Where have all the wardens gone?
18/08/2008
In July last year, a 70-year-old sheltered housing resident fell in her sitting room and lay there for several days before she was spotted unconscious behind the sofa by neighbours. She wasn't wearing her emergency pendant. Tragically, she died of hypothermia the day after her arrival in hospital. The onsite warden at the home had been removed months earlier, following a cost-cutting shake-up of housing support.
This is just one example of what can happen when live-in wardens are ditched as a widespread response to dwindling "Supporting People"
budgets. In their absence, residents are relying on 'Telecare devices', such as emergency pendants and pull cords - but the limitations of these devices have been sorely felt by residents.
Protests have flared up - especially in Devon where resident wardens will be phased out completely over the next three years - but coordinating them nationally has proved difficult. So how can people stop electronically controlled 'care' and 'floating support' taking over from the human touch and reassuring presence of a warden?
On a practical level, electronic care is creating a lot of problems of its own. For example, if an emergency pendant is used, an ambulance is called even if it’s not needed - something that happens very frequently in sheltered housing because there are no other services on site to see whether the fall is serious or not. And 'supporting people', who send round visitors for non-emergencies cannot possibly cover one whole building which may have up to 66 flats inside.
The only benefit seems to be financial. For example, in North Ayrshire councillors have saved £230,000 by scrapping sheltered housing wardens and replacing them with 18 roaming ‘care at home’
assistants. One resident, Richard Davidson, commented: "Previously, wardens knew everybody. But these roaming assistants just don’t have the time to get to know people. It's not their fault. They’ll come around once a day and knock on everyone’s door, and if there’s no response, they’ll go to the next door."
Historically, the Warden system has worked very well financially for decades. For residents receiving Housing Benefit the pro rata costs of the Wardens salary was paid from within their allowance, and self- funded residents paid the housing provider for a Warden facility through service charges.
Then in 2003 the Government ceased funding Wardens in this way and passed the money to local organisations, usually councils, and named these organisations 'Supporting People'. They took over the local funding and care provision, and sheltered housing was moved from General Needs housing into their care umbrella.
Vernon Yarker, from the new website www.shelteredhousinguk.com, told the Mature Times: "The effect upon sheltered housing has been disastrous. Supporting People have decided that residents of sheltered housing do not all need a Warden so they will not pay the housing provider for one. Instead Supporting People contract out to agencies to provide what is termed 'floating support' who visit people on their checklist both inside and outside of sheltered housing, enabling people to live longer in their own homes are. So effectively people visited outside of sheltered housing are seen at the cost of those who reside in it.
"These visits are perhaps once per week, or sometimes once per month, and the objective of 'floating support' is to solve a problem. When the problem is solved, they cease visiting that particular individual."
But many who moved into sheltered housing did so in the knowledge that a Warden was a part of the facility on offer, and if they are taken away then the property reverts to normal OAP dwellings. For many elderly people, having no Warden reduces the incentive to move into sheltered housing at all.
Currently pleas by residents to retain their Wardens are being ignored. Housing providers are only required to hold consultations with their residents - but a consultation has no legal meaning.
Having listened to the views of the residents the provider can then go and do what it likes. In some instances the decision to remove the Warden has been taken before the consultation - and the latter was held with residents for appearances sake .
Initially Help the Aged and Age Concern were more or less on the sidelines - but now they taking the matter very seriously.
The situation needs a nation-wide response to make changes. Please get in contact with the web-site linked at the bottom of this page and share your concerns with others. Alternatively call Vernon Yarker on
01245 224166, or write to him at: Flat 2, 71 West Belvedere, Danbury, Chelmsford, CM3 4RF.