Author: whileincare

 

I removed the count timer display that was above after it reached over 1000 days,  the number of days between the date my brother was allowed home to visit his mother and me, without interference by Herefordshire Council or The Priory Group. Both organisations ignoring requests and forcing us to only have contact or home visits when convenient for them, denying him and us of private and family life for this period.

Since my brother was placed in the residential home, out of county and against his family’s wishes, his needs have been neglected and he has not been provided with adequate care and support nor communication aids or a reliable phone service and necessary equipment. The Priory Group and Herefordshire Council ignoring, not least, The Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970, since December 2013.

The severe restriction imposed on my brother had denied him access to a mobile phone I loaned to him for contact with us, since November 2017 when it was confiscated from him by a carer at H House. Seeing some video recordings, including recovered deleted video confirmed my concerns.

 

Before this time my brother was not allowed home to visit his mother for some 54 days 2 hours, this due to Herefordshire Council refusing to allow us to meet at a chosen location or provide alternative support to him and our mother and I. Prior to this the longest periods were 64 days, 58 days and 23.5 hours, due to The Priory Group and H House wilfully ignoring a total of 18 of 24 requests.

In January 2018, some months after communications were punitively restricted and blocked by directors of Herefordshire Council, I requested during a phone call that my brother’s social worker RC arrange for care to support me while I was on a hunger strike in protest at the inadequate care and support, and recurring neglect and institutional abuse of my vulnerable brother.
I was visited, in the same month, by a social worker AJ and her colleague LT who appeared to me to be inexperienced, and lacked knowledge of specific legislation.

The below is AJ’s record entry of the visit to me on 17th January 2018.

AJ Record Entry 17-01-2018

 

 

Some points to note in the record entry are:

1. After the social worker AJ alleged I was unlikely to survive my protest, no support was provided by Herefordshire Council to help me cook meals or assist with personal care of my frail elderly mother while I conducted my protest. Herefordshire council refused, on 23rd January 2018, to provide the support I requested and needed, as a phone call recording can evidence, leaving me to die.

2. I did not say the council server was easy to hack; I said I was aware the council email system had critical vulnerabilities.

3. The social worker’s record, entered on 18th January 2018 at 12.08, was edited by a third party on 23rd January 2018 at 10.05 pm, I believe with information removed, coincidentally this edit occurred after I received a call earlier the same day from JW a senior practitioner of the social care team, who refused to provide the support I had requested.

As an unpaid carer I am, unfortunately, familiar with the dire service and lack of accountability of staff of Herefordshire Councils adult social care, however, for supposed professionals to abandon a duty of care, it is in my opinion, worthy of condemnation and in the public interest for such to be known.

Today is my mother’s 89 Birthday; sadly, my brother was only allowed to visit us yesterday. And for the first time in over 40 years, we have no Birthday photo/video record of us together due to current CoP restrictions.

Why can’t our family be like any other family?

It is now over 19 month since The Priory Group ignored my original subject access request to them, and DW (Director for Risk and Safety at The Priory Group), lied to The ICO about preparing to send the data soon to me after The ICO re-opened the case.

It is also a further six months since I submitted a renewed subject access request under The GDPR to The Priory Group; which to date has remained ignored.
However, it is no surprise to me that DW and the lawyer for the firm MD has attempted to avoid providing the data I requested, particularly in consideration that he assisted in concealing neglect and institutional abuse at a Priory Group managed home for an extended period and provided specious letters attempting to change versions of his story.
In fact, in one letter, DW said he did not see any issue with my vulnerable brother sleeping in the same clothes he wore to visit our mother and me; when we did manage to get my brother home.

Below is part of one of DW’s specious emails, this particular one to The ICO concerning requested information.
In my opinion, it is extraordinarily convenient that there was a technical fault involving a person and data regarding my case, and that particular data was claimed to be unrecoverable.

If DW’s claim were to be believed, this raises questions, notably do The Priory Group not have adequate system backup of other client and patients data, as declared in a letter from Matthew Dillon  (Data Protection Officer and solicitor for The Priory Group) to Aberystwyth University

Letter from MD Regarding EAP Aberystwyth University

 

Last week I received the below letter from SV of Herefordshire Council, the person who is also responsible for removing my unpaid carers support in March 2018 without assessment or notice, while also charging my elderly mother for agency care support which she did not receive.
Subsequently I was sent three threatening letters from Herefordshire Council demanding payment for support my mother never had, and no apology was given for the distress this caused my mother or me.

Letter from Stephen Vickers (director for Adults and Wellbeing)

Letter From SV Hfd Coucil change of SPOC 01-11-2018redacted_Redacted

 

MA The named “Single Point of Contact” for my contact with Herefordshire Council is the same individual who wrote to me on 26th October 2017.
In the letter, MA, who was Head of Safeguarding and Principal Social Worker at the time, defended the negligence of a previous social worker and colleague EG and the inaccurate care records during 2016/17.
Such assisted with the continued neglect and institutional abuse of my brother, long into 2018.
My brother remained an unhealthy five stones overweight, with The Priory Group and Herefordshire Council social care ignoring his mandatory right to NHS support and treatment and he having almost no access to his family home or mother and me; just two of many concerns very poorly investigated and ignored by both Herefordshire Council and The Priory Group.

In the public interest, particularly those who may have a vulnerable relative under the care of Herefordshire Council, these are example of what you and your relatives may experience if you are unfortunate to discover and expose neglect or institutional abuse, particularly in a Priory Group home.

 

Once again and for another year my brother was deprived of visiting his family home for a Birthday celebration.
No attempt was made by Priory Group staff or Herefordshire Council including by my brother’s current social worker (RC) or line managers (AM) to contact me regarding arrangements, nor have dates changed since my brother moved from the family home in 2011.

Further, two of my three estranged sisters, whom Herefordshire Council claim in care documents are involved with his mother and I and family home visits, did not help my brother for this established event. However, it will no doubt be claimed to be my fault, which I firmly dispute; established dates and arrangements have never changed, and both organisations are aware of such.
Incidentally, both The Priory Group and Herefordshire Council have restricted my communications with them; the later continuing punitive restrictions.

 

In the coming months, I hope to redesign and update this website as my brother remains in a residential home our mother and I did not wish for him to go to, and we remain severely restricted by Herefordshire Council and The Priory Group.

I also expect to concentrate on, and complete writing a book chronicling my experience, including as an unpaid carer, whose family has been actively destroyed by these organisations with reported incidents ignored or covered up, and who continues to be victimised for exposing organisational or institutional abuse and the inadequate care and support provided to my adopted brother.

By sharing my experience, and detailing the long running issues in book form I hope that it may help others who are unfortunate enough to be in a similar situation, or who may be in the future.

In my opinion and from experience of Herefordshire Council social care, its commissioned services and some professionals from directors of organisations, social workers, advocacy service and paid carers, it is shameful that so many are prepared to lie or misinform to conceal neglect and other incidents of organisational or institutional abuse, merely to protect each other or claim ignorance of the incidents that happen.

 

Since moving to HH and my repeated requests since 2014 for Skype to be available to my brother for contact with me and our mother, it has taken Herefordshire Council, The Priory Group and my brother’s currently appointed RPR TC and social worker RC over 14 months since a best interest meeting in July 2017, to arrange for Skype to be possible.
Disappointingly, of two poor quality video calls, one occasion was terminated abruptly by the staff of H House after a mere one minute one second with no attempt at reconnecting, and my attempt to reconnect showing he was offline.

I believe any reasonable people would consider such a long delay after repeated requests to allow a vulnerable person access to Skype for contact with their family is inexcusable and excessive.
Such notably when both The Priory Group and Herefordshire Council have blocked and ignored requests for my brother to visit his mother and me, and ignored our chosen method of communication.

Similarly, my brother’s desktop PC which was damaged at H House in September 2017, has taken eleven months to arrange its return to him, his current social worker RC delaying returning it since I repaired and upgraded it after DW of The Priory Group ignored my request to provide insurance details for its repair.
Due to these facts, it will likely take a long time for me to help my brother to regain his skills and enjoyment of computers, having appeared to become deskilled.

 

In the letter from DW of The Priory Group to me regarding the phone loaned to my brother and its confiscation, DW stated: “The videos do not in any way at all show that ********** is being mistreated.”

Contrary to DW’s claim, and since, I have reviewed the video and other data further.

One video clip shows my brother wearing and sleeping in clothes which he also wore when visiting us at home, a photograph I recently found also verifies this. How long my brother has been sleeping in his clothes and why his current social worker RC, appointed RPR TC or DW of The Priory Group did not address this, I do not know.

In my opinion, it is reprehensible for DW to defend such an indication of institutional abuse. Further, and in another video clip, staff can be heard shouting angrily at another resident.

A further concern is that DW, who has written several specious letters to me, permitted one of his colleagues to delete video of themselves and a carer from the confiscated loaned phone, yet DW conveniently never mentioned this even after I recovered the deleted footage.

The original post and redacted copy of DW’s specious letter can be viewed here

Letter from DW Priory Group 13-06-2018 - Copy_Redacted

Below is a redacted copy of yet another specious letter I received from DW of The Priory Group, dated 13th June 2017, regarding the phone that was confiscated from my brother by carers in November 2017. Along with DW’s letter were attached some blurry photos of the phone my brother loaned and a previous letter relating to my emails including the phone and damage to my brother’s PC. Email of 5th June 2018 and email of 12th October 2017

 

Letter from DW Priory Group 13-06-2018_Redacted

 

 

There are issues with DW’s letters and attached images, notably after stealing the phone from my brother someone compromised the security of the phone to gain access and then tampered with it and deleted data. Even with the blurry photos DW supplies, he gives no evidence of who made any video recording nor do his stories match a specific video. Further, his allegation that my brother did not consent to have the phone is untrue; my brother and I worked with the device on the rare occasions he was visiting his mother and me at the family home, to ensure it met his needs; this took many months. It is also, in my understanding of the law, discriminatory for DW to deny my brother of a device that has recording capability. By breaching the security of the phone loaned to my brother DW and his colleagues also intruded on my personal data without permission.

A redacted copy of the blurry photos DW sent to me of the phone stolen from my brother

 

IMG_20180615_0002_Redacted_opt

 

DW keeps changing his version of why his excuse for taking the phone off my brother and denying him of private and family life was justified. I can identify after reviewing further recorded video, what my brother was telling me, and before the phone was taken from him.

As a side note and from experience, while DW’s specious letter may give an impression of desiring to co-operate, he has since I first raised concerns for and on behalf of my brother, disregarded recurring and ongoing concerns, blocked communication for many months, ignored my brother’s rights, assisted inadequate care and support, and attempted to justify institutional abuse.
As matters have been permitted to happen and recur for such a substantial time, without improvement for my brother, I have no desire to engage any more than I already do with DW or his Priory Group colleagues who have caused my brother to regress and who has denied my brother of the care and support he should have and needs, nor do I wish to be associated in any way with a company who appear to place profits over individuals health and wellbeing. I consider three years is more than ample time for them to have improve my vulnerable adopted brother’s situation.

In the interest of transparency, below is a photo of the envelope addressed to DW which he refers to in his letter of 13th June 2018 as being angry and profane, I believe I am justifies in using the commonly accepted word in brackets, particularly in consideration of the lies, broken promises and length of time concerns of inadequate care and support have been permitted to recurred and continued.

Below is a censored still frame from a deleted video I recovered from the device, of AW and LP tampering with the confiscated phone, and a transcript of their conversation

Transcript of the conversation from the recovered deleted video ([000002].mp4),
I believe P1 is LP and P2 is AW
P1: Where’s the video recording tool?
P2: (inaudible word), goes to that background, (pause) background something (inaudible) just says
P1: Your pissed off now ain’t you?
P2: background video, ye’
P1: That’s fucking bad
P2: They don’t fucking care, social workers listening to the social workers (inaudible) (pause)
P2: Just given more evidence to try and fucking turn against us

Regarding protected evidence on our site, which DW has requested we removed, I inform DW I will not be deleting evidence.