“Disabled people in residential care who want to live more independently are being prevented from doing so by funding wrangles between local authorities” – that’s taken from a piece I wrote three years ago, but since then little has changed.
“Caught in a trap: disabled people can’t move out of care”, The Guardian October 2010
Here’s the mess: an individual’s “ordinary residence” is usually in his or her original local authority area, so if a council places someone in residential care outside the area, it remains financially responsible.
But when someone decides to move from that residential care in the new area into supported accommodation within the same (ie “new”) area, their original authority argues that it is no longer responsible for funding. However, the new authority – where the person actually lives – argues against funding someone not originally from the area. The result – limbo.
Confusing? Not really, what it boils down to is that councils are passing the buck over people’s care, effectively dictating where people should live -and all the while, individuals themselves appear to have no say. And quibbling over the care bill will only get worse as local authority cuts continue to bite.
I’ve been involved in a piece of work published today by social care organisation Voluntary Organisations Disability Group. The VODG has previously demanded action to resolve such ordinary residence dilemmas and, this time, it argues that the Care Bill offers ample opportunity to finally tackle the challenge. The new briefing, Ordinary residence, extraordinary mess, is available from the VODG website, with this post outlining how the situation has become “business as usual” in many areas.
One way forward, which the bill could accommodate, is strengthening the duty on local authorities to cooperate with providers and with each other to prevent delays in funding when people want to move from one care setting to another. The Epilepsy Society, for example, which contributed to today’s publication, estimates that in the last three years it has covered gaps in fees totalling £350,000 and “staff time involved in chasing fees over the same period has amounted to approximate 340 days across all departments including senior and service managers, finance and administrative staff”.
Here’s just one story from today’s publication, from a social care provider in central England: “Joe moved out of residential care into supported living accommodation nearby, run by the same charity provider. Council A, where Joe is now ordinarily resident, is refusing to take over funding from Council B which had previously paid his out of county residential care fees. Some 14 months later, the social care provider (a medium sized charity) is owed nearly £50,000 from Council A for this one client. Members of the charity’s finance team chase Council A each week and include copies of previous correspondence and agreements. Council A continues to delay payments, giving the provider different reasons for not paying and passes the query around different council departments. The charity has continued to provide care and covered this gap in fees.”
While the powers-that-be seem unwilling to either acknowledge the scale of the problem or indeed have the confidence to untangle the mess, vulnerable people across the country remain in limbo, unable to move to the place of their choice because of bureaucratic wrangles.
As Anna McNaughton’s mother told me three years ago: “All Anna wants is to live in a suitable home – it’s a basic human need, not a luxury.” It’s a desperate situation that three years on, her words still have the same resonance.
‘Gold’, from Bound, Anthony David King and Samona Naomi Williams
Huge lashes sweeping over her eyelids, face framed by diamante and skin shining gold, this is a photographic portrayal of how Samona Naomi Williams feels some days: valuable, not a burden to society.
Yet Samona, a wheelchair user who Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS) type 3 which, amongst other things, affects her mobility, also has days where she feels trapped by her condition, vulnerable and delicate. Outwardly, on some days, she may show little sign of her disability. This is reflected in a portrait where she is bound to her chair with tape emblazoned with the word ‘fragile’.
‘Fragile’, from Bound, by Anthony David King and Samona Naomi Williams
Then there are times, she recalls, referring to a shot of her on a mattress strewn with medication, that her bed is a “marshmallow prison”: “There is no rest for me here. Yet I’m tied to it. I’m bound to it. There’s nothing sexy about being bed bound, though I wish to see it differently.”
‘Bed’, from Bound, Anthony David King and Samona Naomi Williams
Samona has turned her experience of disability into an art project, Bound, documenting her story with photographer friend Anthony David King. The pair recently exhibited the works at the Brick Gallery in east London and the pieces are available to view online at Saatchi with an exhibition tour of London planned for later this year.
Until her diagnosis in 2009, Samona was a TV, music video and film producer, producing and directing a short film screened at Cannes. With her condition, she felt she had “nothing to give”: “I was just this ‘disabled person’. I cannot write, I cannot do my films, I cannot work – that’s when Anthony and I sat down and had a discussion about what can I do to use to use my skills and illness. We came up with photographic project which we could make work around my disability.”
Anthony, who met Samona as a student, adds: “When she became ill, the impact on me as a friend, seeing her go through this…I could see she felt she didn’t have much to offer. We decided to do something together, an opportunity to do something not just for her but to tell her story that may be encouraging to others, looking at ways we could express her experiences.”
Samona’s condition means that everyday tasks – taking a shower or making a cup of tea – can be difficult. She uses a wheelchair when she goes out due to weakness, dizziness, a heart condition and pain when she walks. She often suffers fortnight long “crashes” where she remains in bed, exhausted and in pain. She describes these episodes as “being crushed by bricks”.
Yet the images are bold and provocative – Bed and Gold, for example, portray an attractive woman. Samona adds: “I may be sitting there [in bed or in the wheelchair], but in my head, I’m imagining something else, a feeling of fantasty. I was keen to get away from any stereotypical views that are out there; this is something that we don’t talk about – I’m still a woman…I know lot of people living with illness and we can infiltrate popular culture and can present beautiful images.
“Disability in the media is about benefit culture, it’s a negative thing, and also a lot of the time I feel people [without disabilities] cannot relate to disabled people, they have one of two reactions – they look away or they overcompensate. But we are just normal people who have an illness – it does not change you as person. I can’t get up every morning and do my hair but it doesn’t take away the desire to be who I am and who I was before. We all suffer from some kind of weakness and vulnerability; some wear it on the outside and some on the inside.”
The project, says Samona, also stemmed from a desire to draw attention to the lack of support for disabled people and how the current welfare reforms are a threat to vulnerable people.
Samona, who has home care, adds: “It is important, especially after the Paralympics, to keep attention on disability – not say ‘well, the Paralympics was a positive thing, and now let’s move on’…we are not miserable people who don’t want to work and who are in chairs and who are a burden on society.” She worries about the government cuts. “Of course they pick on the most vulnerable members of society, most disabled people are suffering.. it’s difficult to get out of bed some days, let alone write a letter to make a complaint. They kick you while you’re down.”
The artists stress that their exhibition portrays the the challenging side of Samona’s experience, but has a positive message. “The full set of images we shot try to keep a balance of reality – so the truth is that there are great moments and we tried to show that in images like Gold, Samona still has something to offer, still a valuable person,” says Anthony.
Samona explains the story behind the shots above: Gold:
“When I realised that I wasn’t going to recover easily, quickly or perhaps not at all from this illness, I didn’t know what to do. I had so many dreams and goals and suddenly it felt as if I would no longer be an asset to this world. I was going to be a burden. A burden to my family, a burden to society, incapable of contributing anything to anyone. I sat and contemplated this new existence, I felt completely worthless and couldn’t really see the point of carrying on, I may as well end it, I thought. However the caterpillar struggles through its cocoon before it can become a butterfly and a rock undergoes immense pressure before it becomes a diamond. I slowly began to see this illness as less of a torment and more of a metamorphosis, a struggle into something greater than I was before. I saw my worth in a different way. I could still contribute to my family and I still have so much to give to society. How? By allowing myself to be me regardless of this illness and realising that rather than being worthless, I am worth more than ever before. I am valuable. I can still shine and I will still go on.”
Fragile:
“I sometimes wish I were wearing this fragile warning tape when I go out in the wheelchair so that people would heed the signage and treat me delicately. Being in a wheelchair means you are exposed and on show and people often have reactions, judgments and lack consideration. They may see you as an inconvenience or worst still behave like they don’t see you in a clumsy and nervous fashion. In my case, people behave confused ‘what exactly is wrong with her’. I see their questioning and it feels almost accusing sometimes, ‘You’re not really disabled.’ ‘You don’t look ill’. Imagine how that makes me feel. The physical pain is enough but this is coupled with emotional pain whenever I go out. I feel the need to explain, ‘Hey, I might look ok but I’m suffering every day’. I am broken physically and mentally and I wish people would understand. It would be easier if I could just wear the tape.”
Bed:
“I have found a new relationship with my bed. It’s like a marshmallow prison, necessary, uncomfortable, restricting and binding. It’s where I spend most of my time, in complete agony and pain. I feel restless, unable to sleep and too weak to stay awake. It’s a mind- numbing, agonizing, maddening experience being unable to move from the bed. Despite its billows of softness, feathered stage and relaxing countenance, it is not the pleasure pen that I wish it could be. There is no rest for me here. Yet I’m tied to it. I’m bound to it. There’s nothing sexy about being bed bound, though I wish to see it differently.”
Lutfur Rahman’s name is usually prefixed with the word “controversial”. It is an apt description of the first directly elected mayor of Tower Hamlets, in east London. He is the council’s ex-Labour leader turned independent mayoral candidate who won 2010’s election amid political intrigue, mudslinging and alleged links to Islamic fundamentalist groups – allegations he has repeatedly and categorically denied. His win, with 51% of the vote, handed Britain its first Muslim and Bangladesh-born executive mayor and the Labour party an intractable gulf between national leadership and grassroots activism. The rest of my piece is on the Guardian’s Society page.
A performance by secondary school pupils based on the stories of disabled people from post-war Britain to modern day (photo: Jon Legge/University of Leeds)
“I quite clearly remember being tied to the cot sides,” recalls Florence, now in her 70s, of the childhood she spent in hospital. “Literally, two wrists tied to the cot sides with cotton tape so as I couldn’t get up and I couldn’t sit up because they – the doctors – had decided that if there’s something wrong with your back, you have to lie prone.”
Florence’s memories are among those featured in a project that encourages schools to create theatrical performances based on real stories of disability from people born in the 1940s, 60s and 80s. The Changing Lives, Changing Times project involved workshops at three Leeds schools over five weeks last summer and led to the development of teaching packs. These help teachers run awareness-raising workshops about disability and are being sent out to UK schools by the end of the year.
The drive coincides with Disability History Month, which starts today.
The rest of my piece in the Guardian’s social care pages is here, and I’m devoting the remainder of this post to extracts from the stories of Florence and Dan, both born in the 1940s, Poppy, born in the 1960s, and Holly, born in the 1980s, reflecting the contrasting experiences of disabled people in different eras.
Florence was born in the late 1940s, the daughter of a single parent, but when doctors diagnosed that she would never walk, her birth mother left her. Florence attended mainstream schools throughout the 1950s. She left school and entered her first paid job in the mid 1960s as a telephonist and clerk. Her second job was as a typist. Florence is a trained social worker. She is single, she has no children, she drives her own car:
“There were all sorts of problems of having a child that wasn’t going to be able to get do things normally. The children’s home really wasn’t ideal and they decided that they would foster me out because there were too many kids running about in the children’s home and because I wasn’t mobile I was getting picked on, getting hit, getting spat at by the other children.
I then went to foster parents who, although they knew that I wasn’t going to be able to walk, said: “Oh yeah, we’ll manage that fine”. And they didn’t, and after two months I was back in the children’s home. The children’s home said “no, we can’t cope with her here because she’s not mobile” so I went back into hospital, where I didn’t really need to be but because there was nowhere else suitable and they couldn’t find another foster placement, so that’s where I went.
My mother still was saying, “I don’t want anything to do with this child’, which was really difficult for her because any time that I needed any surgery or any intervention they had to get hold of her, and every time I needed something obviously it brought it back to her that I wasn’t living with her. So that must have been really difficult for her.
A relative of a child that was in the next bed to me for quite a while came in and after a couple of times coming in she realised that there wasn’t anybody visiting me, because nobody from the children’s home came, my mother didn’t come, so nobody came. So she said; “Well could I still continue to visit after my niece goes home?”. And they [hospital staff] said: “Yeah if you want to”. You know: Why would you want to do this? And she said: “I just seem to have got on with her and she’s got a really nice smile”. And so after a couple of visits she’d sort of said to the nursing staff “Is there anything else I can do?” And the nursing staff had obviously said, “Well, you know, it’d be nice if you maybe spoke to the social worker”, and so they set up an appointment with the social worker – and I ended up going out to them. Initially short-term fostering and then it turned out as adoption eventually. So that was really just luck and chance.
I had absolutely no idea where I was going because there was no proprietary work done – no photograph of the house, nothing. They didn’t do things like that then, they just assumed that a child would cope with it, you know. So we ended up at this house and there were like two steps at the front door. Although they knew I couldn’t walk it just didn’t register. I suppose because they felt I could stand up, I could walk, and the two are not at all related, but to people that have not known disability … why would you think about it?
I don’t think my adoptive brother was really consulted that much about it and I think he just took the attitude, “well, I’m an adult, it’ll not bother me”. And so, because there was such a big gap there really wasn’t a very close bonding at all and there still isn’t, but there is with his children, so that’s okay.
Apparently one day when we were in the town shopping … my adoptive mother saw my other, saw my natural mother coming in the door … … and we turned and walked away. Now I have not even got any memory of what my natural mother looks like. I have nothing.”
Dan, born in the 1940s:
“I can remember, I should imagine possibly 7 or 8, being in and out of hospital and, it was suggested by the medical profession that I should go to a special school, and I always remember it was a real big old type of building and we used to be taken on a… on a blue single decker bus and this school was um, it… it was more about doing this like making raffia baskets and playing with you know, clay and they… they had gardens at the back and used to let us potter about, digging things up or planting things, but it didn’t seem to be you know, really academic type of thing, it was all about… and I always thought I was the least disabled person there to be honest.
You were sort of cotton-woolled, you went in and there was always lots of people to help you, you know go to your classroom, help you if you needed it, sitting down, people brought things to you all the time to your desk or whatever, and um, it was… you knew you was different and you had this all the time, you knew that you were, you was different from anybody else, those outside, your friends at ordinary school, you needed this particular facility because you had a disability, and it was always the physical disability that was sort of, you know, important. That’s why I’m sure you know, it was as though you were limited, your mental capacity was limited.”
Poppy, born in the 1960s, went to residential special school at the age of four until she was 16. The school became her social world and she remembers feeling bored and lonely at home during the summer holidays. Her ability to move around independently was limited by an inaccessible environment. At school there was a strict institutional regime of normalisation including intensive physio and speech therapy (“the more dependent you were, the less privileges you got”) and there was corporal punishment for non-compliance and allegations of sexual abuse from some children: “I knew it wasn’t right, but there was no one to tell”. Poppy also saw changes towards a more enlightened attitude in the late 1970’s and whilst academic expectations for the pupils were not high she was able to gain enough basic qualifications to enrol at a further education college. Here is Poppy’s story:
“My first memory of school was crawling down the corridor after my mum and dad had gone, and I was in tears, because I didn’t really understand what was happening. I never walked, I was on the floor, I always crawled, so I crawled down the corridor. So the headmistress picked me up, shouted at me and put me on my feet. They had bars on the walls, and she said ‘we don’t crawl here, we walk’ and I had to walk and I’ll never forget that. It was pretty traumatic at the time.
The school was very institutionalised, and you got up at 7 every day, including weekends, which I wasn’t too happy about, and they had set meals, you had set bath times, set bed times, the day completely structured. Luckily we did have lessons, they did try to educate you, as much as they though was possible, but I still think we had a substandard education. It wasn’t very tasking.
I remember one child getting hit around the head, and I knew it wasn’t right, but I was too scared to tell anyone.
A new headmistress came, and she had very new ideas about disabled children, and I think she had higher expectations of us, and she taught us about classical music, how to appreciate the arts, I think we responded to that quite well. We would go to the theatre or we would go on days out to the Tate Gallery.
The aim was to get us as independent as possible, but not independent to use a wheelchair to get about; you must walk, you must talk. I had speech therapy, although you couldn’t tell now. I had speech therapy, and , I had physiotherapy, and we had to dress ourselves, we had to feed ourselves, and some people weren’t able to do that; the more dependent you were, the less privileges you got. So because I could get dressed on my own, I could sneak a few minutes in bed longer in the morning, I had more freedom, you know, I could do as much as anyone, I could come and go as I pleased.
I think young people have a lot of pressure today, I think it’s harder, I know one lad, he’s at a non-disabled school and he finds it really hard to kind of be part of the whole system, because he is different, he knows he is different and in some ways, his school mates treat him differently and he hates that. I didn’t get that at school, we were all the same.
College was like a right of passage. It was where I learnt to become who I am now. The way I learnt to become, I think, an independent adult, not in the sense of learning to walk, dress and all that stuff but to think for myself, to have the choices that I wanted, and to be able to make those choices. Also it made the selection process more powerful because you knew you’d been selected because of your intelligence, and not someone patting you on the head.
I majored in English and my minor was in Sociology and we studied ethnicity, racism, and sexism, and different kinds of religions and beliefs, and age discrimination and class, nothing about disability, so at that point I wasn’t even aware I had a political identity as a disabled person.”
Holly was born, several months prematurely, in the 1980s. She was not expected to live for more than a few days and doctors advised her parents not to bond with her. Her parents separated after her impairment was diagnosed, so Holly lived with her mother, who gave up her career, and a step-brother from a previous marriage. Her mother re- married. Holly was sent to a residential special school when she was two-years-old, and stayed there until she was 18. When she left school, at the age of 18, Holly also left home, partly because she had become more distant from her parents, and because she had experienced some domestic violence and abuse. She went to a mainstream college to study dance, but never finished due to back problems. Holly lives alone in a council flat. She works as a volunteer for a local disability organization and a charity that supports children who have been abused. Holly has aspirations to do a paid job and marry her boyfriend:
“Some people are completely ignorant, not through malice but they are ignorant when it comes to disability. Somebody’s already formed in their own head what a disability means and if you kind of break their train of thought about what a disability is, you kind of completely shock them.
I think it’s changing very, very slowly but I don’t think it’s changing at the pace that it should be. I think there’s still an awful lot of undertone, tokenism, you know, people still get patronised when they’ve got a disability. I actually find the worst people for it are teenage girls – like girls in between the ages of let’s say fifteen to early twenties. I don’t know whether it’s because you know, I don’t quite understand, but I’ve experienced really quite bad attitudes with that kind of age group.
I still find it absolutely disgusting that women that need to access places like women’s refuges are turned away on the basis of their disability. I think people are still like –what do you mean domestic violence? Well, you’re disabled. Because they either think that you – that you are completely spoilt and wrapped up in cotton wool as a child, and obviously you can’t experience domestic violence from a partner because disabled people don’t have sex. I find the – worst thing a parent can do is pull a child away when they want to know why that lady is in a wheelchair. I wish to god parents would just let their children ask. And then maybe we could start educating from that age.”
When social housing provider One Vision Housing (OVH) reduced its total management costs by £2.8m in five years, it was partly due to the fact it had been benchmarking its back office functions.
The Merseyside-based group spends less now on what it terms its regularly recurring front and back office management than it did in 2006, when it was formed after a housing stock transfer from Sefton council. As a large transfer organisation with a very tight business plan, benchmarking to encourage efficiency was key, says operational director of finance Gaynor Robinson. However, Robinson emphasises that “it’s not just about identifying savings, it is about improving business processes and prioritising your resources … it’s about quality and governance”. Read the rest of my piece on the Guardian’s voluntary sector network pages.
A damp squib of a sticking plaster, or what health secretary Andrew Lansley has said is the “most comprehensive overhaul [of social care] since 1948” and an end to the care lottery?
Most early reaction to today’s long awaited care and support white paper and its associated draft bill is firmly on the side of the former view.
I’ve yet to read all the detail, but while there’s a much-needed focus on elderly care, there’s not enough of a recognition for other sections of society needing care and support, and nothing to plug the funding gap.
As Merrick Cockell, chairman of the Local Government Association, told Radio 4’s Today programme this morning: “We haven’t got time to tinker around…We’ve got to look at radical change.” The LGA has said there is a £1.4bn gap this year between the money available and the cost of maintaining social care services. There’s a good run down of the council perspective on the LGC website and while this post from Ermintrude2 was written before the publication of the white paper, it’s a really good explanation of the issues.
While today’s announcement picks up some from the Dilnot report (Dilnot suggested a system for the elderly where the total cost of care would be capped to £35,000 and support to old people should be extended to those with assets of £100,000), any “victory” for common sense and civil society is bittersweet because it fails to lacks the cash to make real far-sighted change a reality. The proposals might well show good will, but there’s no financial way (this communitycare.co.uk piece relates to the vision for social work, which could be undermined by the lack of cash).
It is, as shadow health secretary is quoted in the Guardian’s politics live blog as saying, “a pick and mix approach to the Dilnot package”. So the government hasn’t taken up the “once in a lifetime opportunity” that Dilnot mentioned when he launched his vision of how to fix the social care system.
Among today’s main points are plans for an optional social insurance scheme under which people pay the government premiums to ensure that their costs for care and accommodation are capped, and a “universal deferred payments” system where councils lend money to those needing care, then recover the cash when the house is sold after death. Sound sensible – perhaps even familiar? That’s because it’s already in use – around 9,000 people already used deferred payments.
Today’s government press statement suggests we watch this space: “The government will continue to work with stakeholders to consider in more detail variants under the principles of the Dilnot commission’s model, before coming to a final view in the next spending review.”
Having already waited with bated breath for today’s long overdue white paper and draft bill, it’s unlikely that many will hold it much longer.
Here’s a flavour (by no means a comprehensive round up) of reaction on Twitter and the web to today’s social care white paper:
Richard Humphries, senior fellow at the King’s Fund: “There is a financial vacuum at the heart of these proposals which undermines the bold and ambitious vision for a reformed system set out in the White Paper.”
Julia Unwin, chief executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation: “Successive governments have failed to act. Without a sense of urgency more of us face insecurity and uncertainty as we age. The failure to address social care properly will only mean more pressure on the NHS thereby destroying all hopes of a sustainable and functioning health system in the future.”
Clare Pelham, chief executive of disability charity Leonard Cheshire Disability: “It is a question of fundamental decency that disabled and older people should be able to live their lives with dignity in Britain in the 21st century. We hear a great deal about the need to support older people through dignified social care, but it is important that the needs of younger disabled people are not overlooked.”
Mark Goldring, chief executive of Mencap:”The social care system is in crisis. Years of underinvestment and cuts to services have left one in four adults with a learning disability literally stuck in the home, isolated and at risk, with family carers at breaking point and scared about the future…We are reassured to see that the Government has committed to fund immediate reforms, but this promising blue print will never get off the ground if it fails to address the chronic underfunding in social care. The Government cannot delay any longer, and must now outline an urgent plan of how it intends to fund social care reform in the long term.”
Carers UK chief executive Heléna Herklots: “The measures set out in the draft Care and Support Bill would move from piecemeal carers’ rights legislation to the establishment of carers’ rights in government legislation and, for the first time, equalise carers’ rights with disabled people rights…But to make these rights a reality, what carers also need is a social care system with the resources to overcome years of chronic underfunding and rapidly growing demand. Those who face soaring care bills, service cuts and a daily struggle to access even basic support from the social care system, may see new rights in legislation as empty promises without the funding to back them up.”
David Orr, chief executive of the National Housing Federation: “We’re pleased the White Paper recognises that housing is crucial to the integration of health and social care, and welcome the investment to build more supported housing for older people and younger disabled adults…We need a health service that invests in services that keep people out of hospital, not one that simply treats them when they get there….the Department of Health needs to encourage local government and the NHS to pool budgets, focus on housing-based preventative services and set out its full proposals for the funding of social care – for today and for tomorrow.”
Nick Young, chief executive of the British Red Cross: “That the Government is accused of failing to address the social care crisis is no surprise. The scale of the funding problem is enormous and growing. It will take courage, creativity and tremendous degree of political will to solve. That isn’t going to happen overnight.”
@ageuklondon Though it contains some good ideas, the #carewhitepaper doesn’t go far enough. The problem of care will not go away and is getting worse!
@Sensetweets Deafblind people continue to be abandoned, as funding fails to materialise – our response to the #carewhitepaper
@TonyButcher #carewhitepaper – like excitedly looking forward to your birthday but then only getting a cheap pair of Primark socks – disappointing
@gary_rae If this is a “watershed moment” for #ukcare then we’re clearly drowning. #carecantwait #dilnot
@Marc_Bush Care crisis demanded decisive action. Today we got a holding statement…’ @scope rspnd 2 @DHgovuk #carewhitepaper http://tiny.cc/scopetocare
@WoodClaudia focus on deferred payments in #carewhitepaper due to absence of other funding ideas. It is option for some, not THE solution being proposed
@Ermintrude2 Disappointed that headlines about #carewhitepaper all seem to concentrate on selling houses to pay for care. System about so much more.
I had to share the infographic below from learning disability charity United Response which, if you’ve not already seen it, lays bare the impact of cuts to disability living allowance (DLA), the benefit that helps people with care and mobility costs.
Compare these stark sums to Ian Duncan Smith’s much-criticised claims that the number of people claiming DLA had risen by 30% in recent years and its cost will soon soar to around £13bn a year.
Not that a war of figures is the thing here; as shocking as the total numbers below are, the persuasive argument against the cuts is the individual stories of the difference this vital benefit makes to people’s lives and what will happen if it is cut. It’s easy for politicians to bat percentages and pound signs back and forth (and fudge the facts and stats, as the Spartacus report suggested earlier this year); it is harder to ignore the personal stories of how reform will make life even more difficult for those who are already vulnerable.
As Rob, a wheelchair-user who has multiple sclerosis, commented in a blogpost on the Voluntary Organisations Disability Group (VODG) website (I manage the group’s blog), DLA allows him to be more independent: “Whilst it isn’t always easy, I think you have to make the most of life. The DLA enables that life to be a better one.”
Take a look at the figures:
How the cuts to Disability Living Allowance will affect disabled people
Government is passing down an unprecedented austerity drive to local government. In the perfect storm of cuts, rising unemployment and ageing population, the budget failed to throw much of a lifeline to local government.
But as the Treasury resigns councils to choppy financial waters for longer than predicted, how far have authorities grasped the notion of prolonged austerity? Can they handle what needs to be done long term and to put it bluntly, how bad can it get?
It is the biggest council housing landlord in London and the fourth largest in the country. With 39,000 rented and 16,700 leasehold homes, a 19,000-strong waiting list and almost 15,000 properties needing repair ( “non-decent”, 2010 figures) the scale of Southwark council’s housing challenge demands a radical response. Housing barrister Jan Luba is to chair a pioneering study into housing need and policy – but will the council listen to it? Read my the rest of my piece on the Guardian website here.
Think homelessness and film and you can’t fail but think of Cathy Come Home. While the social action that followed Ken Loach’s cinematic call to arms was a one-off, the film project The Truth About Stanley could be a modern take on that artistic tradition; a visually striking and thought-provoking piece of social realism that seeks to raise not only awareness about homelessness, but funding.
Just today the government’s new homelessness figures showed 48,510 households were classed as homeless in 2011, a 14% rise on 2010. The situation has led one charity chief executive, Leslie Morphy, of Crisis, to demand action from the government amid the “perfect storm” – a combination of economic downturn, joblessness, soaring demand for affordable housing, housing benefit reform and cuts to homelessness services.
This is the dire social and economic backdrop to the forthcoming film shot by award-winning director Lucy Tcherniak. The Truth About Stanley tells the story of two rough sleepers who make unlikely friends; Stanley, an elderly Congelese man, and Sam, 10.
Still from The Truth About StanleyStanley (Oliver Litondo) in The Truth About Stanley
The non-linear narrative is intriguing, opening as it does with the death of Stanley and developing into questions about Stanley’s past and the reasons for Sam being on the streets.
Sam (Raif Clarke), The Truth About StanleySam, The Truth About Stanley
The lines between reality and fiction are blurred as the pair’s friendship develops and Stanley regales his young runaway companion with stories from his past. Or, as the website neatly puts it: “No home, no belongings, plenty of baggage. A short film about a man, his stories and the boy who listened.”
The project, a twist on more traditional donation campaigns, aims to raise money for two homelessness organisations, social enterprise The Big Issue Foundation and charity Anchor House.
The film offers a much-needed focus on the twin issues of older and younger rough sleepers. Entrenched rough sleeping is common among older rough sleepers but accurate figures on the issue and that of homelessness among older people are hard to come by, partly because of the hidden homelessness and the lack of age breakdown in head counts.
According to Homeless Link, however, the 2010 total of street counts in authorities with a known or suspected rough sleeping problem was 440 and generally around 18% are over 50-years-old.
As for children sleeping rough, again the figures lack accuracy, but according to the charity Railway Children, at least 100,000 children runaway in the UK every year and many are not reported as missing by their parents or carers. According to youth homelessness charity Centrepoint, 80,000 young people experience homeless in the UK each year.
The 20-minute film is being produced in association with Oscar-winning Trademark Films and features songs by Radiohead and Mumford and Sons. Stanley is played by renowened Kenyan actor Oliver Litondo, the lead from the international feature film The First Grader and Sam by 12-year-old Raif Clarke. This Guardian piece from last year tells you a bit more.
The trailer and shots here (photographs by Ben Millar Cole) have been released ahead of the premiere on April 2 at the Rich Mix cinema in Shoreditch. The film will be and released online on April 4th.
*To donate text STANLEY2, 3 or 6 to 70300 to give £2, £3 OR £6 to The Truth About Stanley fund or visit the project’s Just Giving page.
100% of the donation will go to homeless charities Anchor House and The Big Issue Foundation. Follow the film on Twitter.
