Monthly Archives: June 2011

How to take early action to improve children’s mental health and wellbeing

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By Lucy Smith, OPM senior researcher.

Lucy Smith

“It is common sense that intervening early to stop problems developing has to be the best way of preventing bigger and more expensive problems.” So says the DfE’s introduction to the Early Intervention Grant, which is designed to empower local leaders to respond to the needs of children, young people and families. It is common sense – but it’s also common sense to provide evidence to support the case for early intervention. OPM’s work on the Targeted Mental Health in Schools (TaMHS) pathfinders, which ran from 2008-11, found some compelling evidence to support the philosophy.

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Supporting yourself and others in tough times: our session at the LGA conference

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By Sue Goss, OPM principal.

Sue GossOur breakfast fringe session at the LGA conference was the perfect start to Day 2 of this annual event.

We all know that local government leadership is tough right now. Whichever way we look, the media is brutal, members of staff are jumpy, the public are unhappy and managers are over-stretched.

Leaders, both politicians and managers, are handling unprecedented cuts while creating a vision to which staff and residents can aspire. Difficult choices abound. But little attention is paid to the personal toll of constant calls on our courage, self-discipline and judgment.

The stress is as great as it has ever been – which is why we are exploring new ways in which to support, nurture and equip our managers to lead, which fit the times and their needs. From our work with public authorities it’s clear that there are three crucial skills sets for coping with tough times…

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Closing Winterbourne View hospital – ending an out-moded model of care?

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By Dr Chih Hoong Sin, OPM principal.

Chih Hoong SinToday, Winterbourne View hospital will effectively close as the last patients are transferred to alternative services. The ramifications of the Panorama programme, however, are still being felt as the Government has not ruled out the possibility of launching an independent inquiry into the abuse by staff in Winterbourne View against people with learning disabilities and autism. Although the Care Quality Commission (CQC) issued an unreserved apology within 24 hours of the broadcast, the public response towards it has been extremely hostile. Both the CQC and Castlebeck, who runs Winterbourne View, have undertaken urgent inspections, with the former proposing a programme of risk-based and random unannounced inspections of a sample of the 150 hospitals providing care for people with learning disabilities.

Would these inspections prevent another care home abuse case from happening? After all, the former Healthcare Commission (HC) and the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI) investigated the abuse of people with learning disabilities in Cornwall Partnership NHS Trust in 2006, and in Sutton and Merton PCT in 2007. The HC’s 2007 audit of 638 NHS and independent specialist inpatient healthcare services for people with learning disabilities in England found that safeguarding for vulnerable people received little attention across all aspects of their care. Yet, these investigations and subsequent actions did not prevent the Winterbourne View scandal from happening.

The clarion call by the disability rights movement of ‘nothing about us without us’ must be embraced by regulation and inspection.

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How can local councils respond to increasing variety and autonomy?

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By Hywel Lloyd, senior fellow at OPM.

Hywel LloydHow public bodies respond to staff, service users and residents having more autonomy will be fundamental to their success in the next evolution of public service delivery.

One of the benefits of working at OPM is the opportunity to bring together different lines of thinking, of practical experience, and of evidence. Over the past few weeks I’ve been fortunate enough to hear Tim Harford discuss his new book Adapt: why success always starts with failure. I’ve also been working with the Local Government Group to facilitate a series of events to look at the future shape of local government. Continue reading →

New research into how police services deal with disability hate crime

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By Sanah Sheikh, OPM associate fellow.

Sanah SheikhIt’s Learning Disability Week and here at OPM we’re really committed to raising awareness about and developing solutions to tackle hate crime against disabled people. We were commissioned by the learning disability charity Mencap to conduct research exploring how police services across England tackle hate crime against people with a learning disability. The report was published earlier this week.

The findings indicate that police services face a number of challenges in tackling hate crime against people with learning disabilities, and that approaches vary widely. However there are also many instances of good and innovative practice. The tackling of hate crime could thus be vastly improved if police services got together to share their learning and coordinate their practices. Continue reading →

New Prevent strategy: resource bank

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By Sanah Sheikh, OPM associate fellow.

Sanah SheikhAt OPM we’ve already commented widely on the Government’s new Prevent strategy, which seeks to stop people becoming or supporting violent extremists. You can read our most recent post, summarising the key points of the strategy and discussing likely implementation issues here.

The strategy sets some demanding objectives for local authorities, local partners, and national organisations and sector bodies. New initiatives funded by the Government will need to be rigorously evaluated and much more strongly targeted on those who are most vulnerable to violent extremism. The strategy also indicates that there will be a broader conceptualisation of violent extremism, to include right wing and other forms of extremism, and not just Al-Qaeda inspired extremism.

Over the last four years, OPM has worked with a wide range of organisations responsible for delivering on the Prevent agenda. Through this work, we have been able to generate a good deal of evidence and insights into what works in relation to preventing violent extremism. The links to some of these resources are presented below, and you can also find them on our Knowledge site that we regularly update. We hope you find them useful. Continue reading →

Don’t stand by – hate crime against disabled people hurts us all

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By Chih Hoong Sin, OPM principal.

Chih Hoong SinA recent slew of incidents have drawn the nation’s attention to the experiences of people with learning disabilities. At the end of May, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) released its findings relating to the handling of the case involving the tragic deaths of Fiona Pilkington and her daughter Francecca Hardwick. The IPCC listed a catalogue of problems, and pointed to the police and the council’s persistent failure to take seriously the experiences reported by Fiona Pilkington and her family over a number of years. Shortly after, the Panorama special exposed the persistent abuse by staff against people with learning disabilities and autism in Winterbourne View, a private hospital near Bristol. Today, the learning disability charity Mencap launches its ‘Stand By Me’ campaign aimed at ensuring that the police and the criminal justice system take seriously hate crime against people with learning disabilities.

It is important that we keep up the pressure for change. Hate crimes blight the lives of many disabled people, not just those with learning disabilities. While all crime hurts in one way or another, the very essence of a hate crime is that it hurts more than a parallel crime. Data from the British Crime Survey show that victims suffer distinct harms compared with victims of similar crimes that are not motivated or aggravated by an offender’s bigotry, bias or prejudice. This, alone, should mean that disablist hate crimes are taken seriously and not ignored or trivialised as in the case of Fiona Pilkington and Francecca Hardwick. Unfortunately, appeals to a sense of social justice on the basis of group identity can often be met with sympathy but little real commitment to change. Continue reading →

Postcode lotteries revisted

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By Rob Francis, OPM associate fellow and Hywel Lloyd, OPM senior fellow.

Rob FrancisHywel LloydThe Coalition’s Localism and Decentralisation Bill will encourage local groups to increase their role in running local public services. If this results in greater differences in the services people can expect to get in different places, will citizens be rejoicing that local people are finding local solutions, or will they be cursing the unfairness of new ‘postcode lotteries’?

In 2007, OPM produced a report titled ‘Local solutions or postcode lotteries – the acceptability of difference in public services’. Reviewing existing research on the topic and adding some new, qualitative work with citizens and public service managers, this study considered what people felt about local variations in the services available to them, and what informed their view of whether those differences were either justified or an ugly manifestation of the ‘postcode lottery’.

Through presenting research participants with some local scenarios, it was clear that their initial reactions – that everyone should ‘get the same’ regardless of where they lived – could shift. For instance, it was felt that difference could be acceptable provided there was a ‘basic standard’ that everyone could expect, but which local decision-makers could choose to top-up based on priorities and need. It was also felt that differences might be acceptable in relation to some services, but not others. Continue reading →

Isn’t it time for more self-managed learning?

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By Bob Baker, OPM senior fellow.

Bob BakerEverywhere I hear the phrase ‘more for less’, a sign of growing pressure for significantly increased results from fewer resources, including ‘human resources’. If we accept that staff in cash-strapped public bodies need to take greater responsibility for their own learning, how can this be made to be a positive experience?

At first glance there might seem to be a natural case for organisations to invest in their people, particularly in learning and development. However, there is a big ‘but’: organisations that are under financial pressure often look to cut training and development budgets, perhaps because they are a soft target or that key decision-makers remain unconvinced about the correlation between expenditure on training and development and pay-off for organisations (and presumably for individuals). This may be because individuals learn but then don’t successfully transfer their learning into meeting organisational demands. It could also be simply that the learning feels ‘forced’ onto individuals who then go through the motions of learning rather than embracing it. Continue reading →

Crucial but challenging: helping parents to have their voices heard

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By Shama Sarwar, OPM researcher.

Shama SarwarNow and looking forward, reductions in local authorities’ budgets mean that it’s increasingly important that remaining resources are spent on providing the right services in ways that meet users’ needs. The only way to be confident of getting this right is to involve the people who use the services, making sure they have a say in both their design and delivery. In the case of children’s services this must include a strong role for parents, but what do we know about the challenges that parents in different circumstances face in having their voices heard? Recent OPM research sheds light on the key issues.

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