Beyond a cover up? How the UK Adult Social Care sector is FUBAR
I cheered in agreement while watching GB News last night, as the discussion echoed a message I’ve been advocating for years. Finally, someone gets what I have been trying to tell the world for the past four years, but I have news for you Patrick, the rabbit hole is much deeper than the NHS.
My mother’s story is a harrowing example of systemic neglect. The local council, the home care provider they commissioned, and the hospital that should have been a sanctuary all played roles in a preventable tragedy. What’s bewildering is the web of failings we encountered, a kaleidoscope of errors shielded by the council’s inaction, which ultimately led to my mother’s untimely death. All preventable and should never have happened, but can I get anyone to acknowledge exactly what happened? No.
Four years of navigating through bureaucratic mazes of council complaints and ombudsman processes have brought me no closer to understanding why underperforming care providers continue to receive contracts, operate below standards, and face no repercussions for their actions and why hospitals can misdiagnose patients and ignore family concerns.
The Care Act 2014 sets out that it is the local councils’ responsibility for assessing and ensuring adequate care. Yet, the perpetual outcry over insufficient funds and resources seems to excuse them from their duty, not only are they not able to fix potholes they allow their poor quality care providers to effectively kill those who need their services, and will argue, despite published reports and a significant number of complaints to the contrary, that there is no issue with the care provided.
The Ombudsman (LGSCO) responses to my concerns were in a tone that I am the idiot, not possibly capable of understanding their arcane ways of working, which are, incidentally, not arcane at all. They are published online and we’re all very clearly able to see what should happen when. The LGSCO haven’t even addressed the complaint that I gave them, nor have they followed their own procedures! They haven’t even responded to a service complaint.
As it currently stands the Ombudsman have a service complaint and a review request now several months overdue. The Ombudsman is a public service. People are dying and put in harms way whilst the public’s time and money they are wasting in officially ignoring concerns, yet there is no outrage, no demand for change and no point to their existence as far as I am concerned. Look at the online review sites. I am not alone.
In this complex landscape, the NHS’s role cannot be overlooked. My mother’s repeated hospital admissions highlight a distressing cycle: subpar home care leads to health crises, placing unnecessary strain on hospital resources. The disconnect between hospital care and post-discharge support exacerbates the problem, creating a revolving door that fails to secure the well-being of patients like my mother. I countless times, raised, what I now understand were what should have been treated as safeguarding issues with staff at the hospital which went nowhere. All systems are primed to prolong harm not prevent it.
The one-size-fits-all approach of the legislation such as the Care Act 2014 falls short, particularly in home care settings. The Care Quality Commission (CQC), appears to place it’s focus in regulating care homes, and seems to overlook the nuanced challenges of home care. The care agency that contributed to my mothers death should be closed down, or at the very least in special measures, but it’s allowed to continue with impunity because they are the only commissioned service and what would happen then. Heavens forbid the council have a plan B, which they do on paper but fail to implement in practice. My experience paints a picture of a system where warnings go unheeded until it’s too late, and the cost is irreplaceable human life.
My inbox tells me that I am not alone in this experience.
This ordeal sheds light on the unsung heroes: unpaid carers who step in when the system fails. Their sacrifices, often borne out of the system’s inadequacies, underscore a glaring oversight in how we assess and provide for care needs. Those unpaid carers, family members who have to give up their careers, homes and even their childhoods in order to care for a relative in need of care because they didn’t meet the council’s assessment criteria to qualify for support, but answer me this, if they are not in need of care why do other people have to sacrifice their lives to provide it? Couldn’t be that an under financed and under resourced council mandated to provide care might fudge assessments are make the bar higher than necessary in order to absolve themselves for responsibility, could it?
My aim is not to dismantle but to prompt a reflection on the care system’s current state and its impact on individuals and families. The hope for reform lies not in a single solution but in a collective acknowledgment of the issues and a commitment to address them.
As we contribute to the social care levy on our council tax, it’s worth pondering the real value we’re receiving and the potential consequences of maintaining the status quo. The narrative of care in our society needs a new chapter, one where tragic stories like my mother’s become lessons from the past, not recurring realities.
It’s the 21st century and our systems are archaic. The news is rife with stories of preventable tragedies, from vulnerable children to the elderly, each becoming a grim statistic that adds to an escalating tally. Yet, these numbers represent more than mere data; they are human lives, either young lives cut short or ones spent contributing to a system that ultimately fails to reciprocate when it matters most. The real tragedy lies not just in the loss of life but in the squandered potential for positive change. This cycle persists as the very individuals entrenched within these systems become accustomed to the status quo, overlooking the dire need for proactive measures. Deflect, diffuse and deny any issue put to them rather than embrace an opportunity for change. Personally, I wonder how the people who clearly and deliberately chose not to provide answers my mother’s pleas for release from a toxic care agency or my complaints for closure regarding her death, sleep at night. True reform remains elusive as long as complaints go ignored or the response to grievances is nothing more than a hollow promise that “lessons will be learned.” Is it time to go back to the drawing board?
The other thing I have learned is that a need for care is likely to touch as all at some point, so consider your parents, partner, yourself, your children one day it might be needed, and it’s a game of roulette whether you will get the care you need. I never foresaw a time when my very active, mum who took early retirement would be stuck disabled by a stroke, but at the end of the day she simply needed support because she couldn’t walk. It wasn’t the stoke that was my mum’s death sentence, it was an unfit care agency protected by an even more inadequate council.
How many more before someone stands up and does the right thing?
NB: If you are interested in looking at the full story of my mother’s tragic case please visit my dedicated website. Any support you can give to help me get these important questions answered is valuable. Just a like or share can make a big difference.
