Dec 9th United Nations Anti Corruption Day
There is corruption in health services all over the world
The NHS is no different
I wish journalists would be fairer to care home operators
When I noticed that today is the United Nations International Anti-Corruption Day. I went off on one of those Google wandering trips that you only have time to do if there is something else that you OUGHT to be doing but you are putting it off.
In my search I uncovered some terrible stories about corruption and care homes in the United States . In reports from the UK I found lots of accusations but far less evidence of cases of corruption in the UK care home sector. So I reflected on a BBC programme last week that was giving the impression that care homes are mainly vehicles for faceless financiers to make money, rather than a humanitarian service provided for mainly frail and older people and to support their families.
Care home operators falsely accused
Only last month in November 2021, the Competition and Markets Authority, which is a watchdog for consumers, lost a big case against care home operators. The care homes were accused of breaking the law with their administrative charges, but the court case demonstrated that they were operating legally. They hadn’t broken the law.
There is a good history of care home operators changing their practice anyway when what they were doing was legal but perceived as unfair. For example most changed the practice about charging rooms by the month, even if the resident died during that month. They did that voluntarily persuaded by the “court of popular opinion”. They do listen.
My readers will know that I fight for the rights of care home residents, but I also worry when care home operators are used as easy and populist targets by journalists and politicians. Everyone gets annoyed about the cost of care, but there is no point in blaming the homes for this problem that is not caused by the homes themselves. The real problem is that we don’t want to pay for our own care, and we certainly don’t want to pay enough tax for it to be free for anyone else who needs it. It’s a bind. The implication is that if it is expensive someone must be making an excessive or unfair profit, rather than understanding that providing decent care is expensive because it is a human service.
The publicity for the BBC show complained that care homes only spend up to 80% of their fee income on staff and running costs and more than 20% on paying lenders and investors. Well, all of us (according to Which?) in our own households spend a large proportion of our income on lenders and investors in the form of mortgages or rent and it is a darned sight higher than 20%. Denigrating care homes for being debt laden is a bit unfair, because debt is how the world works, not a badge of shame. Our domestic landlords, housing associations and building societies are not all crooks, are they? Unless you think all property is theft and all care should be free. In which case, you need to vote to change to a government that will agree to more taxes.
Corruption in NHS
So, when wandering in and out of Google looking for corruption for this blog, I was astonished then to see I had missed International Fraud Awareness Week from November 14 to 20th November. And where did I find that? The NHS! On an NHS website.
Those experts estimate that the NHS is vulnerable to £1.14 Billion worth of fraud every year. One rarely associates the NHS with fraud, but on their website, you can read about cases such as a GP jailed for stealing NHS funds, and you can read information relating to members of NHS staff who fraudulently falsify their income, expenses or working hours for financial gain, or fail to notify the pension administrators of changes to their circumstances. Now that would make an interesting BBC programme, wouldn’t it?
National treasure NHS
The NHS has national treasure status in the UK, even though such things happen.
When one clinician or hospital lets the NHS down, they are described as a disgrace to the NHS, but when one care provider is found to have failed us, people are told that is typical of the care sector.
I ask myself why two interrelated systems, both of which depend on each other, and on which we all depend, get such different responses from those they serve when either have good and bad incidents.
If you want to know more of my views on care homes find my book here….
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