Homecare scandal

May 25th, 2009

It didn’t make any better viewing the second time round.

This week, a special screening of the recent Panaroma programme, Britain’s Homecare Scandal, which exposed some of the awful failures of the country’s at-home care provision for the elderly, was arranged in the Parliament.

I was shocked by the programme when I first watched it weeks ago and immediately argued for a Scottish Parliament inquiry into the shortcomings of this system.

With the first evidence session starting next week in my committee, this screening was an opportunity to see again the poor standard of service these elderly people had to endure.

Aswell as meeting with the programme makers, I was also joined by Inverclyde’s elderly champion, Nell McFadden, who had her own forthright view to give after seeing the video.

The sight of elderly man – a war veteran no less - being given a bed bath while his carer talked on her mobile phone was just one of the unedifying clips the programme makers captured on camera.

These daily visits act as lifelines to the elderly confined to their homes yet these companies were seen regularly cutting a half hour visits down to a matter of minutes.

The controversial e-procurement is clearly at the heart of the problem and will be the main focus on the forthcoming inquiry.

This process allows private car providers to bid in a reverse e-auction for contracts, just like you would bid for cheap jewellery on a home shopping channel.

There is no doubt that it brought prices down to an unsustainable level and care quality was compromised as a result.

The programme asks difficult questions of us all - no one wants to face up to the realities of getting old and sometimes it is easier to just to imagine that these problems don’t exist.

But we have a duty to look after these older people who simply want to remain at home. After all, they looked after us when it was their turn.