[Edinburgh-carecampaign] Edinburgh Support Worker's Network first meeting Sun 8th

[Danny]

EDINBURGH  SUPPORT  WORKER'S 

         ACTION  NETWORK               

 



Budget cuts and competitive
tendering threaten to wreck social care services in Edinburgh depriving service-users of quality
and choice and reducing the role of support worker to a minimum wage role.

      

Its time to stand up for our
jobs and our service-users.

 

First organising meeting; 

 

6.30pm Sunday 8th October 2009

 

Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh, 

17 West Montgomery Place,

EH7 5HA

 

Edinburgh Support Worker's
Action Network (SWAN) is being proposed by voluntary sector support workers. 

Against the background of
increased privatisation of council care services,
the current tendering process will see the end of many well established
voluntary sector organisations and a shift towards low cost, private companies with questionable track records.


Choices Care, which stands to win the biggest contract in this
round of tendering, pays support
workers a mere £6.05 per hour. We face massive holes in TUPE regulations, low union membership in our field and our
organisations are competing with each other for contracts. It is essential that
support workers themselves from all organisations join together to defend jobs
and services. 

Meetings will be open to all.

    

                    
Contact - 
swanedinburgh at yahoo.co.uk 

for more info see article below





SUPPORT
WORKERS ORGANISE IN FIGHT TO DEFEND CARE SERVICES 

      Council finance committee defers crucial
decision to 19th November meeting.

      Frontline
staff from voluntary sector organisations get together fight competitive 

      tendering
process

 

On Sunday 8th November Edinburgh's Support
Worker's Action Network (SWAN) will hold its first open organising meeting as
it begins its fight back against the budget cuts and competitive tendering it
says threatens social care services in the Capital. The group is being set up
by frontline staff from voluntary sector organisations affected by the
tendering of services in the fields of learning disability, mental health and physical disability.
On the 27th October a paper was put before  the City of Edinburgh's Finance and Resources Committee
recommending that contracts be awarded to eight companies leaving several
voluntary sector organisations uncertain of their future while hundreds of
service-users are set to be transferred to new service providers. Many people
who currently use these services have hit out at the plans,
pointing to the importance of long term relationships built up with their
support staff. 

There are fears that the process will lead to
inadequate service delivery by private companies employing poorly trained, low paid staff. A support worker behind the new
campaign group SWAN said

 “the company
that stands to win the biggest contract if this tendering process is allowed to
go ahead is Choices Care. They pay their staff £6.05 per hour. There is no way
you can retain good, dedicated, qualified
staff over a long period of time if the role of support worker is devalued to
barely above minimum wage. This would be disastrous for us and the people we
support”. 

The Council plans are not yet finalised. The decision
was deferred to the full council meeting on 19th November before
which groups such as SWAN and the Learning Disability Alliance along with
service users say they will be campaigning and lobbying councillors to reverse
the policy. 

Since the Council announced its plans to put services out
to tender 176 service users have applied for a Direct Payment,
which would enable them to choose their service provider,
with many others set to do so. In response to this the council has refused to
process Direct Payments until after the tendering process is complete. This
decision has been heavily criticised by campaign groups and voluntary sector
organisations. 

A user of learning disability services stated in a letter
to LimDem councillor Jim Lowrie;

 

“I want my staff to keep on working with me. Don’t make
them go away. Leave the staff alone and let them get on with their work”.

 

A support worker from SWAN stated; 

“Budget cuts are not new to us. In recent years the
City of Edinburgh Council has been
systematically cutting support to some of the capital's most vulnerable
residents. Between 2004 and 2008 the 'Supporting People' budget was slashed by
almost 20% from £44m to £36m. At the same time the local authority set about
selling off  75% of its Homecare services
mainly to low cost private companies. People have to wonder how the Council can
manage to find £70m to bail out its arms length property companies yet cannot
provide adequate support for our most vulnerable people”. 

“ People with learning disabilities are a soft target
because they cannot always speak up for themselves. The voluntary sector is a
soft target due to low union membership. Its time all this was changed.
Hopefully with the establishment of the Support Workers Action Network we can
work together with service-user groups and start to fight back.”.







      
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