Yesterday I went to a meeting. I was asked, because they are planning a public meeting about support services for older people living at home in our borough, and perhaps I could speak from experience. The assistant director of social services was going to be there and it was the only time she could make so I changed some meetings of my own and cancelled a work meeting.
The assistant director did not come. The home care manager from social services, who had invited me with some enthusiasm, took a telephone call for the first quarter of an hour, so I waited around – the meeting was going to be in her office. There were three people from the independent sector also waiting, managing services for the borough, so I expect they were used to hanging around. The meeting was going to chaired by someone from Age Concern, who was behind this initiative, but he was later still – he had difficulty coming at this time but had agreed because it was the only time the assistant director could make …
He didn’t expect me to be there, it was a meeting for the managers. I knew now that it was not going to be the best of days.
But there we were, sort of, representatives from the three sectors, statutory, independent and voluntary. No-one had brought notes from their previous planning meeting…. We discussed the public meeting, although no-one had a copy of the programme they had agreed last time – the home care manager wanted to talk about one thing, the Age Concern manager another – it was never resolved who was chairing the meeting. The social services manager had reported a survey they were carrying out - which would inform the workshops they were running at the event. Apparently people at day centres had talked about how their carers never had time for them., were always hurrying on, coming back later. Yes,well – just like their managers, then.
Hold on, why am I bothering to whinge like this? Because I had the thought in the meeting that these people round the table were actually powerfully responsible for the day by day delivery of services for older people in our borough. On the evidence of the basic incompetence and lack of communication in this planning meeting for a simple public event what hope could I hold out for an integrated approach. in the delivery and development of services?
Suddenly the home care manager announced she had another meeting in five minutes. They hurriedly scheduled another planning meeting for five days before the event.


So it was a bloody awful meeting. I am not blaming those who took part – I am thinking what picture is this of the dynamic around the different agencies working with and for vulnerable people.
The voluntary sector person talks about user-led services, about outcome-focussed services. He apologises to me for using jargon. Hold on, I remember when outcome funding was the new thing in the voluntary sector and that was back in the early 80’s. But he sees me as a service user – ‘sorry, more jargon!’ –as someone whose experience is limited to scraping the shit out of the carpet. He is also talking with the freedom of someone without a budget.
The social service manager is concerned that she is both a commissioner and a provider. So she has an identity problem, which side is she on? The providers wonder which of them will speak for their position at the event. I have some sympathy for them. The jargon about user led outcome-focussed services and the research that users want more time with their carers is more or less meaningless in terms of the contracts that they have to sign with the local authority to get the work.
And the person who was too busy to come because she had to meet with elected members, the local politicians making cuts to keep the council tax increase down to 3%? Well she doesn’t want to hear about ideas for improving services for older people that would cost the same as adult services, or to be told that not providing these services is discriminatory.
Thiese are just some of the different questions around the table. The only question that I am in any position to answer and I am struggling to answer is –why did I bother to go to this meeting?
PS. It was my son’s birthday. I had given him a book, Meeting Together, by some wise old colleagues from my days of working in the voluntary sector, Lois Graessle and George Gawlinski. It is very good, and recommended reading for anyone who recognises their own experiences at all in the story I have just told. Look at http://www.meetingtogether.org/
But the confused dynamics of working together around the needs of vulnerable people would be a challenge even for them.