VODG Blog:

With spending cuts biting and the number of support hours available from paid staff reducing, it's time that we as a sector got real about supporting the people with whom we work to connect to their community and to carve out a life which is not dependent on people who are paid to be with them.

One of our tenants Rob, 50, also volunteers at the trust. He used to be a mortgage advisor until worsening Multiple Sclerosis symptoms meant he had to give up work. Rob has limited power in his arms and limitations with hearing and memory. As a wheelchair-user, most public transport in his area is inaccessible and he relies on a car. He can't drive, but his partner can. Rob's DLA (disability living allowance) contributes to the car’s costs through the Motability scheme. He relies on his DLA payments to be independent.

The UK's annual care bill totals £23 billion. Easy, therefore, to understand the case for tighter economic regulation of social care but, as VODG has already argued on this blog, while the end seems logical, the means are less clear.

When does being “looked after” turn into a case of being “locked up?” When the theory of the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DOLS) stands in stark contrast to some of the reality on the ground.

Jane (not her real name) hadn’t heard of personal budgets until her council told her that her learning disabled son qualified for one worth an annual £40,000. A United Response finance manager met Jane at a “market place” event (where service users, families and carers can find out more about provision), just as she was planning the tailor-made support to help her son buy with his social care spending money.

Rarely have standards and quality in health and social care commanded such public, political and media attention. In the last few months alone, the Winterbourne View scandal, the Dilnot commission report on social care reform and the recent damning Stafford Hospital inquiry are among the issues that have catapulted care to the top of the national agenda.

Lucy (not her real name) wanted the same freedom of choice as her siblings, both of whom had moved away from the family home in the North East to study. But until two years ago, there was little to suggest that Lucy, who is profoundly deaf, has cerebral palsy and no discernible speech, would realise her ambition. Lucy lacked confidence and her mother, who acted as her full-time carer, was very protective of her daughter.

If the demise of care home group Southern Cross led people to call for better economic regulation of social and health care, then recent news that more care homes are going bust has made demands for action even louder.

Before a recent pilot mental health scheme in Stockport, one vulnerable woman, prone to frequent moments of crisis, would routinely call for an ambulance, sometimes twice a day. Distressed and hearing voices, she would dial 999 and then, at the hospital, staff would calm her down before sending her home in a taxi. One can only imagine that the cost to the public sector ran into tens of thousands of pounds a year.

“It makes the difference between existing and having a life that’s worth living”. The crucial role of mobility payments for disabled people is laid bare in this powerful comment, submitted to the Low Review on Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and personal mobility in state-funded residential care.

Personality questionnaires and aptitude tests have long been used when recruiting in the business world, but social care providers are increasingly turning to psychometric testing in the pursuit of quality frontline and management staff.

Here’s an unusual proposition; I’d far rather the staff at Dimensions are able to listen to someone like Anne-Marie*, someone we support in her 50s who features in our new book about personalisation, than they listen to me, their chief executive.

Social care regulation rarely makes it onto the public or political radar. Interest, generally speaking, is usually confined to care professionals, service users and their families or the policy wonks in charge of regulatory issues.

Imagine saving more than £6m in adult social care across an entire region at a time when the public sector faces an unprecedented squeeze on funding and the ageing population places extra demand on already stretched services. Now imagine if this saving, could also ease the pressure on protracted cost negotiations between providers and commissioners and help with the planning of future services.

Might the recession be a catalyst for social care voluntary organisations to reshape themselves? How should care providers respond in a climate of rapidly dwindling public spending, fast-changing policies on everything from NHS to welfare and localism? What does it mean to be a not-for-profit provider in post-recession UK and what are the responsibilities of such organisations in the years ahead?

Market development: two words unlikely to raise much interest if you’re a frontline social care worker, and even less, one imagines, if you’re a service user or carer.