because they have not assessed the workers individually yet as they have now promised to do in the review they agreed on Thursday. In the meantime we still have the Richmond Fellowship apparently waiting in the wings ready to turn the place into some kind of training centre where none of the disabled workers will be paid anything and there may not even be places for them at all in this new training centre for all we know. This campaign is about defending the workers best interests. We have seen that achieved to an extent in seeing their £3 a day back paid but their long term security is no nearer being secured.
Yes you are right this campaign still needs a lot of work to be sucessful.
I think you mean this one below Jill and its initiation this year .
See link :
http://www.socialfirms.co.uk/news/index.php/Item214.html
I am not sure of the treatment or care component within it or type of Service User and it has probably only externalised because it may not need MH Staff inputed anymore directly . In others words it might be dealing with a different "class of User"
QUOTE : "5/9/2006 Social Firms UK
Travel Agency Social Firm Becomes Independent From The NHS Trust That Created It
A Redhill travel agency that was set up in 1996 to train and employ people recovering from mental health problems in East Surrey has finally become independent of the NHS Trust that created it (originally East Surrey Priority Care NHS Trust, then Surrey Oaklands NHS Trust, now Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Trust).
Travel Matters (Enterprises) Ltd is unique. As a Social Firm, it has a social objective of creating employment specifically for disabled people within a successful, market-led business. It meets the Social Firm standards set out by Social Firms UK, the national support agency for Social Firm development, around the values of Enterprise, Employment and Empowerment.
It currently employs 4 staff and offers training opportunities as well as work experience to 28 people each week as part of their re-integration back into work. Travel Matters (Enterprises) Ltd became a completely independent enterprise from 1st September 2006. A launch event will be held in its new premises at Rawlinson House in the centre of Redhill on 31st October 2006 to celebrate its independence.
Within the Social Firm sector this is the first known case of a successful externalisation from the NHS. Staff TUPE and pension arrangements were key factors, as was securing a contract with the Primary Care Trust to provide training and employment opportunities to people with mental health problems in East Surrey.
Sally Reynolds, director of Travel Matters Enterprises Ltd and Chief Executive of Social Firms UK, comments ‘Several social enterprises have previously been externalised from the NHS, as have various services which have been outsourced to the voluntary and private sectors, but this is the first case that we are aware of whereby a Social Firm business has come out of the NHS in order to survive on the open market. This is rewarding for Travel Matters which can now have control over its own future and use the success of the business to pursue its social aims, including the creation of employment for disabled people. We are grateful to Surrey & Borders Partnership Trust for giving it this opportunity and assistance to move out of the NHS.’
Peter Cobbett, Managing Director of Travel Matters (Enterprises) Ltd adds ‘we’re delighted to be able to move this enterprise out of the NHS into the independent sector. The preparation for externalisation has gone on for several years and has been fairly challenging at times, but we are there now and the timing is perfect for us to maximise the opportunities being presented through the increased interest in social enterprise. We will continue to grow our business of specialist travel for disabled people – especially for residential homes of people with learning disabilities – alongside our mainstream travel agency service and hopefully continue to have the economic and social impact that we’ve had so far.’
Contact details: Peter Cobbett, Managing Director ....
Yes that Travel Matters place is one they have already set up. But I think these social enterprise/firms set ups in general are a con. They do not really operate as businesses. They get commercial contracts which the disabled volunteers/trainees have to do the work for while getting paid nothing or just expenses. They also get a load of subsidies for providing the disabled workers with these so called opportunities. They are not opportunities. They just use and exploit the disabled workers as slave labour. Meanwhile the directors and managers and salaried employees of these social firms are on a gravy train where they cannot lose. Money from commercial contracts fulfilled by unpaid labour AND a load of money from subsidies. Nice work if you can get it but not nice for our disabled workers. Not nice at all. In fact it is complete inequality because of disability.
Jill , I cannot term Service Users who are being cared for by NHS Trusts "Workers" unless they transit via recovery directly and are employed by the Trust .. The attempt by SABPT to convert the "labelling" reality of them being Service Users into a desired work driven DWP outcome , holds the key to why their needs were squashed ..
I dont hold with the Trust not having a Garden Centre where some therapeutic activity can take place . Keeping that Centre protects the rights of future NHS patients who need a degree of asylum with some activity which is not necessarily functional or output related but is part of a care component the public can have some scrutiny and control over . And some rewards can be added in ..
If such a centre were sold off for "training" you are right it might well use Users on which an external body makes money and careers and there is little mechanism for scrutiny .
Much of this problem at SABPT is caused because of policy pushing from the Govt which wants to see the back of NHS services and estate for cost reasons ..
Care and some asylum for some Service Users must be preserved I feel..
.
The Travel Matters situation is interesting and information points to both PCT (service Level agreement) and Local Authority Involvement (support but unspecified as to what)
Which PCT was involved I dont know (5 in the area are currently combining into one)..
The support behind this Travel Matters looks massive and expertise was inputed too by "Social Firms Uk" .
Look here :
"Sally Reynolds, director of Travel Matters Enterprises Ltd "
Is this the same Sally Reynolds who runs Social Firms UK ?
Yes ..
"Sally Reynolds, director of Travel Matters Enterprises Ltd and Chief Executive of Social Firms UK "
Another tidbit :
Domain name:
socialfirms.co.uk
Registrant:
Social Firms UK
Registrant type:
UK Limited Company, (Company number: SC214915)
Registrant's address:
Social Firms UK
1st Floor
Furness House
53 Brighton Road
Redhill
Surrey
RH1 6PZ
GB
A definition of work and sorry I have forgotten the source is:
'Activities which are directed towards the production of goods and services which typically have a value in exchange and which are carried out for a valuable consideration monetary or otherwise' so yes according to the definition our disabled workers really are workers. Not trainees. Not volunteers. And not a patronising stereotype of vulnerable misfits needing a helping hand to grow a few therapeutic flowers. Care and asylum must be preserved but don't preserve inequality, discrimination and lack of rights along with them.
Jill I am not suggesting any inequality is preserved. I am suggesting the "equality" of perverse DWP/SCMH/NIMHE orienated application is prevented from drowning out the care needs on patients when in care situations such as the NHS.
We are dealing with a health and care body here which will need to re-assess individuals
Dont asume all patients are "hardworking" in the Garden Centre - some might just potter around as they can and that's fine as far as I am concerned , and please don't tell me you know different unless you have been there and seen them all in action and made individual assessments
We have similar situations in my Trust and not everyone who is in the Garden Centre in my location is capable of ordinary hard work ..I know , I've seen it . I have been a statutory monitor for mental health in the area and I personally would not stereotype people , but I will see their different capacities because that is real and it recognises individual differences...
That's the best starting point . SABPT made the mistake as regarding everyone as the "same" .
Indiscrimate views therefore of Service Users creates forced applications based on homogeneity across the board , about how they should be all "Included" in the "mainstream" . This flawed philosophy is NIMHE's and SCMH's and DWP driven .. It is not emerging from Service Users themselves either in localities - its a grand SCMH social engineering exercise that gets rid of asylum , Day Centres , and even treatments with its diversionary costs without ever engaging with Service Users properly bottom-upwards in their own locations. DWP and others have been using NIMHE for false impressions of endorsement.
If patients can make transitions to work its not a problem to me but robbing the services of good therapeutic possibilities inside centres and selling them off is not something I agree with at all .
And charities are just not open enough and able to be scrutinised deeply enough , the latest Charity Bill certainly has made sure of that and who was it protected by as it passed it motions .. ?
I'll leave you to guess otherwise my Lord will hit me with a trolley from heaven ..
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No I have not been to the garden centre yet. We could have gone there after the board meeting but got distracted by a journey which was ment to be a few miles but somehow took in the Kings Road in London. Well it wasn't me doing the map-reading...!
Anyway we have both had our say here and made the points we feel most relevant. And as the next blog entry shows clearly the two views are not incompatible. It is up to each of us on this campaign to keep putting our concerns to SABP and other relevant organisations.
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