A Christmas Miracle
And Lo and behold in a blinding light there suddenly appeared the following long delayed Freedom of Information Act response from SABP Fairy Jo Young.
Truly Christmas is a time of wonder.
Learning Disabilities Services
The Ridgewood Centre
Old Bisley Road
Frimley
Surrey
GU16 9QE
Tel: 01276 605553
Fax: 01276 605599
Email: Jo.Young@sabp.nhs.uk JY/ame
21st December 2006
Mr. Des Curly
Dear Mr. Curly,
We refer to the Freedom of Information Act requests in your email dated 21st November 2006 and our subsequent acknowledgement dated 22nd November 2006. We are now in a position to respond to your request.
FOI Question
I note that on the SCMH website see below - Ms Helen Lockett has no difficulty claiming ownership of the bungled 'modernisation' of Surrey & Borders Partnership NHS Trust work services whereas the Trust itself appears to have some difficulty in remembering what its financial links to Ms. Lockett actually were/are.
"Helen has been an Associate Consultant with the Employment Programme for the past 5 years and carries out both research and service development. Helen has been working in the field of employment and mental health / disabilities for the past 10 years.
Helen's most recent work includes research into patients' experiences of a work rehabilitation project with Broadmoor Hospital and for the past 18 months Helen has been project managing the modernisation of employment and day services within Surrey & Borders Partnership NHS Trust"
In the interests of establishing just how committed the Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Trust is to getting its service users into paid employment would you please explain how much Ms. Lockett was paid by your Trust or on its behalf for managing the modernisation of your Work services and also clarify what Helen's SCMH mentor/manager Dr Bob Groves was paid for his widely reported input.
Lastly, would you please acknowledge that you knew of Ms Lockett's prior relationship with MCCH Ltd and log and deal with this and the above questions as Freedom of Information requests.
Response
Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Trust does not hold any contractual arrangements with SCMH nor are we aware of any contractual arrangements between SCMH and the former Surrey Oaklands Trust.
However, in the summer there was training provided by Helen Lockett to our Employment Advisors in the north west of the county. This was paid for from grant monies which we attained through a bid jointly with MCCH from the Mental Health Capital (Revenue) Grant Scheme via Surrey County Council.
This training was separate and not related to the “Building on the Best” Work Services Review, Eastern Surrey.
The Building on the Best Work Services Review was a commissioner led programme jointly managed by the former East Surrey Primary Care Trust, the former East Elmbridge and Mid Surrey Primary Care Trust (now Surrey Primary Care Trust) and Surrey County Council.
It is our understanding that Helen Lockett was employed by these parties as the Project Manager for this review. She was at no stage employed by Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Trust. We therefore have no information related to this contract and pay.
We are informed that Helen did liaise with SCMH during this project, however this would not be unexpected as they are one of the the leading improvement agencies advising the government and others nationally on employment matters and mental health.*.
I am sure that as Helen was employed by the above organisations she was being paid for this work. However, as stated above we have no information related to this contract and pay.
I hope this answers your questions satisfactorily however if you would like further clarity please contact me.
If you are dissatisfied with the outcome of your enquiry, you have the right to appeal and in the first instance this should be to the Head of Healthcare Systems, Surrey & Borders Partnership NHS Trust, Elaine Gould on 01737 281046 or email elaine.gould@sabp.nhs.uk
If you are still not satisfied with the outcome, you can write to:
The Information Commissioner
Wycliffe House,Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
Telephone: 01625 545700
Yours sincerely,
Jo Young
Jo Young
Director of Services for People with Learning Disabilities
c.c. Elaine Gould, Head of Healthcare Systems
posted by simply human @ 10:47 am
Listen to this article
3 comments
Dot This
3 Comments:
Ms Young's claim that Helen Lockett , a SCMH Consultant, liased with SCMH because of its expertise in advising Government on Employment is laughable and in light of the money wasted by the bungled Modernisation and cost of additional Review insulting to taxpayers who foot the bill for Ms Lockett's incompetence.
SCMH is in fact an agent of Government as it stepped outside its charitable aims and objectives when it helped set up Government quango NIMHE.
SCMH does NOT advise the Government, it does its bidding and even unlawfully subsidises it with charitable funds ( SCMH purchased and set up the NIMHE website for the Department of Health ) and there are moves afoot to ensure that SCMH is subject to FOIA legislation because of its overly close relationship with Government.
At present SCMH is assisting the Department of Work & Pensions target disabled people on benefits to save the Government 7 billion pounds.
SCMH also has an appalling record of getting service users who are able and want to work into real jobs.
I have also received a mail from Jo Young. It has been written by the special department that specialises in: 'Replying to Freedom of Information Requests without Telling Anybody Anything They Don't Know Already' that they have up at SABP. This is the same department that also does the 'Delaying FOIA request answers as long as possible' and the variation 'Ignoring FOIA requests entirely' which we have seen so much of since this campaign started in June.
I would copy and paste the reply here today but my copy and paste function has turned into a pumpkin after staying out too late at our party on Friday so it is just going to have to wait until after the holidays (don't hold your breath it really tells us nothing new...)
In the meantime can I take this time to wish everyone on the campaign very happy holidays and hope we will see some justice for the disabled workers next year.
re. Jo Young's claim that SCMH's involvment reflects its position of centre of expertise and excellence in fields of employment & mental health , this rather conveniently ignores fact that Helen Lockett is pictured and described as Associate member on SCMH website and that a further employment review of SABP's Work Services has had to be underaken because Lockett's was so seriously flawed .
Taxpayers are being forced to bankroll these charlatans .
Post a Comment
<< Home