Last updated at 12:12 AM on 21st June 2011
Shocking: A study has found that some elderly people are receiving just 15 minutes' care a day - leaving them malnourished and in soiled beds and clothes (posed by model)
Society would not allow children to suffer the appalling treatment meted out to the elderly in their own homes, it was claimed said last night.
Charities spoke out after an official investigation found that the basic human rights of pensioners are being neglected.
They warned the situation is likely to worsen because councils are cutting back on social care.
The report – by the Equality and Human Rights Commission – found that elderly people have been allowed to become malnourished or left in soiled beds and clothes.
Sometimes they have to choose between being washed or being fed because visits from home helps are so brief.
Baroness Sally Greengross, an EHRC commissioner, said: 'The numbers of people requiring care are going up all the time, so we have to put in more resources.
'We must get this right and human rights is a tool that can help us. There aren't enough care workers, so they rush from one person to the next.
'Fifteen minutes is not enough time to give people another aspect of their human rights which is contact with someone else.
'A lot of older people are just on their own for 24 hours in this country, so that a person coming in is so important as a contact, a friend, someone to talk to.'
She told BBC Breakfast that many home helps were too rushed to do their jobs properly: 'If you are rushing because you have got 15 minutes you have to choose – do I give them a meal or do I wash them properly, do I make sure that they are happy, that they are content, that they have got someone they can talk to a little?
Concerns: Sally Greengross said more resources were needed because of the number of people going into care, while Paul Burstow said there was no excuse for poor care - either at residential homes or in care homes
'If you don't have time for that because you are so rushed then you cannot do your job properly.'
Ian Buchan of Independent Age, which helps older people stay in their homes, said the interim report highlighted underfunding.
'It means councils don't pay agencies enough, and the result is poor quality, ad hoc care, often with minimal management and supervision,' he added.
'Staff that are being asked to do a very complex job, with frail and vulnerable older people, receive little training and support and are often forced to rush between cases to save travel time, for which they are not paid.
ABUSE HOSPITAL TO BE CLOSED
A hospital where staff were filmed abusing vulnerable adults will be closed down this week.
Sickening footage broadcast earlier this month showed residents with learning difficulties being subjected to barbaric physical and verbal attacks by their 'carers'.
The BBC Panorama film led to condemnation of both the hospital's owners and the social care watchdog, both of whom had previously been warned what was happening.
Yesterday, Castlebeck, which runs Winterbourne View in Bristol, said the hospital would close on Friday when the last patients would be transferred to alternative services.
One staff member was recorded goading patients and threatening them with violence. He later kicked one victim to the ground.
'Probably more shocking is that, funding issues aside, this kind of treatment has been accepted for many years. It is a great shame that it takes a human rights watchdog to point out the neglect that local authorities have been aware of for years.
'We have to ask whether children or younger adults would be treated in this way, and why, in our supposedly civilised society, this is tolerated for older people.'
The National Pensioners' Convention said the report showed that services for the elderly were deteriorating.
General secretary Dot Gilbson said: 'The real people to blame are the private companies that are putting profits before residents' needs.
'More resources are needed if the care regulator is going to properly protect these individuals and the government has to step in to ensure social care becomes a service and not a business.
'The social care system is in crisis – poor care, high turnover of staff, an inadequate regulatory and complaints system – all of which the Government seems incapable of addressing. I challenge care minister Paul Burstow to suffer some of the indignities some of our older people are facing.'
Mr Burstow said: 'There can be no place for poor quality care in care services, either in the home care system or in residential homes.
He said he hoped the EHRC inquiry would help drive up standards.
where are the neighbours and children, ? we are a nation of selfish people
- stephen, belfast, 21/6/2011 06:51
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