I cried through Panorama's program on care home abuse

Panorama's story was shocking but nothing new. There are plenty of other horror stories that would make you weep for ever

 Winterbourne View, the care home featured in the Panorama programme. Photograph: Tim Ireland/PA

I've just cried and sweated my way through that Panorama programme on abuse at a residential hospital. Not just because it was beyond shocking, but because it's nothing new. I and scores of other people have been banging on about this sort of endemic abuse of the vulnerable for decades. You don't have to look far: just go through the Relatives and Residents Association's cases and enough horror stories will pour out to make you weep for ever.
Fielding's dying mother was harshly told off for picking her ulcer scabs in her sleep; my friend X, stuck in a mental health facility, watched an initially clean, well-dressed elderly woman soon wandering around, hair filthy, covered in shit, dangling her dirty nappy. She got a telling off. "We told you to stay in your room . . ."; Daughter's ex-acquaintance, a psychiatric nurse, resigned her post in a local hospital and returned as a bank nurse, for much higher pay, referred to her patients as "fucking nutters", and often bunked off instead of visiting vulnerable patients at home, because she knew no one would check on her. And that's just a mild taster. But no one in charge seems to take any notice.
A couple of years ago I spoke about it at the Labour party conference. Next to me was the then head of the Care Quality Commission (CQC). In the small audience was the MD of a large care home chain that I've never been allowed to name because they'll sue. The MD just denied my allegations of neglect, abuse, rapid staff turnover, inadequate food and drink in institutions, and bed-sores down to the bone. So did the CQC person. Oh it's all anecdotal, they said. It's not true. Those are rare exceptions.
Yes, our inspections are effective. Same old crap response. Deny everything. Ignore whistleblowers. Do nothing. Carry on raking in money.
Separately, the president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services, Peter Hay, plans to turn the nearly bankrupt Southern Cross, with its 31,000 elderly residents, into a "sustainable, viable business". Instead of a tragic business?
Source http://www.guardian.co.uk/