Bang Off Target

Ah see how the mighty have fallen
Emma Harrison (CBE) http://emma-harrison.com/ (the Blog on her site doesn't seem very up to date ;)

Darling of the Coalition and of the BBC
(but I'm knocking off and going home for it's almost half-past three)
Your paperwork's all checked and signed
In different hands, but never mind
In another month it'll be forgot
another £8.6m bonus and that's my lot

It's all about targets.
Granted she missed hers (well, A4e did) but she came out pretty canny (as they say oop North)...but that's the funny thing about targets....
Targets are very trendy these days, even in places where they really don't belong.
You can go and see someone, get them signed up to whatever work experience/workfare scheme is current and the client might be:

1. Annoyed that you're wasting her time
2. Relieved as she hasn't seen anyone all week and her cat just died and she's feeling bloody awful and needs to offload
3. You might have some useful information to impart to the client and they might be improved by this meeting

But whichever it is, you get the same signature.
You hit the same target
If you're looking at this mathematically, which we should, as it's supposed to be in some way scientific, then we have to say that if plotted on a graph the values would be all over the shop.
 What would these targets indicate? What would they prove?
You may as well throw dice.
Of course Ms Harrison is only one person. As The Guardian has pointed out her sin was that she allowed herself to become a TV personality, so slinking away silently from the wreck like she was an Italian ferry captain wasn't really an option.
It's not really her fault though is it?
The coalition needed a cheesy Tony Blair type grin and Emma was there to provide it.
There are quite a lot of huge companies working on government contracts spending our money and they are all anonymous. And that's not a coincidence. You become a public face and the public may love you one minute and hate you the next, and they'll certainly be able to throw cabbages at you in the street.
Too recognisable
Can you say the same about the chairman of Group 4? Or Serco?
Targets? They do have value.
In a spiritual sense. But not in the sense that you could get someone to tick a box, leave a box unticked, or forge a tick.
A couple of months ago I was working with some "Service Users with Learning Difficulties".
I took one of them for a cookery session. He attends these sessions regularly.
If there were targets for this client group (there don't seem to be targets for this client group. The idea seems to be that you warehouse them for life in suspended animation) then we could tick that box and meet that target because he attended.
But most of the time when he attended he didn't do any cooking.
He sat still and watched while his staff "minder" did it for him.
But I didn't think Getting Me to Do Everything was such a good idea.
So, here we are: Recipe of the Day.
Your favourite: "Chicken Casserole"
I took a turnip out of the bag.
A turnip has many characteristics.
It is pretty large, after all when I was little there weren't any pumpkins and we used to hollow them out for lanterns. They are irregular and inelegant. They roll about a lot. They are also pretty solid.
We need a good solid piece of cutlery for this...
So I started looking for a knife to cut the turnip.
The knife drawer was full of cheap blunt knives with blades that were so thin the would bend when you breathed on them.
"Oh" the voice of the supervisor sounded helpfully behind me
"We don't have sharp knives. For Health and Safety reasons, you know. We don't want anyone getting hurt"
How anyone with poor motor skills, a wandering attention span and anxiety issues was supposed to carve up this cannonball of a vegetable using a knife that would struggle to cut soup wasn't explained.
But he did it. I found a blade hiding at the back of the drawer and properly supervised as he did it. And the rest.
I was told that this was the most that he has ever done.
And that wasn't surprising.
It's usually  much easier to do something for someone, that to get them to do it for themselves, but of course they learn nothing.
As this group of Service Users is not meant to learn anything nobody cares about targets anyway, but if they did, the target would be that they turned up. What they did, and the quality of what was done, would not have been considered.
Oh, and they wouldn't have been consulted much either, come audit time.
As long as we can tick the service user involvement box the job's done.
The quality of the involvement is a bit Will O The Wisp, really.
Oh and the next day I asked the Service User if he enjoyed the chicken casserole.
Without looking at me he replied "It went in the bin"
"In the bin?" I asked "Why on earth did it go in the bin?"
Still not looking at me he answered
"Well I hate chicken casserole"

The Death of Captain Scarlet

Coming soon !

Stop The Press

This is the second time I have spent ages talking to BBC journalists about "my experience of being unemployed"
They ring me, I don't ring them. I'm not that sad.
The problem with this is that I keep sounding too upbeat.
Okay I'd like a job that lasted longer than five weeks but:.....The world is in the middle of a recession so it's not just me.....It could be worse I could be Greek.....It could be worse I could be materialistic and want the Aston that Jezza tells me is "just great and much better than their last p.o.s."
But I'm ok really.
 I'm not living on toast in a frozen bedsit with no money for the meter and seven dwarves to feed.
So although I DO have Incredibly Important Views on the current situation I'm obviously not worthy of interviewing as I'm not about to top myself.
How about that for balanced news then?

Five Weeks in Another Country

Roger Rees, David Threlfall:
The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (1982)

Well it didn’t go all that well, really.

Did it go as well as could be expected?.
 I suppose it didn’t sound all that good did it? It looked dodgy, right?

Yessss….. I was quite apprehensive about this job.

Apart from the odd setup at the start....You know, the bit that went:
Have you any relevant experience with this sort of client?: 
No
Have you a current Criminal Records Bureau Disclosure Form to show you're not an axe murdering Satanist?:
No.
Do you have any references from people who can vouch for you?
Might be difficult. Everyone was made redundant. Everyone who could have written a reference has gone "poof"
Poof? I see. That's a "no" then? No references?
Possibly it's a "no"..... probably it's a "no"
Excellent. Sign here and can you start tomorrow?
Apart from that, which was a Bit Odd, I was quite scared at the prospect of working with people with Learning Difficulties.

Now there’s a label for you: “Learning Difficulties”.

It doesn’t really mean anything does it? But that seems to be the point

Once upon a time the great unwashed public knew what the collecting tin was for.

You know, there was the collecting box in the shape of a girl with leg callipers. That was for the Spastics Society.

Now you can’t say that word anymore. It’s like using the “n” word to describe a black person. It could get you arrested and deported to Abu Ghraib.

But people used to know what you meant when they said your donation was “for the spastics”. Now they say it’s for ‘Scope’.

“What’s that then, some sort astronomy project?”

And “Learning Difficulties”.

Used to be mental handicap. Now it isn’t.

Mental handicap is a pejorative term, so we say Learning Difficulties.

Which nobody understands.

I mean I have learning difficulties. I can’t read a map. My sense of direction is useless. Also I never did learn my multiplication tables.

Do I have Learning Difficulties?

No, I don’t. I’m just a bit thick.

Names get changed to protect Service Users.  And don’t get me started about the term “Service users”. Sounds like someone who jumps on a bus.

Society is always trying to protect vulnerable groups. Nothing wrong with that. But you can go too far in the wrong direction. Just like me when I try and read a map.

Old geezers will remember Brian Rix.

He starred in lots of TV shows in the 60’s and 70’s then dropped out of sight.

He had a child who had “learning difficulties” and decided to dedicate his life to that cause.

Except it was called mental handicap back then.

Brian Rix’s son was on the radio in a debate about political correctness.

He said “I really don’t like the new terms people use.

Nobody understands them except the professionals. “Mental handicap” the public understand. Nobody knows what you mean when you say “My child has learning difficulties”

I wonder if anyone asks the service users before they change their labels. But no. They cannot give their informed consent and so they need to be protected from the world.

Anyway, I digress….

I was quite apprehensive about working with these people.

Why, I’m not sure. Something about looking into the abyss and the abyss staring back at you. Maybe.

When I arrived at the large, brick-built house I was shown around it by one of the residents.

Simon was a middle aged man and had been in one institution or another for many years. His parents had recently passed away and this had caused him huge anxieties. Recently the police had been called and he had been arrested following an emotional and physical outburst.

Simon was one of the reasons I was being placed on this house. No more single cover from staff teams.

 He did an okay job showing me around though. At least his sense of direction was better than mine.

I met some of the other residents. They were friendly and seemed quite content.

Content. Now there’s an interesting concept.

Is that what we should aim for with people?  Contentment?

Some of the residents exhibited odd behaviours that were probably characteristic of some mental illness or other. I didn’t know enough about these, but it would become obvious that nobody else seemed to know what these behaviours meant either.

There were lots of strange hand gestures.

One of the residents would punctuate his sentences with a bizarre motion which involved placing his hands in front of his mouth and wriggling his fingers furiously. This made him look like a feeding crab or something decidedly insect like. Maybe like an Ood for you Dr. Who fans out there.

 Whatever the gesture meant it was repeated regularly and without variation during his communications.

I asked another worker about it. The other worker said to me

“Oh, it’s him being threatening. I’ve told him off about that”

“Threatening?” I replied. “No, I don’t think so. He does it when he’s happy. He does it when he’s excited. I don’t think he does it when he feels threatened”

“Really?”  He said this in a way that suggested that nobody had ever brought it up before. Either way, he didn’t seem to think it important.

There were lots of strange facial expressions in this group of service users.

Lots of repetitive behaviour and lots of speech disorders.

I hadn’t seen anything like it since Prime Minister’s Question Time.

There was a young man. Eighteen years old. His name was Thomas.

Thomas was a big lad, about six foot three and well built.

He was very friendly, he made excellent eye contact. He was quite appropriate in most of his communications, except that his voice was way TOO LOUD and he would make some repetitive and sometimes bizarre statements.

He would say to most of the staff team, regardless of their gender that they looked like Cheryl Cole.

 Or better than Cheryl Cole.

I think I got “You look better than Cheryl Cole” but he might have just been trying to get in my good books.

I think I struck up a good relationship with Thomas. Or he struck up a good relationship with me. I’m not too sure which way round it went.

Although he was an adolescent he had a learning age of three and he couldn’t read or write at all.

He was, however very enthusiastic about almost everything, and he loved being busy and engaged. He loved music. His taste was a little off the wall but he loved music.

It was Christmas and he’d been bought an MP3 player by the staff team.

I asked him what music he liked and I put some on his machine. Culture Club and Status Quo. Weird.

I tried to teach him how to download but as he couldn’t read we kept running into brick walls.

Ditto with the MP3 player.

 In order to navigate around menus and find the tracks you need you need to be able to read.

And he couldn’t read.

But buying presents for people in institutions is like that.

This is your present.

Isn’t it lovely?

Now go away and stop bothering me.

Thomas had previously been bought a camera.

 Great idea. I love photography

“Can I see what you’ve got on your memory card?” I asked him

I looked at the pictures he had taken.

There was one of him staring at the camera and gurning.

And here was another one him staring at the camera and gurning …and another….and another.

That night we went for a walk. It was cold, too cold to be out really but I was determined we would come back with something other than gurning pictures.

So we stood in the freezing night air

So he turned the camera round

Darkness.

Inky black. Chill and oh so very clear

Apartment blocks lit up like neon signs, reflecting shimmering pools of light on the lake surface.

So he turned the camera around, we took some pictures and he was happy.

We walked back to the house through the winter cold and the freezing mud.

Thomas showed the pictures to another worker who seemed almost shocked by them.

They are…very artistic really.

Yes. They were.

Really.

Thomas would meet me at the door when I came on shift. He was keen to do stuff.

It didn’t really matter what the stuff was, he just wanted to do things.

I was quite happy to do things with him, and to do things with anyone else who wanted to do things. And there seemed to be quite a few service users who wanted to do things.
Maybe they wanted more than just being content after all.

That’s when I took a look at the staff rota and found that I was to be moved out….

To be continued...