A Wirral Leaks welcome to the new chief exec.

Wirral Leaks welcomes Graham Burgess, Wirral’s FIFTH (count ‘em) chief executive in under two years.

Our ever vigilant retainer and PA Miss Verity Snoop, has been doing some a-googling and found that ex poacher turned game keeper Graham doesn’t like to mention the fact that when he was a Union leader in Liverpool in the 80’s he wrestled Derek Hatton ala Alan Bates and Oliver Reed in “Women In Love” style to the ground. And thus [according to Graham’s PR team] single handily stopped Militant in its tracks, saving the country from communism and all that lefty lunacy, y’know stuff like proper contract monitoring, no artificial delay on care packages, spending public money to benefit all the people. But he doesn’t like to talk about it. So much so that he mentions the fact  he doesn’t like to talk about it in every interview he’s given. EVER.  Even if he isn’t asked.

  We note that like most rubicund hued ex Union reps Graham likes a pint or two down at the local gastro-pub  and relaxes watching the footie, without paying obviously, as reported in the Daily Telegraph HERE

“Graham Burgess of Blackburn with Darwen spent £213 buying tickets to two Blackburn Rovers matches in 2009 for him and nine guests. He also spent hundreds of pounds on regular lunches at his local pub, the Clog and Billycock.

The council said that in both cases Mr Burgess was entertaining “key local and regional partners”.

Entertaining how ?

I mean entertaining like he’s a clown, to amuse you? to make you laugh, he’s here to f*cking amuse you? What do you mean entertaining?  entertaining how?

So a Goodfella and just the man to set Wirral straight then, welcome aboard old chap. We do things differently here don’cha know! …you’ll never leave……

Wirral Gets Slagged

Time for the silly season – is there any other in Wirral BC ?

As regular visitors to this site will know Lord And Lady Wirral Leaks like to maintain a measure of refinement and decorum but alas the good Lady has been reading some decidedly down-market magazines lately ( Cooee!, Celeb Pix!! and Trash!!!) and she has  decided that we need to broaden our appeal. What we need says Lady WL is a salacious gossip monger.

So to this end we have invited a guest contributor to the Wirralleaks site –  Gloria Slagg is the twin sister of that renowned Private Eye columnist and social commentator Glenda Slagg.

Over to you Gloria!   

 

So who’s this troubleshooter Michael Frater called in by Wirral Council to sort out the unholy mess its got itself into!?.

Aren’tcha’yasickofhim shooting his mouth off and saying “weird things were going on” .

Tell us something we don’t know big boy!

Never mind troubleshootin’ how about  a-firin’ and a P-45’n?

I hear he’s got a big gun! (biggun – geddit!)  to fire people!.

If that’s the case Mickey-baby you can Frater-nise with me anytime! (geddit!)

 In other news it’s  farewell to Rick “With a Silent P and we don’t mean for pay off” O’Brien.

You were always destined for greater things and the Wirral love affair simply couldn’t last  .

I always knew you and the Department of Health (DOH!) were meant for each other.

I will miss your chiselled matinee idol face and the fact that we had fun while it lasted ( approximately 4 weeks).

Aren’tcha’sicktodeath of people who have low friends in high places ready to bail them out when accountability comes a-callin’?How low can you get? – not as low as implementing a 4 week delay in commissioning care packages that’s all I can say!

So another Wirral Council whistleblower has been identified by mistake!.

Who cares?.

Pack in the  wingein’ and a whinin’ Mr.Gary Downey .Ok the fact that confidentiality has been breached  means it’s Downey and out for you but that’s what you get for  a-tootin’ on your tin-whistle!

Dontcha just lurve  these whistleblowers?.

Gary Downey can come over and see me anytime!.

You know how to whistleblow don’tcha Big G – you just put your lips together and blow.

Fancy exposing my wrongdoings (geddit)?

HERE THEY ARE  – Gloria’s summertime sizzlers:

• Martin Morton!?!! – crazy name! crazy guy!! (according to Wirral Council sources anyway).

• Surjit Tour !?!!- crazy name! crazy naming names!!

• Anna Klonowski !?!!- crazy name! crazy gal! (Can you check the spelling Cllr.Blakeley )

• Robbie Grabarz !?!!- crazy name! crazy Olympic high jumper! – he can grab my arse anytime.

CIAO FOR NOW!!!

Oh dear oh dear, Another F**k Up

Seriously ?  These are just basics aren’t they ?  What a place !

Council website reveals whistleblower’s secret identity”

full story in WIRRAL GLOBE HERE

The Wirral Council Escape Club

First of all refresh your memories with regard to Rick “4 Week” Delay O’Brien HERE . It would seen having friends in high places has paid off… We are still flabbergasted at how this can be reconciled with implementing a 4 week delay.

See below

*****************************************

PERSONAL ASSESSMENT AND PLANNING BRANCH

BRIEFING NOTE

NUMBER:  77

DATE:  6th JULY 2012

FROM: RICK O’BRIEN, HEAD OF PERSONAL ASSESSMENT AND PLANNING BRANCH

TO:     PRINCIPAL MANAGERS, SERVICE MANAGERS, TEAM MANAGERS,

SUBJECT:        NOTICE OF SECONDMENT

Dear Colleagues

I am writing to advise you that I will be leaving the Department of
Adult Social Care to take up a secondment with the Department of
Health National End of Life Care Team at the end of this month.  The
secondment is full time for a time limited period and may be extended
to a period of 18 months.  As many of you will know I have a
particular interest in this area of work so this secondment will
provide further opportunities to take forward the national End of Life
Care strategy and national framework for social care at the end of
life nationally and regionally.  My last working day will be Friday
3rd August.

Can I take this opportunity to thank managers and staff for their
support in the last 4 ½ years.  It has been a genuine pleasure and
privilege to work in Wirral with those operational managers and staff
who have shown exemplary commitment and professionalism in taking
forward the service improvement agenda, implementing and
personalisation and developing new models of working with partners.
There is a strong foundation to make further improvements and I wish
colleagues every success in making this happen in the future.

Rick O’Brien
Head of Personal Assessment and Planning

*******************************************************

To reiterate

the End of Life Care Lead.

The same Rick O’Brien who apparently thought up the 4 week delay in commissioning services as shown HERE. This would be the 4 week delay that they claimed didn’t exist, the four week delay that has been described as “illegal,” the very same four week delay in which there was no risk or impact assessment(see here) on how this effected the elderly or vulnerable and the four week delay Wirral Leader Councillor Jeff Green described on his own blog as”yet more evidence of a department that was in disarray and a prime example of why we are appointing an ‘independent ombudsman’ to investigate concerns raised around Council practices, particularly in the Department for Adult Social Services” “ For residents, this will have meant care that could have been provided quickly, wasn’t.” This is also the four week delay that  has caused such public outrage which can be seen by the Wirral Globe comments HERE ,

Meanwhile we also came across an illuminating NHS document

http://www.endoflifecareforadults.nhs.uk/assets/downloads/TalkingAboutEndOfLifeCare20110124.pdf

**************************************************

That’s how you avoid accountability folks !

More Allegations From “The Boiled Frog” Council

It would appear Local Authority “Trouble-shooter” Michael Frater “gets” what’s been going on at Wirral Council for years, a place in which senior officers have  treated public office like a private gentleman’s club. In a recent interview with the Daily Post Mr Frater said the council was suffering from “Boiled Frog Syndrome” meaning in simple terms-  if you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, he’ll jump out. But if you place a frog into a pot of lukewarm water and slowly turn up the heat, it will boil to death. A nice analogy into how doing what’s right has stopped being the normal as staff and senior officers have become almost brainwashed  and inured to bad practice. Like some sort of mad “cult.” where wrong is right and anybody who dares speak out is left up shit creak without a paddle.

Mr Frater explained  ““What happens is it’s almost a form of institutionalisation. It’s the boiled frog syndrome – people stop noticing things are a bit different to elsewhere and don’t know how to go about changing it.” He also felt that 250-page report by independent consultant Anna Klonowski which took six months to prepare and cost Wirral taxpayers £250,000 report somewhat understated just how abnormally abnormal and freakishly bizarre Wirral BC’s practices are, and that the tag of a place where“the abnormal is normal” will, according to Michael “take the authority years to shake off – but it’s true, weird things were happening here”. 

Weird and also morally wrong as well as downright illegal Michael old son.  You must also wonder what the hell Wirral’s MP’s have been doing all this time ? (watch them jumping on various bandwagons very soon.)  So do we finally have somebody who really does “get” just how corrosive the culture within Wirral MBC has been ? How they have let down the public, abused the vulnerable and wasted tax payers money whilst bullying staff, attempting to silence whistle blowers and ruthlessly pursing their own careerist ambitions like greedy hobgoblins.  When exactly did they lose sight of what it means to be a public servant and how could they have been allowed, for so long, to treat the public with such utter contempt ? [ Full Frater interview HERE]

We suggest any clean up depends on just how deep Mr Frater wants to dig. For example today at Leaky Towers we have received information from a reliable source who tells us about the shambolic way  Personalisation was implemented in Wirral’s woefully inadequate Department Of Adult Social Services (DASS) . They tell of many staff going off with stress, overloaded with cases simply to meet targets, of bullying managers so inept they should have sticky notes with “arse” and “elbow” written on them, lest they forget.  How, when staff question a system, they are told “It is NOT to be questioned, it is what it is”  We have also had sight of  information which may explain why this was the case.

It has been suggested in a piece of correspondence we have seen that the Reform Grant, which is supposedly a ring fenced revenue grant to be used specifically for the purposes of transforming adult social care and which totalled over £3 million over three years was dipped into by a Head Of Branch, to cover overspends in other areas so as to deceive and also impress elected members.

There is a further allegation that under personalisation the resource allocation system (RAS) which defines each person’s personal budget, was reduced with the approval of a Head(s) Of Service  from 1.88 to 1.62, which would of course make management look super-duper at saving money but would also mean that all those in receipt of the Independent Living Fund would have been disadvantaged.  This can however be disguised at panel. …with some subtle manipulation of figures.  We have more information but at present will not publish it unless we have more corroboration.   

Worth looking into Mr F ?  Good luck, you may well need it. It’s a jungle in there!

Verity Snoop.

The Wirral Way – How Things Work Part 189.

Leaky- Towers seems to be getting positively inundated with anonymous missives from disgruntled and brow-beaten Wirral Council employees these days. Each new missive seems to reveal yet another fresh layer of Hell and makes Dante’s Inferno resemble something akin to a jaunty stroll through an enchanted forest.  It also appears that the endemic culture of bullying and intimidation is alive and quite literally kicking!

 One item which keeps popping up is the invasion of a so called “Liverpool Mafia.” It appears the infamous “Halton Mafia” that once ruled the roost in WBC’s Social Services with ham-fisted but ruthless impunity has slowly seen its influence crumble, like some sort of mushy, malignant, foetid “Farley’s Rusk.” This has been due in the main down to the simple fact that the officers involved were so very,very completely and utterly SHITE at their jobs and were universally despised by all right thinking staff.   However Wirral Council came up with another innovative idea from their book of  great ideas, one which sought to cure all of it’s Social Services Departments well documented ills. Why not  employ some of those nice folk  who worked across the water in Liverpool City Council, another local authority who do a rather natty line in bullying and inefficiency.  It is rumoured  that some may even have taken advantage of the recession and taken Voluntary Severance from Liverpool City Council in order to join the publicly funded Wirral Council gravy train – Well why not ? After all, it appears everybody is at it these days and after all, it’s only public money.

And so it came to pass that the Department Of Adult Social Services now have a new “Head of Personalisation,” one Christine Beyga, who formerly worked as the ludicrously, pompously titled ” Head Of Transformation” within Liverpool Council ( yes I know, it does sound rather like a Harry Potter job title doesn’t  it? Apt perhaps as  WBC has been practising the Dark Arts for many years.)  It appears this may well have been the start of the “Ferry ‘cross da Merzeee” and one can only hope that all these good folks who came on over were interviewed properly in fair, transparent ,open, competitive interviews.    

As the Liverpool crew made themselves at home, things did indeed transform…for the worse.  Sources  told us “safeguarding is becoming a joke,” that “they are getting jobs for their mates”  Another source tells us tales of tenders going out for “support planning” contracts, all part of the Personalisation Agenda (ie/ Cuts dressed up as empowerment) at the end of 2011 which caused them some concern. For example they suggest that a company called IPDF won the contract but it was decided to go through the process again.  It is furthermore alleged by our sources that a company called Self Direction was engaged by a senior manger to provide a support planning service for very vulnerable adults initially without approval of  the SLT /Council Members? And that anybody who raised questions around this matter suffered being bullied to the verge of a nervous breakdown.  Part of this does indeed seem to be true, as borne out by this Freedom Of Information request HERE .

  We of course, being old, infirm,  and quite frankly 4 weeks short of care package, have no knowledge as to whether all we have been told is factually correct but our faithful retainer and PA Verity Snoop did some more digging and unearthed some rather interesting information using something she called “Google”

This is Self Direction  

http://companycheck.co.uk/company/07993770

Strangely it’s also listed here

http://companycheck.co.uk/company/07545704 as ARCHITECTURAL & ENGINEERING ACTIVITIES & CONSULTANCY ????

Their Director listed   HERE  (make a note, you may need this later) and also ran a company called “Lifestyle and Dreams” which is listed as  SUPPORTING SERVICE ACTIVITIES FOR GOVERNMENT (now dissolved)

A further search reveals a Personalisation talk given by (Scroll to page 2 Item 2 ) ……, check those names  yes it’s two former Liverpool Council colleagues now ensconced in Wirral Social Care, one for WBC and one for Self Directions. What a coincidence!

http://www.lldpartnership.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/LLDMIHP-Meeting-4th-March-2010.pdf

other meetings here, again look for familiar names….

http://www.lldpartnership.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Personalisation-Notes-09.12-01.12.09.pdf

OH ! Why here they are again working as part of the LCC Personalisation Team

( see Page 153 of this http://bit.ly/MRc7a0

We of course are not alleging any impropriety, that would be outrageous. We are simply highlighting information that is already out there on this new fangled internet thingy-ma-bob !

Ok so how does Wirral Council monitor such companies to ensure they are delivering these services safely and efficiently ? After all its a lot of money and these are some of the most vulnerable people in society. Ones whose interests  Social Services are charged with safeguarding. I mean surely they’d check against their own robust criteria, have a check list, some sort of performance indicators ( because, after all PI’s are, according to one former DASS manager,  “sexy”)   ? No?

Well observe this FOI – http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/wbc_dass_contracts_monitoring_te_2#incoming-293046

After months waiting for the disclosure of Wirral’s contract monitoring policy the person making the submission is told  …

“Errr.. actually we don’t have one..” The reasoning ?  – “Well we use the CQC essential standards and outcomes. (Phew.. he almost had us there!! Aren’t we ever so clever, wriggling out of that one – *High fives*- these MBA’s are REALLY paying off now!)

Next question –  Ok, so how do you train staff to understand the application, implementation etc  of said standards  ?  I assume all staff are required to undertake rigorous training when working in such an important area ?

Er… Pause.. Er… Delay… Cue Internal review – Cue more delays..(*if we ignore him he might get fed up- shhhhh*)

Eventually, and with Wirral Councils track record, somewhat inevitably,  the person making the request has no other recourse but to submit a complaint to the Information Commissioners Office over Wirral’s abject failure to comply with a perfectly reasonable  Freedom Of Information request.

THEN – *fanfare* ….

FINALLY-

THE ANSWER –

Well actually we don’t train our staff… We just give them the book and tell them to get on with it.

Good luck to the vulnerable people of the Wirral!

DASS at its finest! Promoting best practice at every opportunity.

Accountability ?

Rumours have reached Leaky-Towers that it seems there are some within “Beleaguered Wirral Council” (it’s official title) who are currently attempting to negotiate their “exit strategy” rather than face the music before the axe of justice descends. “Early retirements” and “Enhanced Voluntary Severance ” all round eh chaps? Oh and maybe a job at the Deputy Lieutenants Office office or how about the freedom of the borough ? It’s all the rage apparently for Wirral’s abject failures.

Lord and Lady Wirral-Leaks discussed this matter at length and decided that even an organisation as dysfunctional and abusive and down right stupid as Wirral Council couldn’t be dim enough to allow these careerist charlatans to make haste with tax payers money to the leafy Cheshire suburbs yet again ….could they ???