Comparing Responses from services

From Jill Goble

I feel angry at the way we have been deliberately denied information by the SABP bosses and I don't think MCCH Ltd responded very well either. Instead of just saying they are only doing a report and do not have the Old Moat garden centre contract yet they complained about the photos of their board members on this site even though these are already in the public domain. Then they complain there are inaccuracies on this site and that they have a very person centred record. And they don't answer a single one of my questions about their plans for the Old Moat Garden Centre. MCCH suggest a meeting but when I ask if this can be taped and up on our site they don't reply. Well we are people and service users ourselves and if that is an example of how person centred their responses are then they leave a lot to be desired.

Same with Fiona Edwards saying that as far as she knows the transfer to external providers will go ahead.

Was she really saying she doesn't know or that she can't be bothered to tell us what is happening?

Compare this with the way I did find out the information about the contracts. The building on the best document says the contracts would be with Surrey County Council so I looked all over their website and eventually found what they call their 'procurement' department. All the contact numbers were on voicemail but I eventually found an operator who put me through to a Mrs Lyndsey. Now she was really helpful and she rang me back the next day to say she thought she had found the person I needed to speak to but was just waiting to check. Then she rang me back again to tell me the contact name and number of the person I needed and later she rang back again to ask if I had got through to the right person OK. How is that for helpful service to the public. Then the contracts officer Sandini Crane at SCC was also very helpful and put me on to Diane Woods at the PCT who knew all about the current contracts situation. Yes sorry I got the names wrong earlier and it is Sandini Crane at SCC and Diane Woods at the East Surrey PCT.

The point is if some people can be helpful and provide clear information why are the others so difficult and obstructive?

As for these people earning in the £100,000s range I think that is about 5 times the national average wages so are we as service users getting 5 times average services for this price? Er well we have all the evidence on this campaign to show the answer to that is definitely no... In fact as Rosemary says they don't seem to provide any services anymore but just farm them out to all these external providers. The things that they still have to do like deal with our FOIA requests they can hardly seem to be bothered to do either.

Would it make any difference if there were no managers and directors?

Would we even notice?

Years ago the NHS did not have all these managers and admin style people and yet now they say the admin blocks are bigger than the medical units. Weber called it 'the iron cage of bureaucracy' if I remember because it increases itself rather than getting anything done.

By the way on their website the Richmond Fellowship have a garden style project in Swindon full of unpaid volunteers and they are complaining their funding is running out and they will have to cut back all their services if they don't get more money from somewhere. Is this what will happen to the services they now have a 5 year contract to run in Surrey?