We support, inform and speak on behalf of older people in care
5 December 2018 – Judy Downey, Chair of the Relatives & Residents Association (R&RA) was on the You & Yours programme (Radio 4) on Monday, discussing a distressing death due to choking. Tony, one of our Helpline clients, described how he had discovered his mother being fed with a spoon instead of the syringe that had been prescribed for her and which was specified in her […] Read More...
26 November 2018: This week the Guardian has run a series of stories that show the current unacceptable state of the care home sector. An analysis of data from the Office for National Statistics shows that in the last five years, malnutrition, lack of hydration and bedsores have been referred to in the death certificates of over 1400 care home […] Read More...
2 November 2018 – The government’s troubled Mental Capacity (Amendment) Bill continues to attract criticism for failing those it is meant to protect. Judy Downey: ‘the Bill does not meet the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights.’ Committee Chair Harriet Harman MP said:“The human rights of vulnerable people who lack mental capacity must […] Read More...
31 October 2018 – £650 million for social care sounds good but compared with the massive £7 billion of cuts to social care funding since 2010, it is a paltry amount. Government funding of councils will still reduce by 77% from 2015/16 to 2019/20 – going from nearly £10 billion to £2 billion.* This will […] Read More...
10 October 2018 – R&RA have teamed up with leading social care interest groups to warn the government that its mental capacity reforms are not fit for purpose. It requires them (care home managers) to be judge and jury about decisions in which they themselves could be involved Judy Downey, Chair of the Relatives and Residents Association […] Read More...
5 October 2018: The R&RA is alarmed at the proposals by the Department of Health and Social Care to remove some basic safeguards and radically change the independent element when care home residents lack mental capacity. The Mental Capacity (Amendment) Bill* now going through Parliament leaves those residents with restricted mental capacity more open to abuse. These vulnerable residents now form an increasingly high […] Read More...
The long hot summer of 2018 has bought temperatures across the country that look set to be record breaking while social media has been used to remind us that in the UK we are rarely happy with the weather! And, as the parliamentary recess starts and MPs go on holiday, the new Secretary of State […] Read More...
25 July 2018: We in the Relatives & Residents Association (the R&RA) completely understand why so many people call for CCTV, like Dominic Grieve, it is a normal gut reaction to stories of terrible abuse. But making CCTV mandatory in communal areas will not stop the abuse or neglect that predominantly happens in a resident’s […] Read More...
16 July 2018: David Barton, owner and manager of Barton Park Nursing Home, was sentenced to 21 years in prison on Friday. He had abused his position of trust as a registered owner by defrauding residents, using cruel and heartless tactics to manipulate them and exploit their worst fears. CQC, the regulator, should pay greater […] Read More...
5 July 2018 – Today is the 70th anniversary of the “Appointed Day” when the National Health Service Act 1946 and the National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1947 were brought into force on 5 July 1948. Creating the free universal National Health Service amid austerity and the aftermath of the second world war was an […] Read More...