Our vanishing wardens - the tale continues

06/10/2008

In September we reported that wardens were being quietly axed from sheltered housing complexes across the UK,  causing many vulnerable residents to be left alone for days on end, with only electronic gadgets to press when something went wrong - especially at weekends.

 

“I had a warden when I first moved here,” writes M Price from Woking. 

“One lady fell on a Saturday – with her pendant on the other side of the room. She lay there until Monday morning.”

 

“We’ve had no warden now since March,” writes M Bennett of Bristol. 

“We have a ‘visit’ every weekday afternoon, unless they have to go to a meeting - then we get no one. I see no one at all at weekends. I have written to my MP, but no one wants to know.”

 

“There is an emergency cord to the local hospital,” writes Michael Kendle of Pembrokeshire. “But if an aged person collapses without pulling the cord, no help is available. One elderly gentleman, confined in a chair in an upper flat, has not had a warden visit since being chair confined - he only has a warden by ‘intercom’ - and warden time is limited to about 9 hours a week to cover 33 homes. 

 

Might a manslaughter charge be made to local authorities whose residents die from this kind of neglect?”

 

One lady in her 80s from Bromsgrove told us that she was the youngest person in the complex, with most of the others only able to move about with help. Yet the development is unmanned at night and at weekends, with forgetful residents leaving external doors open. She described the impact of losing a resident warden as “devastating”.

 

It is not only residents complaining about the move from on-site wardens to the new practice of Floating Support. We have received calls from wardens - asking to maintain their anonymity for fear of losing their job – distraught at leaving frail and vulnerable residents without the essential services they have been providing. 

 

“Many of us have lost our jobs and our homes,” one warden told us. 

 

“And we have all been told not to speak to the press. Watching our elderly, vulnerable residents being left alone and uncared for is becoming too much to bear.”

 

Another warden told us: “We’re not allowed to do the little things anymore, like change a light bulb or give someone their medicine. As soon as a warden retires or leaves, the post is axed for the ‘mobile wardens’ or advertised at a greatly reduced salary. Meetings about wardens are usually ‘rigged’. It’s just terrible, terrible for our elderly population.”

 

If you have similar experiences to relate, do get in touch. And, meanwhile, we’ll be taking your concerns to Parliament