An Irish perspective..........
Wilt has had a helpful suggestion from a colleague via email:
Hi - I have been enjoying your site for some time now and fully agree with your take on the role of the great and the good who regulate our working lives and if we step out of the narrow line, our personal lives which can be drawn into the mix for the worthies to pontificate about.
Somehow you have managed not to include the latest regional regulator of social care, the above which came into being in 2001 but didn't seem to do much with anyone until 2005. Based closely on the model of the GSCC, they pretty well follow the same well worn path, extracting vast total sums from the NI social care workforce so that they can park their well upholstered asses in their plush city centre offices in Belfast and regale us with all that they are allegedly doing to support us and our standards of practice. They can be found at www.niscc.info.
Their latest newsletter on the site makes a big fuss of telling us how they are making the codes of practice work for us by providing all registrants with a bookmark with a printed summary of the codes on it. That should make bedtime reading lead to restful sleep - not. Page 6 has a wonderful spread about how the NISCC has performed against its business objectives with a heartwarming Objective 2 display listing the number of the hapless among us who have fallen into their clutches and survived or not as the case may be. Nowhere in the article about making the codes work for us or in the objectives spread is there any mention of how registrants can use the codes to deal with poor and ineffective managers who fail to follow the employer code of practice nor indeed any sign that the NISCC is interested in doing so. Plus ca change plus c'est la meme. C'est la vie. How come it is always french phrases that seem to be most applicable to our weird and wonderful regulators?
Anyway I started out just to ask you to include the NI worthies in your site and then got some angst off my chest while I had the chance. You know how it is.
And of course the correspondent is right – the NISCC (Northern Ireland Social Care Council) http://www.niscc.info/ is not listed as a category but is now.
It seems according to their history of hearings they have been busy boys and girls, see here: http://niscc.info/decisions_from_hearings-104.aspx
And so, let’s hear more views about them, or the Scottish or Welsh versions as well as our friends at the GSCC.
We like the idea of the NISCC “bookmark” listing the codes – I must get a copy. No doubt it was designed by the prince of horror books, Stephen King (http://www.stephenking.co.uk/home) – indeed nice bedtime reading.
You see there are those that do, and those that teach (or regulate, or inspect). It’s awfully easy to sit back and form an opinion on best practice, but less easy to put it into action and a nice earner to criticise as a bureaucrat that which one could not even begin to understand, let alone judge.
Anyway, our sincere gratitude to our correspondent for bringing this matter to our attention, and welcome to Regulator Watch – have fun. We hope you contribute to the Blog – your anonymity is assured as are your comments whether we agree with them or not.
Wilt
By strange coincidence the NISCC are again in the news. See here: http://www.communitycare.co.uk/blogs/social-work-blog/2010/03/has-social-work-lost-its-polit.html
ReplyDeleteAnd the report here: http://www.niscc.info/content/uploads/downloads/aboutus/2009Jan18_PeopleWorjNJPaperwork_Report_Approved_BJ.pdf
Wilt
The NISCC appears to be busy with their usual reminder to pay registration fees on time(with the usual dire threats of removal and a restoration fee for late payers and defaulters). Of course the NISCC is not mainly concerned with revenue. Mind you for once their home page does not have a distractingly compelling link to the usual article on the pending or recent fate of the "accused". I imagine that the need to promote healthy cash flow in order to fund the high city centre rent on their Belfast offices has nothing to do with this. Why do they need to be located in the city centre anyway when there is really no need for this? Perhaps the poor struggling social care workforce in Northern Ireland has been fully compliant with their masters for once or at least managed not to fall foul of them or get scapegoated.
ReplyDeleteThe NISCC site recently featured a statement by the NI Health Minister who stated his support for social workers in NI(most of the social workers in NI are employed by the NHS). In a recent Assembly debate the Minister told members: “Social Workers do not come equipped with crystal balls to tell the future, so what staff have to do is make assessments and balance risks. Overwhelmingly they do this very well and we are fortunate to have the workforce we have.” Tell that to any staff who have been disciplined by their employers and referred on to the NISCC for not balancing risks, known or otherwise, crystal ball failure in other words. They might just not agree with the minster's supportive words. It is reassuring to know that the NISCC, in featuring the statement, agrees with his fine words.
Oh and while on the subject of the scandalously expensive and needless location of the NISCC right in the heart of Belfast city centre, paid for of course by Northern Ireland's underpaid and overworked social care workforce, I suggest that you check out their palatial dwelling, the 7th floor of the modern glass faced Millenium House on Great Victoria Street. You can view it on Google images to see what you are paying through the nose for. Situated handily next to Belfast's salubrious and most bombed hotel, The Europa and with the famed Crown Liquor Saloon and Robinson's bar just across the street, our regulator has got it made - a top notch property with easy access to a great guinness, excellent social opportunities at lunch while the "accused" await their fate as well as racking up vast car parking charges in Belfast's overpriced city centre car parks and even some designer shopping at Victoria Square if they feel the need (you know they do). Oh and if our regulators have to work really late they can always check into the nice hotel next door so that they can get started early the next morning shafting the terminally stressed who fell victim to the usual management bullet dodging.
ReplyDeleteThis organisation could easily be located more centrally and cheaply in a country area, in an industrial estate off the M1 motorway for example. This way the "accused" wouldn't have to pay parking charges while attending their hearing and the fees charged for registration could be reduced. Pigs might fly indeed!
It's getting late now - time to retire to bed and read my book. Just think how much better I will sleep when I can close my book using my nice new NISCC Codes of Practice bookmark. Sweet dreams or nightmares then I wonder. Hmmm...
ReplyDeleteTime for a bit of balance. Now I know that I am being a bit harsh on the hard working people at the NISCC. I have had a little bit of fun mocking them, their grand HQ and their strict demand for registrants to pay up on time or else. I know that many of the people who work for the organisation are genuine and diligent in their approach to their work. Their work is serious and requires care. I also know that it has been led in a way that has not caused it to have the same problems currently besetting the GSCC. It is of course a much smaller body and that helps.
ReplyDeleteImportantly, from what I have read of their work with registrants who have been referred to them, they seem to have generally acted in a balanced way. When the Council started a flurry of "sacrificial lambs" to placate public and media pressure was anticipated but by and large most of the cases heard have been rather black and white and the sanctions measured and appropriate. So far so good. There has been a total absence of action in regard to employers but then maybe nobody complained to the NISCC about them. Maybe that should change but it is a big ask of a poor lone worker to take on their employer. They should try it because once they do they will be pretty untouchable as they can claim victimisation. They will have no career but c'est la vie. You can't have your gateau and eat it.
The real crunch will come when the Council is faced with cases where the waters are much more muddy, where someone has taken a bullet from their employer for an action or omission when the employer themselves had failed to provide the worker with proper manageable working conditions and rendered the failing concerned much more likely to occur. NIPSA, the NI trade union which represents most social care staff, has warned staff about the dangers of this happening in a recent bulletin and advised them to use their supervision to raise concerns about the impact of excessive work pressures. The problem is that what happens is that, when staff are not coping because of work overload, work stress or a myriad of other issues, this is the very time that they cannot see the need to follow the advice of NIPSA. Then when the proverbial shit hits the fan the employer hangs them out to dry and disciplines them with all the benefit of hindsight because they failed to follow procedures to the letter, thereby demanding of them a standard of perfection in their work that was never going to be possible precisely because the employer was already asking too much of them. And that is how the bullet gets bypassed by employers and directed onto the poor employee. Now the problem will be whether the NISCC will actually be willing to challenge employers in such situations rather than simply seal the fate of the registrant on the basis of their actions or omissions alone. Mitigation is notoriously difficult to prove for a social care worker who has been too hard pressed to see what has been happening around them in time to protest. Watchful will be watching with interest.
So far there have been no cases in the NISCC resulting in "Misconduct not proven" or "Misconduct not found", as has occured in the GSCC. Now this might possibly mean that employers in Northern Ireland appreciate what is appropriate to refer on to the regulator. Where things get tricky here is when NI employers wish they didn't have to refer because in doing so they may expose their own failings and inadequacies in relation to the case itself. So such cases are a double edged sword and the potential for much recrimination on the part of employers abounds. Of course the most senior manager will then simply, to use their favourite term of the moment, "cascade" blame downwards and so the process goes on. Watchful awaits the day when this arises and will duly report on the performance of the UK's most recent social care regulator.
ReplyDeleteSo the cutbacks have started. So what can we expect - quangos to go - yes indeed and maybe even public bodies like UK regulators which have duplicate functions. Maybe we could see the management of the UK regulators harmonised into one management structure with fewer chiefs and a skeleton structure in the outback areas. It's what is going to happen with the civil service, the NHS, Councils etc so why not slim down the bloated regulatory sector. It would save on pay, expenses and property rental. Perhaps I may suggest that to my MP but he hails from the loony creationists who populate our assembly, so a sensible proposal is unlikely to appeal to him. His ilk are too preoccupied with trying to make Belfast museum feature subject matter related to creationism. Let me tell you if God created the earth he certainly wouldn't have created such a bunch of fruitcakes to be our public representatives, unless of course he liked practical jokes.
ReplyDeleteSo back to our beloved regulator the NISCC - will they still be untouched and in the same place in 5 years time? - who knows though I can feel the prospect relocation to a metal building in that industrial estate off the M1 in my bones already...here's hoping folks. Sure it would save on the rates wouldn't it? That's the least they could do.
What will also be interesting to watch in the future will be how far,in cases that come before the NISCC, they seek to pander to the moral imperatives of their political masters, the Democratic Unionist party, the main government party and to the relative narrowmindedness of the population. Not that long ago park swings were chained up here on sundays and mowing your lawn on the sabbath was frowned upon. It still is in the Ballymena bible belt but somehow that doesn't quite square with the massive swinging and dogging that goes on throughout NI. The internet abounds with websites featuring NI swingers looking for others to hook up with, the same as anywhere else but all the institutions with power are truly narrow minded.
ReplyDeleteSo what does this mean for the way in which an NISCC registrant behaves? Where will the line be drawn for behaviour that makes one unsuitable to work in social care? Will it reflect the same narrow mindedness? Let's think of a few examples. Say a social care worker espoused the christian religion or creationst views in their work with service users - would that lead to them being removed from the register here? I wonder if the NISCC would have the balls to do that when their political masters might likely not see this as a problem. Would we have an Ofsted/Shoesmith in a conclusion which appeared to many to meet political pressure - thus a registrant not removed because their behaviour reflected the views of the political masters?
Where is the line to be drawn? Failing to pay a TV licence and being taken to court? That behaviour has been forever endemic in whole counties of Northern Ireland and remains so.It is part of the culture here that a certain part of the population is loathe to pay anything to a british institution and many elect not to do so. The DUP are incensed at this. Would this mean that said registrant would be removed from the register by the NISCC to placate the DUP?
What about said registrant drinking to excess and drawing attention to themselves regularly at weekends by being off their head, rowing in public with the wife and generally breaching the peace? This a national pastime in NI fuelled by the required downing of at least 15 pints of beer. Are they to stand trial for this and to risk being removed?
How many points will be too many points on a driving licence? Will getting caught for sheep shagging get you removed?
Raising the issue of abortion with service users in the last part of the UK where it is still not legal? The prevailing consenus is almost certainly against abortion.
The strange and most odd contradiction is that some minor indiscretion committed in NI may be enough to get you removed to conform with local opinion yet we have in some of our government leaders those who have been closely linked to terrorist organisations.
I suspect that how registrants behave in their personal lives won't much matter unless they get caught doing something that offends the outwardly pious yet often similarly offending population. So getting caught cottaging would be a hanging offence but having an extramarital affair with a person young enough to be your grandchild would likely not. Having drunken straight sex within public view a hanging offence? - possibly not yet covert gay sex in a public place definitely yes.
The jury is out on the NISCC so far on pretty well anything of significance. They have yet to prove that they are not just there to reflect popular locally flavoured prejudice and placate the media and the local politicians. I remain Watchful...
Now the interesting thing about the NISCC role is that it regulates the social care workforce in Northen Ireland and has in place two codes of conduct, one for social care workers and the other for social care employers. Yet the NISCC website shows no indication of any role in policing the latter. This appears to be the role of the RQIA, the Registration Improvement and Inspection Authority, yet another regulator with an expensive yet totally unnecessary city centre location. Interestingly the NISCC doesn't see fit to encourage its registrants to use the RQIA to make complaints about social care employers. Yet the NISCC business plan for 2009/10 makes clear that it has the business objective 2.3.1 to monitor and review the protocol governing its working relationship with said RQIA and to ensure their regulation of the Codes of Practice for Social Care Employers. If that is indeed the case how come the NISCC does not see fit to make explicit to its registrants that they should have recourse to the RQIA to complain about their employers' failings in respect of them in accordance with the Employer Code of Conduct. Now I am sure it has nothing to do with their office locations being only a few hundred yards from each other. Belfast is a very small place and everybody knows everybody else and if they don't they make sure that they find out about them. It's a cosy little regulator world in downtown Belfast. They must meet each other all the time when out and about for lunch or a coffee.
ReplyDeleteAnyway back to my point. Surely it would not be too much to expect the NISCC to make clear on their website that registrants have recourse to RQIA in respect of failings in social care governance by their employers. The Employee Code of Conduct is explicit for example, where registrants consider that their working conditions are potentially unsafe, that it is their responsibility to raise this with their employer. Indeed and so far so good. But where do they go when the employer fails to take remedial action? It should be the RQIA but the NISCC never tell them this, yet they claim that they are working in partnership to ensure that the RQIA acts effectively in regulating the Employer Code of Conduct. The NISCC does not seem to want to go there, preferring instead to remind registrants that they are accountable for their own practice, that everything is their own responsibility, including complaining about working conditions that lead to or may lead to unsafe practice. The NISCC stops short of making it known to registrants that they have an option to escalate the issue with the RQIA. This is a typical example of the sort of cosy familiarity that exists in Northern Ireland. None of these bodies wants to rock the others' boats, including the employers. It is of course entirely coincidental that many of the senior staff in the regulatory bodies have previously held senior posts with the employers and I of course feel suitably assured that this has nothing to do with the matter.
In the end the poor registrant is left powerless, having to work unsafely with excessive workloads and ever increasing bureaucracy which employers fail to address. The poor registrant, stressed to the limit, hasn't the clarity or the foresight to see the danger lurking for them and to protect themselves effectively. Something then goes wrong and in come the employers and the NISCC for the kill. Yet harm to service users and the loss of a registrant's career could be avoided if registrants had somewhere to turn when the employer doesn't act in accordance with their Code of Conduct.
My post about the cutbacks on 26 may must have been prophetic. The cull has indeed started with the General teaching Council for England. Time now to put a stop to the wasteful proliferation of social care regulators. There is absolutely no need for the four UK countries to have their own separate regulators unless of course you take a look at, for example the NISCC (Nobody In Social Care Counts) business plan which stresses its committment to developing close partnerships with the other regulators. This is so supposedly laudable and altruistic but no doubt pursuing these links means that the upper echelons of the four regulators get to attend each others conferences etc with attendant opportunities for much socialising and wine tasting at public and social care workforce expense. Off with their heads I say, no indeed off with the whole damn bodies!
ReplyDeleteI would like to endorse the sentiment of Christine Blower, general secretary of the NUT in relation to the scrapping of the GTC for England. She stated " Any replacement for the GTCE needs to distance itself from the belief that a watchdog can also reserve the right to make intrusive judgements on teachers' personal lives" This should be the case for all of the social care regulators, including the NISCC (Nobody In Social Care Counts). The whole issue of making decisions about the suitability of workers in social care based on how they conduct themselves in their private lives is unacceptable. Obviously being convicted of a crime such as theft or a serious sexual assault might lead to removal from the register but for everything else it is entirely up to the Council to choose to make a value judgement based on their prejudices or which they, in their godliness, consider to conform to conventional or local social norms. Do social care workers have to be moderates with no extreme views and behave like angels in their private lives to comply? Is questioning the very existence of the NISCC a hanging offence because it could potentially appear to show support for leaving social care unregulated? If Max Moseley had been a social worker I wonder if he would have been out on his ear??
ReplyDeleteI think we should have much clearer guidelines from the NISCC as to the types of behaviours that would lead to action by the Council. This is the norm for employers in disciplinary procedures and is a requirement in employment law. So why should the NISCC which is in effect a disciplinary body not have to do the same thing? The list does not have to be all encompassing but could give examples of what could lead an admonishment of a suspension or removal. I know of course that circumstances are required to be considered as is length of valuable service. Without some effort at clarity the NISCC remains an unregulated free for all. The regulator needs regulated.
So now the new coalition is promising to be all inclusive with the public in working out how to cut the deficit. Hmmm - perhaps they will welcome my suggestion about getting rid of the multiple regulators like the NISCC. Four countries and four regulators all allegedly working in partnership, except in cost saving for the public and their registrants. This errant nonsense needs addressed at the earliest opportunity. There is no way that NI, a tiny country the size of Yorkshire needs a separate regulator for its social care workforce. The same goes for the RQIA. Its management could be merged with a UK body by placing the workforce under an established management team, thus dispensing with the well paid senior managers here in NI and saving the taxpayer much needed money. It is time Mr McGimpsey got stuck into chopping back the bloated regulatory sector in this tiny part of the UK or Ireland if you prefer.
ReplyDeleteBloody hell! Does this regulatory proliferation never end? It seems that the NISCC hopes to measure the standard of its conduct function against CHRE standards. Now what is the hitherto unknown CHRE? It is apparantly the modestly named "Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence". This lot are top of the tree for regulating the regulating of doctors, opticians, nurses etc and for Northern Ireland social care workers. They set the standards apparantly and can even refer cases back to the High Court if they think that a regulator has been too lenient in conduct case. It really never ends for the poor social care worker that gets disciplined by their employer, referred on for investigation by the NISCC, them on to the Care Tribunal for appeal, then maybe on from there to the Council For Healthcare Excellence and if really unlucky the all the way to the High Court. Who would want a job in social care if that is the potential prospect facing you? Not me for one.
ReplyDeleteI sincerely hope that our masters in the NISCC took the time to watch last night's "Dispatches" programme on Channel4. This undercover look at the life in a child protection team was highly illuminating and would have served well to illustrate very poignantly the real pressures and difficulties facing frontline social work staff in this area. What should be taken on board from this by our beloved NI regulator is the sheer constant pressure, fear and anxiety involved in working in this area. It was just so evident that the burden of bureaucracy and paperwork was totally overwhelming for all staff and that the burnout rate for staff was extremely high. This demonstrated the background against which social workers who are struggling to cope will make mistakes or fail to adequately perform a function of their job. When I referred above to overpressed staff failing to be able to see clearly that they were getting to the point where they were no longer always working safely, this programme exemplified my point. Yet in the middle of all this mayhem the NISCC expects social care staff to be accountable for their own practice. This is totally unrealistic. The expose illustrated perfectly how the well intentioned worker took on too much or unsuitable work precisely because they felt powerless yet still wanted to help clients by not refusing to take the work on. There was also the clear instance on the programme of the hapless social worker who had already said to her manager that she could not cope but getting even more work passed her way and crying in great distress. This expose illustrated the reality of life in child protection and how staff are struggling to cope. Other areas of social work can be similarly stressful. The NISCC needs to take this on board and not just follow the lead of the employers when they hear cases. Employers have a vested interest in shafting the social care worker as it shifts blame onto the individual and thus prevents it being attributed to a systems or management failure, a result much more inconvenient and uncomfortable for the employer.
ReplyDeleteNow it might be unfair to suggest that the NISCC is prejudiced in advance of conduct hearings but worryingly their website section "Conduct hearings and Outcomes" lists only three possible outcomes to these. All are sanctions. Now if they meant sanctions would they not have said this? The presumption to be taken from this is that all conduct hearings will lead to one of three sanctions and that no other outcome is possible. What about "misconduct not found" or misconduct not proven" as outcomes? Perhaps this has never occurred to the NISCC. This is tantamount to sending out a notice of a disciplinary hearing to an employee with a "Gross misconduct by ......" on the cover of the list of charges, in other words that something wrong has in effect been committed. Get your act together NISCC and tell registrants that there options actually exist that are not sanctions. After all the NISCC business plan Strategic Objective 1 clearly indicates that its policies and procedures should be aligned with the other UK regulators. The GSCC has potential outcomes of misconduct not found or proven so why not the NISCC. Maybe the NISCC wants to appear to the public that it is hard on alleged wrongdoing and the causes of wrongdoing to the extent that it has lost sight of the possibility of the concept of innocence. The GSCC clearly states that if misconduct is found them there are three options but the NISCC only says that, if their investigations have established sufficient evidence to progress the case, there are still then only three options. This is very different as it implies that if the NISCC progress the case, which must surely mean go to hearing, then there are only three outcomes, all sanctions. What happens if the hearing throws up information that discounts or negates what the NISCC already believe from their investigations? Linking the 3 outcomes as the only options when progressing to hearing is prejudicial and unacceptable. I rest my case and remain ever watchful...
ReplyDeleteHasn't it been fun watching the upper echelons of The Belfast Health and Social Services Trust sharing some television exposure with Gerry Robinson, the business guru, in looking how to make the health service work better? I have been quite impressed with the social work managers' openness, not forgetting the Chief Executive who is from a social work background. These are the same people who will have the responsibility to refer staff who allegedly err sufficiently to the NISCC. It would be reassuring to think that these same outwardly affable beings would only do so if there were genuinely sufficient grounds for concern that the staff in question had really done something which constituted true malfeasance and was not just the result of being overwhelmed by burnout and exposure to the very high pressures of the job. We would all hope that this would indeed be the case.
ReplyDeleteJust to clarify further why this review is a total waste of money and time, the fact is that NI social services already routinely imports social care developments and legislation almost wholesale approximately 7 to 10 years after mainland UK has introduced them and often when these are at the point of becoming obselete there. There is of course a bit of tinkering to make things appear as if they are specific to NI but effectively this is window dressing. The developments, the direction and the legislative framework always ends up sharply mirroring what is in place in Great Britain. Yes health and social care are integrated in NI but that is going to end up in a fine old mess when a disaster occurs in social care and the penny drops that the idiotic and dangerous general management structure in place was at fault because it was a case of the blind and ill informed leading the clear sighted. Remember baby P and the fact that Sharon Shoesmith was in charge but was not from a social work background. It could happen here too in any discipline now and probably will. I sincerely hope not.
ReplyDeleteTime to get back to the NISCC and its relationship with the RQIA, the body that is supposed to be the flip side of the regulatory coin in regulating the employers' management of the Code of practice. In the NISCC Corporate plan it states that it it is going to regulate how the RQIA regulates the implementation of the Employer Code of Practice. Now what RQIA has been doing is looking at governance issues and how services are managed and organised. They purport to address issues relating to the health, safety and well being of staff. In doing so it skims the surface and let the employers off far too easily. Yes the employers have introduced family frendly policies. Well they had to didn't they as they had to comply with government policy? They even cite the employers' cynical contract with Carecall to provide an independent counselling service for staff as an example of good practice. Yet no NI NHS Trust has as yet introduced a stress management policy despite each Trust Chief Executive having been specifically written to several years ago by NHS Employers and told to do so. Now what has RQIA done about this dereliction of duty? -zilch! Don't they realise that the Trusts have cynically entered into the contract with Carecall, not out of some altruistic concern for their employees' welfare but rather because they think that providing access to such a service will prevent them being successfully sued for negligence in preventing work related stress among staff. It is lip service, nothing more and will not save the Trusts' hides when they get taken to court by people who know the law and what they are doing. The prolonged failure by Trusts to introduce specific stress policies will catch them out in the end. What I want to know is why the RQIA is not doing something about this governance issue. So will those whom the Trusts fail. What is the NISCC doing about this - nothing either. Plus ca change etc...I remain Watchful...
ReplyDeleteProbably the best way forward for staff who are negligently stressed out in any NI health trust would be either to take legal advice and sue the Trust directly or to report them to the Health and Safety Executive. There is no point relying on the RQIA, The Social Services Inspectorate or the NISCC to help you. This cosy little regulatory cabal is much more involved in perpetuating its own self interest than your miserable working life or mental health. You never know the HSE might repeat its treatment of Lincolnshire NHS Trust in ordering those here to get their act together in relation to improving how they manage stress at work. This is of particular relevance for social care workers who are well known to be in the top echelons of stressful occupations. Trust managers have been banging on about caseload management systems for years but they have singularly failed to implement these in any coherent way if at all, instead leaving this to the discretion of line managers who they put under pressure not to maintain waiting list of unallocated referrals. So in the end the poor social care worker gets dumped on as usual. What is our cosy regulatory cabal doing about this -yes you guessed it -nothing as yet..I remain Watchful...
ReplyDeleteHow come the NISCC hasn't had any publications since October 2009? You people are slacking and are not meeting the standards required of any self respecting regulator. To have failed to publish anything for nigh on 2/3 of a year is unacceptable and does not befit a regulator of your alleged quality. If I approached my PRTL like that I would be strung up. So come on NISCC get your act together.
ReplyDelete[...] Comments Watchful on An irish perspective……………Watchful on An irish perspective……………Watchful on An irish [...]
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the good people at the NISCC have a sense of humour? I know that I have been mocking it in parts for what I consider to be its unnecessarily expensive headquarters and aspects of what they have published on their site and also the self important tone of their presentation on their website. I have also made it known that I consider that the work they do is necessary (even if it could be done more cheaply without the NISCC) and that they take their role seriously, are hardworking and to date appear to have been fair to registrants who have come before them. If only this were the case with all social care employers.
ReplyDeleteThe vast majority of my comments are about the questionable need for its existence in NI but this also applies to the other three UK social care regulators. It is the duplication of role and the proliferation of regulators that I object to and to the resultant waste of public money.
I have taken issue with the NISCC about its place in a huge hierarchy of regulators in social care. I have also expressed concerns about how the prevailing political and often hypocritical moral standards in NI could potentially influence the outcomes of conduct hearings inappropriately.
Lastly I have made it clear that I will continue to monitor the performance of the NISCC and report back to the online public via regulatorwatch. My comments will endeavour to be as fair as possible although I reserve the right to mock if felt necessary. I would hope that those at the NISCC have a sense of humour,will appreciate that they are not under enemy fire, just the subject of critical appraisal by an unofficial critic who genuinely believes in fairness and equality in social care and good value for money in our public bodies.