Gracemere Le Smileys Early Learning Centre bus tragedy: Neveah Austin’s was ‘only child’ on van | Daily Mail Online

Little Nevaeh Austin, three, is fighting for life after being found unconscious on a bus outside Le Smileys Early Learning Centre at Gracemere, near Rockhampton, on Wednesday.

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It goes without saying that this should never have happened and I do hope Nevaeh make a good recovery.

As to the 2 workers involved they have committed extremely serious situations in the actions or non-actions they did, for it is not only an extreme safeguarding alert, but also a criminal offense.

A total lack of ‘Duty of Care’.

Source: Gracemere Le Smileys Early Learning Centre bus tragedy: Neveah Austin’s was ‘only child’ on van | Daily Mail Online

Just when No 10 wants to be taken seriously, it creates Sir Gavin Williamson | Marina Hyde | The Guardian

It’s hard to believe Boris Johnson will really crack down on Putin’s cronies, when he’s just knighted one of his own, says Guardian columnist Marina Hyde.

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I believed that the giving of these honours was to reward individuals for the actions they have taken and been successful in, well the appointing of a Knighthood on Gavin Williamson just shows how mistaken I am. For what is Gavin Williamson successful in doing, well as far as I can see it is turning up. It is said he was a good at being a Chief Whip in 2016/17, but that is not saying much as I feel this means he is good at finding MPs secrets and using this information to try to persuade reluctant MPs to toe the Tory Party line, in other words could it be blackmail or just plain bullying.  For he failed miserably as Defence Secretary  2017/19 and even more so as Education Secretary 2019/21.

So, is it a reward for failure and being a bully.

 

Source: Just when No 10 wants to be taken seriously, it creates Sir Gavin Williamson | Marina Hyde | The Guardian

We are ‘scapegoats’ for government failures, say headteachers | Education | The Guardian

English school leaders to tell MPs frozen salaries, soaring workloads and the effects of Covid are deterring next generation of heads

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This is so true, but not only for within teaching for it could be said of many professions.

But firstly, let’s look at teaching, for what is teaching for, well to educate the children, so they can become an integral part of Society.  However, to do this the system needs to be right.

I was in the system in the sixties, and it was not right then and it has not move that much further now, for in many respects it could even be worse. Yes, I learnt a lot, but was much of that any use to me, I would say very little, especially in Maths for have I ever used algebra, trigonometry, not never. Also, I was expected to be an expert in all matters, even art and while I did my best, I was castigated for my efforts. So, children will be gifted, while others will not be, but like much in the UK, the approach was ‘one size fits all’, which is never right. We are all individuals, especially children and the education system needs to recognise this.

The teachers do their best, but again the system does not help them. Then you get Government interference, by bringing changes dependent on the Government of the day without any real consultation with anyone in the profession, except those within the Department of Education, who are mainly civil servants ingrained deeply in the processes of the civil service and virtually no teaching experience and certainly no current experience.

Unfortunately bullying as always been an element of the education system, sometimes by teachers overusing their power of children, but mainly by children, many who don’t wish to be at school and take their resentment out of some of the other pupils.

There is no effort to care by many teachers, especially some head teachers, some of whom don’t even respect their own staff.

My view is the system is completely geared to getting as many children as possible to gain paper qualifications, many of which will have no bearing on their future lives. I feel as well as giving children some academic background the schools should also provide some elements of life so that children will have a grounding on how to proceed when they leave school.

As in many other professions education has been starved of sufficient funding and many school buildings are in aspects of deterioration, and if the building are deteriorating it could well have some affects on how education is given and received.

But as I said earlier many professions are not in a good place and this could not be more so than for social care. For social care has been deprived of funding for more many years, perhaps since the was social care and other areas before. Governments have not seen the importance of social care, either by design or ignorance, but social care is just as important to Society as is health care for they are both interrelated. These should have always been run in conjunction with each other. However, while health as not been fully funded it has always been thought of as being more important and essential than social care, while both are as essential and as important as each other.

Give this government its due, as it as promised to fund social care more, but so far this funding is not materialising, when it should have been the most important priority, as the lack of social care resources is seriously affecting the delivery of health care, causing much more strains on an already overburdened NHS.

Both are suffering from lack of staff, but I feel social care is more so. Pay in social care is so much more abysmal than in health. Even with vaccines for COVID, as care homes staff were the first to be threatened by mandatory injections and there was no or very little public outcry as to the unfairness of this as there has been for health staff. Now the Government as put a stop to mandatory injections while a consultation is in progress, but that is too late for staffing in care homes.

Care homes also suffered in early 2020 when COVID patients were discharged to care homes, while it was said there was a protective screen around care homes. Perhaps there was, but not as we all thought to keep COVID out but to keep COVID in, so much for government promises. Now there does appear to be a ruling.

The UK is in dire straits, unless you are one of the favoured few, those who can afford to pay their way out.

 

Source: We are ‘scapegoats’ for government failures, say headteachers | Education | The Guardian

Education needs a total overhaul, not just new faces and minds | Letters | The Guardian

Letter: Helen Parker says brilliant teachers of all ages are ground down by the numbers and by administrators who lack imagination, courage and leadership

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Yes, education does need a complete overall for what does our current education Syllabus produce, well not much, except ‘sausages’.

Sausages, well, Yes, for they are there to ensure students receive an education for them to pass exams to get a Certificate, which in reality is there to ensure a few to go to university and maybe some more to get a job.

But for many students it does virtually nothing, certainly not to enable students to live their lives. Does it provide for students to learn life skills, does the syllabus enable students to learn anything which will be useful in their forthcoming lives.

Well I believe not, for it did not for me, not that my school life was wasted for it was not, but that was down to me not school. There was a school Master whose job content included to enable students leaving school to have some idea what they would be doing when they left school. But for me that did not occur and it was up to myself to propel myself into a career into what I had no idea was was about. However, from my own endeavours I did come through and received the promotions that I wished for.

Was I lucky, I feel I was, were there any students who find their school lives were wasted, perhaps this was down to themselves , but the schools should be there to help them.

The teachers do their best, but the system is what is wrong, for education is not centred on students, but on a system, which assumes all students are the same, ‘one fits all’, which is never going to be right.

As per usual in the UK, the money available is way insufficient, yet another area where it is not, for there is health and certainly social care to name two more and there will be many other areas.

Again it is the system, for systems need to change for they should be there for everyone, but currently the system is there for the system.

Source: Education needs a total overhaul, not just new faces and minds | Letters | The Guardian

After A Year At Home, Children With Disabilities Deserve Priority Vaccination

Again persons with learning disabilities are getting a raw deal, why is this always so?

If not adukts it is children, why all this discrimination, for they are citizens as well and we should all be treated equally

Same Difference

They disappeared more than a year ago and many are still out of sight. When the pandemic hit, 53,000 under-18s in England with disabilities that made them vulnerable to coronavirus began to shield away at home.

Kept off school long after their classmates went back, and away from friends, they have found their childhoods put on hold. And while the vaccine rollout gave high-risk adults some reprieve in the new year, those aged under 16, who have not been eligible for any vaccine, are still living in limbo.

Yet we have barely heard a thing about disabled children’s plight through the coronavirus crisis – a silence that has not been helped by the faux-reassuring narrative that “no healthy child” has died from the virus. And now that the UK regulator has at last approved the Pfizer vaccine for 12- to 15-year-olds, this blind spot is becoming…

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Parents Fear For Pupils’ Mental State At £53,000 Fee School

This is all very worrying in any school let alone a special school for children with autism. I have had my doubts for sometime about CQC inspections, for they did not notice the abuses at Winterborne so can you really believe their inspection reports.

I inspections and reports need to be greatly improved for all concerned.

Same Difference

A private special needs school, whose directors include businessmen associated with the Winterbourne View care home scandal, has been accused of putting profit ahead of pupils’ needs.

Annual fees paid by councils to send pupils to Leaways School in east London are £53,000 – higher than Eton.

One parent told a BBC investigation she is pulling out her son as she fears for his mental state if he stays there.

However, Leaways denied the claims that it put money ahead of welfare.

In a statement, the school said: “We strongly refute the suggestion profit is ever put ahead of the needs of children.

“The vast majority of families are happy with our school and they see their children doing very well here.”

The school says it was “deeply saddened to hear the opinions of a small minority… of our parent and staff community”.

‘Sold a dream’

One is Donna, who…

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Katie Price: Harvey And Me

Anybody’s son or daughter moving on in life is a stressful and worrying situation, but even more so in respect of persons with autism and some other conditions. This is because parents and the children have spent years getting to know each other and now in a moment in time great change is occurring. Even when all is going smoothly, there is always going to be that deep down worry, what can happen next, have we covered everything and any others that may occur.

But life as to go on and nothing will ever be fully covered.

But with autism will the new surroundings and people within have sufficient knowledge to manage all that can occur and the answer is most likely not, all that everyone can do is the best available.

Same Difference

When faced with having to move their disabled child to a different school or college, families face difficult decisions. Now, reality TV star and ex-model, Katie Price, is on that journey with her eldest son, Harvey, who is about to make that transition.

It was a quiet 18th birthday for Harvey. There were balloons in the garden and presents were opened, including a frog lunchbox and an iPad. For a treat, Katie took him to one of his favourite places – the local train station.

“This is the best train ever. I love it,” Harvey says, taking photographs.

His birthday marks another milestone. It is time to leave school and find a college, a process the family has filmed for BBC One documentary, Katie Price: Harvey and Me.

“It’s pretty predictable to know what will happen with the other kids,” Katie says, who has four other children. “But with…

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95% of decisions in favour of parents, but nobody wins at the SEND Tribunal – Special Needs Jungle

Unfortunately Local Authorities (LAs) are not only not working with the ‘best interests’ of children under ‘SEND’ or ‘SENDIST’, as they also are not in many assessments of Need for both children and adults.

Are they doing this deliberately, I feel they are, but not because they are mean and wish to do do, although some may, no it is because LAs have been left desperately short of funding, due to 10 years of austerity cuts and the the additional costs of COVID-19.

In fact, social care has never been sufficiently funded and this is purely down to successive Government in depriving LAs of sufficient funding, not only for social care, but many other essential services.

Also when Governments put additional responsibilities on LAs, the Government fail to provide the additional funding to allow the LAs to successfully manage these additional responsibilities.

To a large extent this is also the care with health care (NHS), but no where to the same degree.

Is it that these Governments do not understand LAs and especially Social Care, well to some extent this can be so, but they also see LAs as a means to save on funding, as they do not fully understand the needs.

This has been recently be shown in the Governments handling of PPE during this COVID-19 pandemic. for they could not see the need to have a large stock of PPE, but would assume that they just need supplies to cover the usual demand, and felt if that demand increase it would be easy to obtain additional supplies, which COVID-19 has proved is a false premise.

But like LAs in their dealings with SEND and SENDIST, they never learn and only look to make saving, when, effectively saving are not there to be made, it is pure incompetence.

So when, it is clear needs are not being covered or they spend money they can ill afford to in defence of indefensible legal cases, this leads LAs to be even more short of funding, rather than cut their losses and pay or provide what they should have done initially.

This, in turn, creates an impossible situation for the persons in need and their families, who are already in very stressful situations and they should not be subjected to immense further stress from LAs and technically Governments.

The leaders of LAs in challenging the Tribunal’s to be changed is far from the answer, but LAs see this has the easiest option.

For the LAs are completely ‘at fault’ and so are the Government, but to challenge the Government for more substantial is much more difficult.

In addition the need to have Social Care, which is effectively as important as health care and could be more so, is far from recognised by Government and unfortunately a sizeable portion of the UK population. For, if you are not in need of Social care, many will not see its importance, that is, until they require it for themselves or for a loved family member.

Most people use health care. but not the same proportion use social care, so social care is not recognise as a very essential service, when it really is.

This Government needs to do, urgently, to reverse the non-actions of itself and many previous Governments and immediately provide all the funding for LAs to provide all that is required within Social Care, which will include SEND and SENDIST.

For this reason and many more, I created the petition, Solve the crisis in Social Care,

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/solve-the-crisis-in-social-care.

Please show your support for children and adults in need of social care, by signing the petition and then sharing.

 

Source: 95% of decisions in favour of parents, but nobody wins at the SEND Tribunal – Special Needs Jungle

Why Is Basic Decency Towards Learning Disabled People Remarkable?

I agree, unfortunately caring and carers with regards to Social Care does not get a good press and the Governments attitude to Social Care goes a long way to put social Care in not a good light.

But for those who have a need for Social Care it is a very important lifeline.

As to doing your duty being treated as exceptional, well unfortunately this appears to be so as there are so many examples of bad care and in some instances very bad care.

Winterbourne was mentioned and even if this was the exception, then that would be bad, but it is not the exception, for bad care happens daily.

But a lot of it goes unreported as those in need of care and their family are scared of losing the care they have, no matter how bad it is.

I facilitate a Learning Disability Carers group and when the carers are talking I heard some instances of bad care, but they do not wish to allow me to take it further as they have been advised that the care would be withdrawn if they do, leaving them with no care at all.

I am a carers representative on our local Learning Disabilities Partnership Board and I have request a presentation from the Council run inspection teak, who should be inspecting Care Providers, for I believe they are not looking deeply enough into actual care delivery.

As to the CQC, I feel they spend to much time on looking at records, for anything can be written down, which may or may not mirror the actual care delivery.

So, I will start with the local council team and then ask for the CQC to present.

Care is in crisis for a large number of reasons, of which funding is a major concern.

For social Care has never been sufficiently funded from 1970, when it was brought under the control of local Authorities, and well before 1970. Then we had 10 years of austerity and now COVID-19 making the crisis even worse.

The reference to 1970 was when Social Care when brought under the control of Local Authorities (LAs) for before that it was a ‘mishmash’ of sources. Some LAs, but others included Charities, voluntary organisations, health and many others.

But as well as Funding there is

insufficient staff
abysmal pay
poor working conditions
unsocial hours
insufficient time
lack of training and skills
and others.

To many people caring is seen as an unskilled profession, well, if it is done badly then it is, but to provide good quality care is is far from it.

For, as we all are, persons in need of care are individuals and not objects, for they have feelings, they have choices, may need emotional support, routine to be followed, knowledge of a persons conditions, such as dementia, learning disabilities, autism and many others and in most cases a mixture of conditions.

So, in caring you can not, or should not, assume that caring for one person will be exactly the same as the next one and could need to change on a daily basis, or even more frequently.

So, it is a very skilled profession, for which the salary is nowhere sufficient, as caring has been left so short for far too long. Government promises have been broken so many times and social care has been left to sink, well sinking is not infinite and will come to a base from which it will not recover.

That base is very near and in some instances has been reached.

Action was urgently required, yesterday and certainly today, for tomorrow could well be too late.

Support for my petition, Solve the crisis in Social Care,

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/solve-the-crisis-in-social-care

Same Difference

In late July 2019, I tweeted asking families with autistic or learning disabled children to share their experience of “sparkling” actions by health and social care professionals. I was writing a book about how professionals could make a difference in the lives of children and their families, and the manuscript was woefully negative.

The tweets started appearing and the thread grew across the next few weeks. They included extraordinary examples of what I came to call “pockets of brilliance”. An administrator who included pug memes in the appointment letters for a dog-loving young patient. Professionals who were prepared to sit on the stairs so a child could stay in their bedroom during a visit. The GP who told one mother: “I don’t know very much about autism, but I promise you that I will do all I can to learn.” Another GP who rang a mother in the evening after…

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Shielders Need The Support Of A Mayor

This Government appears to ignore the problems experienced by vulnerable and at risk people in all that they do and have done for years, even prior to COVID-19.

Is this a deliberate action or do they just not understand the problems people are experiencing, however, no matter what it is extremely worrying that this Government have this abandonment policy.

Now which is it?

Initially, I believe it was, more likely a case of not understanding the problem, but since then much has been said to bring these problems to the attention of the Government.

But, in many aspects there has been an ‘air of indifference’ by this Government. For they may say the required words, but the lack of appropriate actions, speaks so loudly.

So, effectively it is a mixture of both, resulting in the abandonment policy.

It is, more than likely, that the people being abandoned by this Government will not be Conservative voters, so the Government thought could be, so what, if we abandon these people, to the eventual result of their death, for they will not increase the the support for Conservatives, but will reduce the support for the opposition parties.

But there is a major flaw in this. likely Government reasoning and that is new voters appearing due to the progression of age of new voters.

These new voters will have been following all these Government actions and are therefore, more than likely, to be offended and disgusted by the Governments actions and thereby, when they do attain the age of voting, they will be more inclined to support one of the opposition parties, than support the, current ruling, Conservative Party.

Or am I assuming too much insight thinking by the current Government and that they really are just ignorant dumbasses.

Same Difference

As coronavirus cases rise, headlines are dominated by northern leaders being forced by central government to accept inadequate financial aid packages. This is a shameful dereliction of duty by the Tories and is rightly attracting ire, both from regional mayors and the press. And yet it is striking that a similar thing is being done to another group – shielders – but with even less attention. New guidance for shielding for people at high risk because of underlying health conditions was released by the government last week, but without even a small offer of financial support. The new guidance advises “vulnerable people” in high alert areas to stay at home as much as possible, but offers no support to help them cope with paying the bills or accessing food and medicine. Even in the highest alert areas, if shielders are unable to do their jobs at home, the guidance only…

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