The London 2012 Paralympic Games will be held between 29th August and 9th September this summer. They were the dream of Dr Ludwig Guttmann of Stoke Mandeville Hospital, who organised the 1948 International Wheelchair Games for those injured during World War II, coinciding with the 1948 London Olympics. The first Paralympic Games were held in 1960 in Rome, with 400 athletes from 23 countries.

Since then, the Paralympics have gone from strength to strength, and will return to their birthplace in London this year, as a record 4,200 athletes from 160 countries compete across 20 events. Like the Olympics, the Paralympics also have a winter equivalent, which will next take place in Sochi, Russia in 2014.

The Paralympic Torch Relay, which the five of us will participate in, will take place between 24th and 29th August. Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales will celebrate by each lighting a national Flame. The four Flames will then be united at the Paralympic Flame Lighting Ceremony in Stoke Mandeville, creating the London Paralympic Flame. From there, the Torchbearers will carry the Flame in teams of five from Stoke Mandeville to the Olympic Stadium, ultimately lighting the Cauldron at the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 Paralympic Games. 

The opening ceremony on 29th August will feature deaf and disabled artists, injured soldiers and former Paralympic athletes. Artistic director, Bradley Hemmings, said: “We want to transform the perception of disabled people in this country and globally.” These comments could be transposed on to the Paralympic Games as a whole. As Bradley says, “…it is a show that is full of humanity and heart…”

As the storm that accompanied the journey of the Health and Social Care Bill to Royal Assent subsided, our sector has enjoyed relative calm in the past month.  However, despite Parliamentary recess for Easter, several noteworthy policy developments from the Department of Health are worthy of discussion.

The proposed changes to tobacco packaging attracted considerable political and media attention. Tobacco displays were removed from supermarkets at the beginning of the month, and a consultation to determine the potential impact of plain packaging for tobacco products was launched shortly afterwards.  At the launch of the consultation, which will take evidence from NHS and local authority chief executives, Health Minister Andrew Lansley was keen to stress that the Government has an open mind on the issue.

Significantly, this is the first time that a consultation has detailed what requirements for standardised packaging might consist of, including no branding, a uniform colour and a standard font and text.  This move has predictably seen reaction from the tobacco industry. John Noble, Director of British Brands Group, was sceptical about the impact the legislation will have on reducing smoking, saying:

“We feel plain packaging risks taking a myopic view of branding where it is seen as an unproven link between the role of branding and smoking behaviour, while it ignores the wider role of branding.

Cancer campaigners will also have been cheered by the news of significant developments in the treatment of cancer, specifically breast cancer and prostate cancer.  The Government published a guidance note for GPs on the referral process for patients with suspected cancer, entitled “Direct access to diagnostic tests for cancer: best practice referral pathways for general practitioners.”  The note is part of a wider strategy for early intervention and the referral to diagnostic test to rule out or diagnose cancer at an early stage.

Later in the month, the highly politicised topic of foreign language checks for doctors was in the media spotlight. The Department of Health launched proposals to ensure foreign language checks for doctors practicing in England, which were debated at Prime Minister’s Questions. The issue was thrust into the public eye in 2008, when David Gray, from Manea in Cambridgeshire, was unlawfully killed by Daniel Ubani, a German Locum GP. Ubani’s linguistic shortcomings meant that he mistakenly injected his patient with 100mg of diamorphine – 10 times the recommended maximum dose. Under the terms of the new proposals, senior doctors, who are responsible for ensuring other doctors’ fitness to practice, will also be responsible for ensuring their understudies have a sufficient grasp of English. 

Elsewhere, delegates at the Nursing and Quality Care Forum were challenged by Prime Minister David Cameron to actively seek out best practice across the NHS. The forum, made up of 22 health care professionals, will seek to determine and implement best practice, and has been established as part of the on-going drive to ensure the majority of nurses’ time is spent caring, rather than on other peripheral tasks.

The forthcoming and much delayed White Paper on Social Care, which will set out how the government intends to reform the care sector’s legal framework, funding and delivery, promises to dominate the agenda over the coming weeks. ECCA members can expect, therefore, that health and social care will continue to feature prominently on the national political and media agenda for some time to come. It remains to be seen, however, whether it will attract similar levels of controversy.

With our closest neighbours showing such political fervour, is Britain’s voting apathy a product of the electoral system or a disillusion in politicians’ ability to produce change?
France’s political instinct is intrinsically linked to an unmovable belief in the rights of citizens, forged largely through five Republics and three revolutions. Having twice deposed their Monarch the French hold their right to elect their leaders close to their hearts. Choosing their President matters to the French. Rightly or wrongly, the President is seen as having the power to change France’s political direction. In addition France’s proportional system helps smaller parties create a political momentum and foster the sense that political alternatives are possible.

In majoritarian Britain, however, voting for a smaller party can feel like a wasted vote despite the Coalition Government. Being able to directly elect a leader may also explain the divide. Even with the introduction of the Leaders’ Debates, UK General Elections still amount to voting for parliamentary candidates, who in turn influence who resides in Downing Street. By contrast Presidential Elections, present a direct link between the electorate and the Elysée.

Presidential Elections are also breeding grounds for personality politics and populist rhetoric. The current election has seen Socialist hopeful François Hollande, and the National Front’s Marine Le Pen, fight for ‘the people’s candidate’ mantle in opposition to Nicolas Sarkozy’s image as ‘the President of Bling’. Britain is no stranger to personality politics, this May’s London Mayoral election pits two of the UK most recognisable politicians against each other. Yet according to Democratic Audit the Ken vs. Boris rematch is failing to gather much interest. With turnout forecasted to plunge as low as 38%, many Londoners seem to have little interest in City Hall.

So perhaps it’s not just the political system that fails to create a political spark with British voters. The continued gloomy economic outlook, coupled with media and expenses scandals seems to have led many voters to view politics with a certain level of cynicism. This is not to say the French are less disillusioned with their political classes – far from it.  But while UK frustration with politics is leading to electoral apathy, France’s proportional system promises distinctive alternatives to the status quo, keeping the French determined to have a voice in their country’s leadership.

However, in a society where having a personal accountant is no longer the domain of the super rich, when does cunning accounting become “aggressive” tax avoidance, and when does this become immoral, let alone illegal?

Amongst those who have received a particularly bad press in recent weeks is Amazon, which is alleged to have avoided taxes on sales of £7.6 billion in the UK, through a registered parent company based in Luxembourg. In the past U2, one of Ireland’s greatest exports, has also received heavy criticism for registering part of their business in Holland, reaching fever pitch with the creation of a website www.makebonopaytax.com*and protests at Glastonbury.

So does this constitute abuse? After all, our current tax system has in part been designed to enable certain groups and individuals to pay less tax as a means of promoting entrepreneurship and stimulating economic growth – both critical in these post recession times. Take for instance this year’s Budget statement, where George Osborne announced the Government’s intention to give UK video game producers tax breaks to stem the relocation of the industry to Canada. Or indeed ISAs, where many of us place money for the sole purpose of paying less tax.

Alas, the Government’s proposed solution to the problem has proven no less controversial as plans to cap tax reliefs on charitable donations have sparked outrage across the third sector. As proposals currently stand, from 2013 uncapped tax reliefs - including those on charitable donations - are to be capped at £50,000 or 25% of a person’s income, whichever is higher.

The backlash from these moves has been swift and strong and, once again, the Government has had to take a step back and open the plans to further scrutiny. We shall wait to see how the issue plays out in what has been one of the Government’s most difficult months since coming to power.

* This website has subsequently been taken down

Such anecdotes go a long way to explaining why Mark Zuckerberg decided to shell out $1billion USD in stock and cash to buy Instagram earlier this week. Currently, with 30 million users, Instagram users are valued at $28 per head.

The question is, was it worth it?

One argument is that this purchase is a necessary step to leverage the photo sharing capabilities of Facebook into the mobile world. As a first time user of Facebook in 2004, sitting at my desktop screen in my university halls, I could never have envisioned photo sharing on a touch screen phone. That is Facebook’s current weakness. In order to expand the extensive photo sharing functions of Facebook and move away from the static nature of the desktop platform, Facebook needs to entrench its brand on mobile platforms through popular apps. Enter Instagram.

The second argument is that Facebook is likely beyond its peak in terms of user numbers. Even if it developed an app to compete with Instagram, its launch on iPhone and Android would not have exponentially grown Facebook’s user-base. By purchasing Instagram it has bought a pre-existing network of users.  Thirty million registered Instagram users to sell to advertisers means a greater ability for Facebook to monetise its mobile presence.

The third argument goes back to basics. When Facebook first launched within the American university community, it was cool. Now lagging behind trendy mobile social networking apps, Facebook is in a fight to meet the ‘cool’ threshold. If indeed Facebook manages Instagram as an independent brand with its own identity, able to network with other social media third party groups apart from Facebook, it may revitalise its coolness among users. However, if Facebook chooses to smother Instagram much like Twitter did to Summify when it purchased the start-up, Facebook’s increasingly corporate-style identity may cut away at its own user base more than Instragram may have been able to do as a competitor.

Regardless of how the world of social media mergers and acquisitions evolves, what is clear is that major players with a large market share are willing and able to seek out talent and fresh ideas well beyond the start-up price.

Having first advised Scope back in the late 1990s, I followed with interest the advent of Disability Rights UK, a charity which is led, run and operated by disabled people, with disabled people making up at least three-quarters of its Board Members.  The charity focuses on promoting meaningful independent living for disabled people, promoting leadership and control and helping to break the link between disability and poverty.

PLMR’s Alexis Darby and Kevin Craig with Cllr Neil Coyle, Head of Policy at Disability Rights UK

So in 2012 one of the things that gave us immense pleasure was when PLMR sponsored DRUK’s Extraordinary General Meeting and Debate ‘Are disabled people powerless? The panel included former MP Roger Berry, who had co-chaired the All-party Parliamentary Group on Disability, Linda Burnip from Disabled People against the Cuts, Stephen Brookes, Co-ordinator of the National Hate Crime Network and Neil Crowther, formerly Director of Human Rights at the Equality and Human Rights Commission. My colleague Alexis Darby spent the whole day there and came back very energised.

Roger Berry began the debate arguing that disabled people are not powerless and can influence government policy. Roger outlined that 80% of Government spending cuts have yet to come into place and when they do, in his view, more disabled people will be driven into poverty. Roger focused on the media’s depiction of disabled people as scroungers and ‘living off benefits’ – a problem that PLMR will return to publicly in May 2012.  The best way to respond to the challenges disabled people face is to engage with Government says Roger and challenge discrimination wherever it occurs.

Linda Burnip, Stephen Brookes and Neil Crowther all passionately echoed Roger’s sentiments. Neil explained that he feels society is moving away from the idea of a deserving disabled and increasingly disabled people are viewed in stereotypical ways as vulnerable, poor and helpless. He believes this needs to be reframed and disabled people need to make a declaration of their rights.

Members of Disability Rights UK then put some interesting questions to the panel about the challenges disabled people face in the UK today.

PLMR is proud to work for and support organisations that change lives and the work of DRUK is a lifeline for many people.  I’m delighted PLMR can help to make a difference albeit a small one.  As the austerity era really starts to bite, DRUK’s voice has never been more important.

However, as surveillance measures continue to become more prominent in society, we must not generalise what is a very complicated issue by assuming that as security increases liberty declines, or vice versa. The tendency to come to this conclusion is not helped by the fact that the debate has become so infected with this perceived logic that even the UK’s National Security Strategy links ‘justice and freedom’ with ‘the basis of security.’  The same can be said of Article 5 of the European Charter on Human Rights which affirms the ‘right to liberty and security.’  These documents play a pivotal role in our lives; firstly in how we guard against terrorist attack, and secondly in outlining the basic rights we are entitled to as human beings.  Yet they contain the language of ‘liberty’ and ‘security,’ both of which are impossible to define.

In today’s context, the impact of the liberty/security equation means that we see policies implemented to improve detection of terrorism attacked on the basis of their perceived impact on liberty.  Conversely by scaremongering about terrorist threats Governments justify putting in place overly restrictive policies. By framing the debate in this way ‘security’ and ‘liberty’ remain diametrically opposed.  If we are going to move forward we must get beyond this viewpoint.

The past month has been a turbulent one for the sector, with controversy continuing to surround the Health and Social Care Bill which finally completed its tortuous Parliamentary journey. On 20th March the House of Lords approved the Bill, which will now need Royal Assent before being enshrined in the Law. 

Pressure was put on the Government to further amend or even scrap the Bill up until its final approval in the Lords. At their Spring Conference, Liberal Democrat delegates ignored calls from the Deputy Prime Minister and Party Leader Nick Clegg to endorse a revised version of the Bill. The delegates’ decision did not have binding power on the Government, however, it certainly increased the political pressure on Mr Clegg.

The Labour Party, helped by a few Liberal Democrat MPs, made a last ditch attempt to delay the Bill by presenting a motion before the Commons, asking the Government to publish the Department of Health’s register of the risks associated with the new policy. The motion was defeated by 82 votes.

In a final act of defiance, Shadow Health Minister Andy Burnham pledged that Labour would overturn the Bill if the party won the next election.

Controversy and intrigue continued with the resignation of Cynthia Bower as Head of the Care and Quality Commission (CQC). The announcement rocked the sector following widespread criticism of the regulator.
 
In the maelstrom that followed the resignation, many leading figures were critical of Ms Bower and her colleagues.

Gary FitzGerald, Chief Executive of Action on Elder Abuse, called on other CQC board members to resign.

He said: “It is good news that Bowers has finally fallen on her sword.

“But it is not enough. There are others who collaborated in the atrocious strategies adopted by this regulator and who cannot claim immunity from responsibility. We need a fresh start with the board of the commission and that can only mean a thorough spring clean.”

Bower’s resignation came on the back of the publication of the Department of Health’s findings into the performance and capability of the CQC. The Department found that although the Commission had done an excellent job of creating a new system of regulation for Health and Social Care in England, and increased the number and quality of staff inspections, it may have underestimated the scale of the project. As a result the Commission found providers, patients and the public often do not fully understand what role the CQC plays, or how it operates.

The Department of Health recommended the Board of the CQC should set out a clear strategic pathway to success, and make arrangements between the Board and the Executive to ensure they are holding the operations of the CQC to account.

Despite the turmoil, the Department of Health made a number of significant funding announcements in the past month. The Deputy Prime Minister announced an extra £22 million will be geared towards giving children with mental health problems the best access to services. The additional investment in The Children and Young People’s Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) will go towards funding the expansion of state-of-the-art psychological therapies and extend training for people working outside of health settings, such as in schools or youth clubs.

The Deputy Prime Minister said: “Mental health must have the same priority as physical health. Giving children the treatment they need as soon as they need it will help ensure that millions of children suffering from a mental health problem will have a fairer opportunity to succeed in life.”

The end of March saw Secretary of State for Health Andrew Lansley promise to invest an extra £1.8 million into funding for end of life care. The move is intended to give patients more choices over where they receive end of life care. Speaking at a Marie Curie event the Health Minister stated:

“A fair funding system will enable us to ensure that this support is available. It will ensure all qualified providers of end of life care, whether they be statutory, voluntary or independent, are fairly funded.”

The next few months will continue to put pressure on Mr Lansley as he strives to steer the Health and Social Care Bill through its final stages while continuing to address dissenting voices. People throughout the sector will now turn their attention to the White Paper on Social Care which is due to be published in the late spring. 

I can trace my passion for creative writing back to my 6th Birthday when I was given a typewriter, having devoured every Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton book my parents would buy for me. I decided there and then that when I grew up I would be a writer. Some 20 years later this childhood dream is yet to be realised, but my passion for creative writing and the wonderful feeling of getting lost in a good book remains undimmed. As a child the chance to attend a project like the Ministry of Stories would have made me giddy with excitement.  As an adult, to be able to take on the role of a creative writing mentor and to engage young people in storytelling and reading sounded like the perfect volunteering opportunity.

The Ministry of Stories was founded by Nick Hornby and Co-directors Lucy Macnab and Ben Payne in 2010. Based in Hoxton, East London it provides a free space for fresh writing by young people aged 8-18. Working closely with schools but also providing one-to-one mentoring for young people Ministry of Stories aims to improve language skills, increase abilities in communication and add to social and educational confidence.  The services are provided by volunteers who all give their time for free.

On Saturday I attended my first creative writing class at the Ministry of Stories. This week the theme was Mummies Day; Ministry of Stories has a monster theme at present so the children were tasked with creating Mummies Day cards for a Mummy (in the Egyptian sense), their Mum or a monster. I worked with a girl who put together a poem and designed a special Mother’s Day card for her Mum.  To work with children and to see their creativity and enthusiasm for language was inspiring. Ministry of Stories demonstrates the importance of sparking a child’s interest in the use of language which will hopefully stay with them as adults.

Last week Chief Schools Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw commented on the importance of literacy. Sir Michael said that England is being overtaken by other leading nations because progress on literacy has stalled.  Reading standards have not improved since 2005 and this means, according to Sir Michael that young people, “can’t access the curriculum in secondary school… and find it difficult to get jobs.” He went on to say that “There can be no more important subject than English. It is at the heart of our culture and literacy skills are crucial to pupils’ learning for all subjects.” To highlight this issue Sir Michael visited St Mary’s in Battersea where he saw the admirable Evening Standard’s literacy campaign in action.

Signs of the ‘Get London Reading’ campaign are evident around the school from posters on walls saying “reading is fun” to the 25 volunteers, recruited through the campaign from the Evening Standard’s partner charity Volunteer Reading Help.  The Standard have been doing their part for the Big Society with their literacy campaign and since it started they have sent more than 300 volunteers into schools across the capital to read with children who are falling behind.

I completely agree with Sir Michael that English is crucial to young people’s development in all areas of life. It’s vital that volunteers, teachers, parents and government develop young people’s passion for language and literature at an early age as it’s the foundation for learning.

This year sees the Olympics come to London and the nation unite to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. What better time to celebrate all things British and get involved in your local community by volunteering.  If you’re as passionate about the written word as I am, you might want to find out more about Ministry of Stories, or for wider options I encourage you to check out the Team London website for opportunities in your area.

Dilnot’s core proposal, to cap an individual’s contribution to their care in later life at £35,000 and raise the means-tested threshold to £100,000, has been met with both praise and opposition with the notion of ‘fairness’ being the yardstick around which this debate is taking place.

Critics of the Dilnot report ask how the proposed cap on an individual’s contribution that is not a percentage of income, coupled with a revision of the means-tested threshold is ‘fair’, when it could be argued to serve to disproportionately benefit the wealthiest in UK society? Supporters of the Dilnot report respond that the current system fails to protect the assets that individuals have accrued over a lifetime of hard work, and as such the current funding arrangement cannot be considered ‘fair’.

If Dilnot’s proposals were to be implemented, once an individual’s social care exceeded the cap of £35,000 the state would fund the remainder of the required care through general taxation. Opponents argue this means that the rich pay proportionally less for their care and the less well-off pay proportionally more.

Welfare systems are systems of social stratification that actively order social relations, building broad or narrow solidarities across populations. They can be redistributive and /or entrench existing social divisions. Dilnot’s proposals, his critics argue, are far from redistributive, and would serve to inhibit the transference of wealth from the haves to the have-nots.

Take the potential impact of Dilnot on housing and the redistribution of wealth as an example. Owning property is a means of entrenching wealth. Those critical of the proposals argue that by negating the need for individuals to raise equity through the sale of their house(s) to support their care in older life, Dilnot’s cap would prevent un-mortgaged equity being released into the economy, preserving and further entrenching the inheritances of the well-off across generations. In essence, the proposals could act as an obstacle to the redistribution of wealth and are, it could be argued, ‘unfair’.

But then how ‘fair’ is the status quo? Those calling for the implementation of Dilnot’s proposals argue that not only does the Dilnot Report provide a way forward in the nation’s acute need for a new social care funding relationship between the state and the individual,  but that Dilnot’s proposals are a much fairer way forward. Under the existing means-tested system an individual is expected to fund their own care until the value of their assets falls below £23,250 (in England), at which point the state foots the remainder of the bill. The rich pay more for their care and the less well-off pay less.

The underlying issue here is that the current system fails to reward those who are prudent savers, having accrued assets carefully over a life time. Where is the incentive to save for old age when those who haven’t done so immediately qualify for state funded care? Why should some individuals exhaust their assets while others have no need to do so? How can this situation be deemed ‘fair’?

Most observers would agree that the ultimate aspiration would be to provide a model for social care funding that guarantees support for everyone in need, that does not place a disproportionate burden on the less well-off and that doesn’t disincentivise financial prudence.  It will be fascinating to see how these competing needs impact on the adoption of Dilnot’s proposals over the coming months.