“Devastating” day centre cuts for Manchester’s elderly and disabled challenged at council
Article published: Wednesday, September 4th 2013
A “devastating” decision to close two Manchester City Council day care centres for adults with learning disabilities has been “called in” for scrutiny following outrage from carers.
Plans to shut Northfields in Moston and Eric Hobin in Charlestown as part of a £1.7m cuts package have been condemned by carers, who say closures will have a “catastrophic effect on people’s ability to live fulfilling, independent lives.”
Town Hall chiefs approved the decision in July despite a 1,000 strong petition opposing the plans and strong objections from Health Scrutiny Committee councillors, who warned that the proposals could violate the council’s own social care policy.
It is understood that opposition Lib Dem councillors have now “called in” the decision, which will be reconsidered by tomorrow’s Health Scrutiny Committee on Thursday, 5 September at 2pm in Committee Room 11, Manchester Town Hall.
The committee may approve the plans, pass them back to the council’s leadership with recommendations or put the decision before a meeting of the full council if the service review is judged to violate the Labour-dominated council’s core policies.
A fourth centre, Oakwood in Northernden, was earmarked for closure but will now remain open for people considered to have the most critical needs. It too will close by 2017 however, with clients passed to a PFI—built centre in Brunswick operated by a non-council provider.
Vulnerable
The centres cater to some of Manchester’s most vulnerable residents including adults with learning disabilities, the elderly and people with physical disabilities.
The council says the number of centre users has halved since 2010 due to people using personalised budgets to access service elsewhere, and claims that no residents will lose day care provision as affected users will be consolidated into the city’s three remaining centres.
But furious carers allege that recently introduced care reassessments are slashing the number of days users are entitled to use the service, and warn that many may either have to leave work to care for disabled family members during the day or place relatives into residential care.
Robert Churchill, whose daughter uses Northfields, told Mule that “If Northfields closes the impact is going to be devastating for people.” Churchill also disagreed that there were sufficient services for people with low and moderate learning disabilities. “There’s nothing in place”, he argued.
Choices, choices
Officials insist that “choice for customers will be increased as access and support is made available to more universally accessible services”, with greater use of individual care budgets and people with mild to moderate learning disabilities directed to universal provision through libraries and leisure centres.
Some carers denied that users would be left with any real choice, however. “They’re saying you have a choice but you haven’t got a choice” said Paul, whose relative uses one of the centres. “Because the council is taking your choice away from you.”
Paul told Mule that the council may not have kept track of what alternative support, if any, that users who had left the centres since 2010 were accessing. “They’ve not got an impact statement on people not in the centres”, he said. “They cannot tell you what happened to these people. Where are they?”
Executive member for Adults’ Health and Wellbeing Councillor Paul Andrews said, “Our plans have been creative out of financial necessity – but they mean that there won’t be a single resident losing day centre provision. We will do our utmost to keep friends together and offer provision on geographic and personal needs.
“We have statutory duties to fulfill and we have a duty of care to make sure our residents and our staff are safe – and we believe that using the bigger, more modern buildings is a sustainable plan which will allow us to develop the activities and resources we have on offer.”
Richard Goulding
Comments
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Hello Mule…what is planned on this to demonstrate public opposition. Date time and place would be really helpful.
also a bit more background digging ..how much do Manchester charge for these facilities? They used to come close to the top. three years ago they were charging £50.00 for elderly people to sit in a condemned church hall. Please give us a bitof background.
Comment by Carer on September 4, 2013 at 5:30 pm -
The Finance Scrutiny Committee meeting is Thurs 5th September at 10am.
Venue: Committee Room 11, Manchester Town Hallhttp://www.manchester.gov.uk/meetings/meeting/1935/finance_scrutiny_committee
See you there?!
Comment by Marc Hudson on September 4, 2013 at 5:37 pm -
AAARGH…. Wrong scrutiny committee mentioned (by me).
This – from the article. “It is understood that opposition Lib Dem councillors have now “called in” the decision, which will be considered by tomorrow’s Health Scrutiny Committee on Thursday, 5 September at 2pm in Committee Room 11, Manchester Town Hall.”
IF the Health Scrutiny Committee does indeed say “reconsider” then presumably it would go on the (packed!) agenda for Executive on Sept 11th.
“The committee may approve the plans, pass them back to the council’s leadership with recommendations or put the decision before a meeting of the full council if the service review is judged to violate the Labour-dominated council’s core policies.”
Comment by Marc Hudson on September 4, 2013 at 5:41 pm -
Hi
As above, the relevant meeting is the Health Scrutiny Committee tomorrow (Thurs 5th Sept) at 2pm, committee room 11 in the Town Hall. It’s open to the public.
There’s a little more background in the link below but there is more to this story and we will be following this up.
http://manchestermule.com/article/day-care-centres-under-closure-threat
Comment by richard on September 4, 2013 at 5:44 pm -
Hello Carer,
I don’t personally know of any protests, but the scrutiny committee is open to the public. From the council’s website:
“Get Involved
To find out more information have a look at our full work programme. This includes what topics we will be looking at, what specific issues we will be considering and who we will be hearing from. Please bear in mind that the programme is continually updated, and so dates and agenda items may change from those listed in the programme.
If there’s an issue you want to contribute to, let us know. You can either send a written contribution to scrutiny@manchester.gov.uk or you can attend a meeting and ask the Chair if you can speak. You can also suggest a topic for us to look into by filling in our ‘suggestions form.’
If you want to speak to somebody about contributing to the committee, please call our scrutiny support officer on 0161 234 3011 or e mail scrutiny@manchester.gov.uk
[source: http://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/100004/the_council_and_democracy/5168/health_scrutiny_committee ]
Comment by Lulu on September 4, 2013 at 11:44 pm -
There’s also some more information on this page of the council’s website:
http://www.manchester.gov.uk/meetings/meeting/1951/health_scrutiny_committee
You can see the agenda and also the relevant document ‘5. Call-in: Day Services’.
Comment by Lulu on September 4, 2013 at 11:48 pm -
What a comtemptible and disgusting way to treat the vulnerable .
Comment by tim on September 5, 2013 at 5:35 pm
These greedy ,grabbing, grubby CLOWNCILS have plenty of our extorted money.
Don’t be fooled , People . -
We should all make an alliance , and a stand to smash these evil thatcherite policies .
I advocate mass refusal to pay council tax .
Comment by Ged on September 12, 2013 at 5:42 pm -
I agree .
Council tax is illegal.
No contract exists between those forced to pay money and these greedy , rotton ,and corrupt councils.It is Extortion.
We must refuse to be extorted by the Rotton Council cheats and liars .
We must fight back .
Comment by Al on September 21, 2013 at 12:05 pm -
Yes.
Council tax is illegal .
No contract exists to pay this extortion .Mass refusal to pay now .
Comment by Dean on April 13, 2014 at 2:17 pm -
Vote TUSC .
Comment by Andy on May 2, 2014 at 3:51 pm
The comments are closed.
