12th Nov 2009 - Investigation under way at Sefton Council. Managers at Sefton Council have viewed the Respect or Neglect ? DVD and are currently conducting an investigation and liaising with the various agencies who were part of the multi-agency approach to my father's support. Unfortunately, Adullam's charity status (and thus exemption from the Freedom of Information Act) doesn't even allow Sefton Council to view my Father's Casefile at Adullam. When the DVD is released to the media this exemption issue will be a key campaign issue. 10th Sept 2009 - Progress update. The majority of Adullam Housing's funders and partners have now been informed of my father's case and have received copies of the Respect Or Neglect ? DVD. I've received responses from approx thirty of these organisations, which range from shock, concern, anger and the launching of reviews of existing contracts with Adullam Housing ... to apathy and disinterest - the "your father's case didn't occur under our locality" response. Fortunately, only a handful of managers have responded with the latter and none of them have challenged the evidence presented in the DVD. The variation of response certainly reveals the importance of personal attitudes of managers and how it relates to regulation of services. One of the most surprising responses was that of The Mental Health Foundation, who include the following as descriptions of their work on their website.
From this description one would expect a Watchdog with these kinds of mission statements to take a detailed interest in a case such as my father's. However Kathryn Hill, the Director of Mental Health Programmes for the company has written to me that the Mental Health Foundation "cannot be seen to take sides, especially without hearing from the other parties implicated in the story". I wrote back to Kathryn and explained the total contradiction between her reply and the company's mission statements. I also reminded her that Adullam's detailed responses are included in the film, and I requested that she contact Adullam to get their side of the story for herself. Kathryn has not replied. If you feel the Mental Health Foundation are being unreasonable in this matter then feel free to send an email to the organisation. Their contact details are available on the Mental Health Foundation website. Further steps are currently being taken in terms of distributing the DVD to appropriate sources. Further updates will be added to this page as feedback is received. 9th July 2009 - The full film can now be downloaded as a single video file. Click the "Watch the Video" link on the menu left screen. 30th June 2009 - The first 17 minutes of the film can now be watched here on the site. Click the "Watch the Video" link on the menu left screen. 21st June 2009 - The full edit of the film is complete.
|