Todays shocking revelations that over 1000 people complained about residential care services to the Office of the Confidential Recipient is a significant cause for concern and requires urgent investigation by Government .
While the HSE had the foresightt to set-up the the independent service in 2014 to resolve confidential complaints the failure of the service providers is scandalous and the HSE must look at withdrawing funding from many of these service providers .
Further =more we have 1000s of people with disabilities now on waiting lists for any level of support or service with many people who contacted the Confidential Recipient receiving less than 1 hour a day support .
The report which covered 2019 and 2020 showed the following ,
. 320 new concerns raised .
. Disability Services accounting for 282
. Mental Health for 22
. Primary Care for 9
. Hospitals had 2 complaints
. Private Nursing Homes 5
Of major concern was the real anger and stress from younger people with disabilities who have to make the choice of accepting nursing home care at a young age ( some in their 20s or 30s ) or staying in the community with no supports .
What was a significant conner was the failure of residential facilities to communicate to service users and in most cases failing to respond at all.
Concerns about safeguarding and abuse came to 119 with concerns raised about financial abuse around family inheritance.
These report has highlighted some very serious issues for those in residential care and for the 1000s waiting for residential care and Don’t Leave Them Behind are calling for the appointment of an inspector to examine the report and develop an implementation plan to address these matter urgently .