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15 July 2010
The issue of safeguarding adults at risk of abuse has gone very quiet over the last month, partly because we have been keeping our collective mouths shut and partly because other issues have dominated the wider political agenda. Silence however hasn't been through any sudden lack of interest on our part, but because we were assessing the impact of the change of Government and where adult safeguarding fits into the new scheme of things,
Of course, it would be easy to say that things could not have become any worse with a new Government than we experienced under the previous administration. The last eighteen months for adult safeguarding, and for us as the primary Third Sector voice on the subject, were not easy. Our written submissions to DH were invariably marginalised - we submitted one of the most comprehensive documents possible to the No Secrets Review and it was very obviously ignored - and our contributions to meetings were often treated with disinterest, to the point where it became pointless to attend events other than to keep the flag flying. And, of course, a major hit for AEA was when DH refused to provide any further funding for the charity, presumably on the basis that, if they couldn't shut us up, they certainly weren't going to give us funding to effectively subsidise what we were saying. We have no doubt that the decision had nothing to do with the quality or content of our proposals and everything to do with what had gone wrong with the Government, and perhaps with a civil service who had stopped giving the Government any advice that they (the civil servants) judged might not 'fit' with what Ministers wanted to hear.
How far Labour had traveled, and what a sad route they had taken, from the days when they published the elder abuse prevalence study and committed to the Review of No Secrets, a document that they had originally introduced back in 2000. And there is no doubt that we might have held a very different view on their ultimate track record if Ivan Lewis had not been replaced by Phil Hope - one of the many actions taken by Gorden Brown for what seems to have been personal rather than sound political reasons. And we could no doubt be forgiven for viewing somewhat cynically the observations of one ex-Labour Minister at last months National Pensioner's Convention who agreed that what was needed was Adult Protection legislation. Yeah, right! Perhaps she should have said that two months ago to her (now unemployed) former colleague when he was Minister of State for social care.
So, where do we go from here? Well, someone who we trust significantly on this matter suggested recently to us that the General Election should be considered a 're-set button' when it comes to safeguarding in general, and also to the debate on safeguarding and personalisation.
We agree. And we're pushing that button because, for adult safeguarding and elder abuse, and despite the dire financial challenges facing the country, the Coalition Government still offers a much better chance to have grown-up discussions on these matters, and achieve strong foundations for adult protection, than was ever likely to be the case with the Brown Government and Phil Hope. And we look forward to that.
SOURCE: ElderAbuseAdultProtection blog
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