The first report of Supreme Court Review Group which is examining the relationship of the High Court of Justiciary and the UK Supreme Court is now available from the Scottish Government’s Website here.
Is there a crisis in how we care for the elderly and other at risk groups in Scotland? The recent media coverage suggests yes but I suspect even as I start a series of articles on this subject that any conclusions I draw will be more complicated than a simple yes or no.
I am in my mid forties. My Mum is in her early seventies as are my wife’s parents. How we care for our parents is an issue that my generation cannot ignore. It is not just how we care for the elderly that is making news headlines. The scenes shown in the recent Panorama programme on Winterbourne View care home were sickening.
Southern Cross
Southern Cross has rarely been out of the news recently. Southern Cross, which operates across the UK, announced it is reducing its rent payments and cannot afford to meet its annual rental costs of £230million. The background to this is the reorganisation of the business a few years before the current economic difficulties. The recession has caused Southern Cross, and others, real problems. I will look at this issue in more detail when I look at how we fund elderly care. I will also look at the charge levied at Southern Cross that “they are just like the bankers”, i.e. they award massive bonuses when things are going well but, when things go wrong, demand public funding.
Winterbourne View care home, near Bristol
The Winterbourne View care home, near Bristol, was featured in a BBCPanorama programme. The scenes shown in the programme caused revulsion and outrage. Police in Bristol have arrested a number of people after the secret filming by Panorama found a pattern of serious abuse at this residential hospital. Winterbourne View treated people with learning disabilities and autism. The hospital’s owners, Castlebeck, have apologised unreservedly and suspended 13 employees. The hospital has now been closed. Even though this is an English care home the issues raised cannot be ignored here in Scotland. How robust is our own inspection process? Do we listen to whistle blowers? Does the buck truly stop somewhere?
Elsie Inglis care home, Edinburgh
The Elsie Inglis private nursing home in Edinburgh has been forced to close down. The owners of the Elsie Inglis Nursing Home volunteered to de-register the business after it became clear they would not meet a deadline for improvements ordered by Social Care and Social Work Improvement Scotland. SCSWIS said it had: “very serious concerns about the quality of care” at the home. There is also a police investigation into the death of two residents of the care home.
Ninewells Hospital, Dundee
Ninewells hospital, Dundee, was severely criticised in a report by the Mental Welfare Commission over the care of an 80-year-old woman with dementia. Before her death, the woman was given dozens of sedative doses over 16 days in ways the Mental Welfare Commission deemed distressing and unnecessary. Ninewells Hospital was not named in the report and its identity only became public when the media and politicians started asking questions about the report.
Erskine care home, Edinburgh
Erskine’s Edinburgh care home received a critical report from SCSWIS. It was also reported that the Chief Executive Officer of Erskine, Major Jim Panton has resigned. A spokesman for the care home said that the resignation was not connected to the critical report. The inspection report found that prescription drugs had not been administered properly and that fluid and food intakes had not been recorded.
The last three matters may in fact point to the fact that our system of inspection is robust. I will though look further at this issue in a later article.
Some facts and figures
There are over 900 care homes in Scotland. Approximately 170 are owned by our 32 Councils, 240 by charities and just over 500 by private operators.
Southern Cross has 98 homes in Scotland, Four Seasons has 49 and BUPA 30.
Approximately half of Scottish homes are run by sole traders.
Some 39,150 people reside in Scottish care homes.
77% of care home residents pay for their care.
Scottish Councils pay £550 per week to private providers to look after old people with estates worth less than £22,000.
Councils spend approximately £800 per week per resident in their own homes.
Someone occupying a non-specialist hospital bed costs the Health Board approximately £1,500 a week. An acute bed costs approximately £2,800 per week.
Future articles
Over the next few weeks I will look at a number of the issues mentioned above in greater detail. This will include how we fund elderly care, the quality of care given, inspection and whistle blowing issues, the role to be played by the private, public and third sectors, the debate on merging our health and care sectors and the options for taking control of some or all of a person’s affairs.
If you have any questions on this issue or simply want to make a comment please either contact me or use the “comment” option below.
James Aitken
Legal Knowledge Scotland
The Financial Times reported today that HM Treasury will not overhaul the way it assesses the tax take on private finance initiative deals even though their ownership is increasingly moving offshore.
The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee has been told that ultimate ownership of 90 of the 700 existing PFI projects has moved offshore.
Justine Greening, economic secretary to HM Treasury, did though admit in a Commons debate last week that there was little information available about the way PFI ownership was being sold on and traded in secondary markets.
Plans to use a £420,000 bequest to convert a substandard care home into a healthy living centre, complete with spa and gym, for pensioners in the Galashiels area have been ditched following a three-month public consultation.
The report from the Southern Reporter can be found here.
HMRC has published the latest list of registered Community Amateur Sports Clubs. The list is available here.
CASC staus takes a bit of effort to achieve. That said, the benefit can be thousands of pounds per year and is worth looking into.
The UK Government has finally published two important consultation papers on a “statutory residence test” and the reform of how we tax non-domiciled residents.
The statutory residence test consultation proposes the introduction of a statutory definition of tax residence for individuals and seeks views on the design and implementation of the framework for such a definition and on options to reform the concept of ordinary residence.
The reform of taxation of non-domiciled individuals consultation document seeks views on the detailed policy design of the changes announced in the 2011 UK Budget.
The First Minister announced a 6 month delay to the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications Bill during First Minister’s questions today. It had been scheduled to be passed by the end of the month but Alex Salmond said he had listened to concerns that the new law was being rushed through parliament too quickly. It is now to be passed by the end of the year.
Elekta Limited v The Common Services Agency, 21 June 2011
Outer House case concerning the procurement of radio therapy equipment (with an estimated value of around £21m) for cancer centres in Scotland.
Elekta, which produced radio therapy equipment, complained that the Common Services Agency (also known as NHS National Services Scotland), which was responsible for procuring the equipment, had effectively excluded them from bidding by specifying criteria which could only be met by one tenderer. Four out of the five cancer centres in Scotland had a system manufactured by Varian and the Agency specified that the equipment would have to integrate with the Varian system. However, Elekta argued that Varian system was not compatible with those of other suppliers meaning that everyone other than Varian was excluded from bidding.
The effect of Elekta raising the proceedings (in terms of the Public Contract (Scotland) Regulations 2006) was to prevent the Common Services Agency from entering the contract with Varian and the Agency applied for an interim order bringing that prohibition to an end.
After considering the authorities, Lord Glennie laid down a number of points:
Lord Glennie noted that Elektra had not argued that the criteria were not objectively justified and pointed out that there a number of possible justifications for the decision such as the cost, disruption and potential teething problems involved in replacing one system with another.
Elekta also referred to the fact that the Agency had followed an open procedure (under regulation 15 of the procurement regulations) rather than the negotiated procedure (under regulation 14) arguing that, if it chose to follow the open procedure, it had a duty to frame the criteria in such a way that allowed a range of tenderers to bid. However, Lord Glennie said that, whilst it may have been that the Agency could have used the negotiated procedure, it did not follow that, by going down the route of the open procedure, it had to remove criteria which it regarded as essential to define its requirements (i.e. that the system could integrate with the Varian system).
In addition, Elekta complained that the criteria requiring integration with the Varian system had also been applied to the one cancer centre which did not already have Varian equipment. However, Lord Glennie also found that there was no merit in this point. The contracting authority was entitled to decide what its procurement requirements were and how to frame them. It could properly decide (on the basis of objectively justifiable criteria) that there should be a sole tenderer to provide equipment across the five centres.
Lord Glennie was not asked to dismiss Elekta’s action but found its case to be a very weak one which had no reasonable prospect of success. As such, an interim order was granted removing the prohibition on the Agency contacting with Varian.
The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), the umbrella body for Scotland’s 32 local authorities has warned that uncertainty over the economy and changes to the welfare system could reverse years of improving council tax collection rates.
Council tax collection rates rose again in the past year, up by 0.2% on the previous 12 months, despite more than £1 billion having gone unpaid since the charge began 18 years ago.
For 2010-11, £1.86bn was paid by March 31 from the total bill of £1.97bn.
Differences remain among local authorities, with taxpayers in Glasgow only paying 92.3% last year compared with a 97.6% total in Orkney.
Dundee recorded the highest increase with a collection improvement of 91.4% to 93% over the past year.The average percentage of bills collected annually across Scotland’s 32 councils increased from about 87.2% in 1998-99 to 94.6%.
The article in the Herald newspaper can be found here.
