Kings reach care home.

[hboy]

4 minutes ago, WTF said:

all very good,  but the cut of point for legal aid hardly gives an individual the finances for a genuine case against a big entity if they earn a quid too much.

That is why there is no "lawyer driven compensation culture" in the IOM as previously claimed. It's too expensive without no win no fee and, by and large, legal aid won't fund frivolous claims either. 

[Andy Onchan]

http://www.moorestephens.co.uk/news-views/august-2017/16-of-care-homes-at-risk-of-failure

[hissingsid]

Government should own all nursing homes and charge reasonable prices, you can stay in a 5 star hotel for the cost of a week in a nursing home.   They subsidise loads of people in these private homes who have nothing so although it would be a cost I do not think it would be as bad as imagined, also if they owned the homes they could always keep a few beds free so that Nobles were not overburdened. We are an age into population and this issue has to be tackled sooner rather than later.  Also there should be more sheltered accommodation built to free up social housing for young families who should not be stuck in flats paying so much rent they cannot afford to get on the housing ladder.   There is money there it is just not getting spent wisely and the gap between the haves and have nots is widening every day, this does not make for a good society.

[notwell]

It's a very difficult sitaution really.   I agree about government taking more ownership of it.

To some degree you have the same issue at the other end of the scale with nursery provision for under 2 year olds.    The Children's Centre closed their doors to under 2's not so long ago and the issue is how to make it viable.   Even when you charge £900 a month when you have a ratio of 1 staff to 3 under 2's it must be near imposssible to make it profitable.  In this area if people are to get back to work then the government need to assist nurseries and parents.   At the moment the parent struggles with a £900 bill and the nursery doesn't really charge enough at £900 to make it work.

 

 

[Expatriate]

Just shy of three grand a month for my mate's ma to sit in her room all day at the Ellan Vannin home. Not that the staff aren't giving it their best shot and not that some of the residents don't do better there than they would on their own. When she's down to her last thirteen grand sometime next year the government chip in a bit but not as much as the home charges. Then when the last thirteen grand is gone she's out on her ear and hoping the government has a bed for her somewhere on the system.

[Tarne]

Yup, it costs more than a fricken cruise ship to look after old people in a care home due to the regulations and care required. You can see why so many old people spend time on cruise ships!

[woolley]

5 minutes ago, Tarne said:

Yup, it costs more than a fricken cruise ship to look after old people in a care home due to the regulations and care required. You can see why so many old people spend time on cruise ships!

With most people on cruises though you don't have to spoon feed them and wipe their arses. That costs.

[Tarne]

Indeed it does. My grandmother went into Cummal Mooar years ago, she didn't last long in there (government paid for everything btw). Going in to see her was awful - their rooms were pleasant enough as were the staff but just the standard of life they had wasn't pleasant, it was just keeping them alive for the hell of it. All comes back to the whole "quality of life" thing, and how it's a lesser evil to let them go peacefully than keeping them in perpetual hell at great cost. 

Ah well. We'll continue to have crazy high cost of care homes over here, and a shortage of beds because that's the choice society has made. Personally I think it's evil, but I can also see how euthanasia would be abused. I know if I had the choice right now to choose on a form I'd choose the option to be allowed to die. 

[ecobob]

Years ago on summer holiday from Uni I worked at a privately run care home just up the road from the Children's Centre, big lovely white house with a Victorian conservatory on the front. It's closed down now thankfully. Looked lovely from the outside. I did a night shift.  There were two staff on and forty five residents.  The fridges and pantries were locked overnight so if someone was hungry they went hungry.  The patients with dementa were locked in their rooms and some of them were secured to their beds with bandages.  It was the most dreadful experience for them and for me.

After two nights I rang the owner and told her I no longer wanted to work there and that her practices were unsafe and inhumane.  I threatened to call the Fire Services to get them to look at the place and she threatened me with her lawyer and legal action.  I was young, I didn't know what I know now and I took it no further but every time I cycle past that house I remember and yes, I still have guilt.

It wasn't a care home, it was a money making factory for the owners.  The residents were given the cheapest food and little of it.  It was all about making money.

I'd really like to think that things like this don't happen anymore.  Would our government run them any better?  Undoubtably yes - they couldn't do any worse.  Would they do it well enough? I'm not sure.

[ecobob]

9 hours ago, Tarne said:

because that's the choice society has made. 

With respect, that's not true. We've been told that's the only choice we have to make but it used to be that granny or grandpa lived at home and their families cared for them and they in turn cared for their families, looking after children for example, teaching us how to cook and to mend things.  But we were told that we didn't have time to do that any more because we had to go out to work so we could afford all the things that we didn't really need just to keep the economy afloat and now we spend a huge proportion of our salaries on childcare because mummy has to go out to work to afford to live and granny and grandpa have to go in a home because we're all too busy to look after them,

It's all about money.  It always has been and it always will unless people wake up and see what is happening and say enough. We've lost our connection with what is important.  It's been taken away from us so we don't have time to think about it, we're too busy trying to keep our heads above water to pay for services falsely inflated to make sure we keep going out to work to pay for them.  And our children are looked after by women else and our parents are looked after by someone else and meanwhile we are sick and tired and stressed and can't see a way out so we drink too much and we take drugs and we watch mind numbing TV as respite and to give us strength to get up on Monday morning and begin all over again with no time to think about what is important.  And I really do believe that that is all part of the plan - to stop us thinking and keep us tied in our cycle of making money and spending money.

[Andy Onchan]

3 minutes ago, ecobob said:

With respect, that's not true. We've been told that's the only choice we have to make but it used to be that granny or grandpa lived at home and their families cared for them and they in turn cared for their families, looking after children for example, teaching us how to cook and to mend things.  But we were told that we didn't have time to do that any more because we had to go out to work so we could afford all the things that we didn't really need just to keep the economy afloat and now we spend a huge proportion of our salaries on childcare because mummy has to go out to work to afford to live and granny and grandpa have to go in a home because we're all too busy to look after them,

It's all about money.  It always has been and it always will unless people wake up and see what is happening and say enough. We've lost our connection with what is important.  It's been taken away from us so we don't have time to think about it, we're too busy trying to keep our heads above water to pay for services falsely inflated to make sure we keep going out to work to pay for them.  And our children are looked after by women else and our parents are looked after by someone else and meanwhile we are sick and tired and stressed and can't see a way out so we drink too much and we take drugs and we watch mind numbing TV as respite and to give us strength to get up on Monday morning and begin all over again with no time to think about what is important.  And I really do believe that that is all part of the plan - to stop us thinking and keep us tied in our cycle of making money and spending money.

Spot on.

[notwell]

Very thought provoking post Ecobob

[2bees]

That's the best thing I've read on here for a long time Ecobob, thankfully/hopefully I am mostly out of that loop. I am working towards being able to look after my dad when he needs me (ages yet), old people's homes are horrible and I don't want him to be lonely. 

[hissingsid]

What a great post it is so true.