Yesterday, Friday, turned out to be a strange sort of day. We knew that in the late morning, we were due a review visit by the social worker who has supervised Meg's case for the past couple of years together with the two managers from the care agency. Our domestic help turned up yesterday and we exchanged stories of what had happening to us. In the case of our domestic help, she had needed to cope that a friend had contacted her to say that her husband had died in his sleep at not a very old age. We briefly discussed my sister's situation in North Yorkshire and by the time we had breakfasted a little late, there was no time to make a trip out before the meeting with the social worker. But our domestic help brought along a belated birthday present for Meg, consisting of a scarf with good little pockets built into each end of which I am pretty sure Meg will enjoy. I popped out to get the daily newspaper and our domestic help had very sensibly decided to give Meg a breath of fresh air at the front of the house. She had also brought along some nice pastries from Waitrose so Meg spent a good half hour enjoying the sunshine, reading the newspaper and entertaining the cat (Miggles) who had made himself at home by stretching out in the sunshine at our feel, not neglecting the opportunity to sneak inside the house when the opportunity arose. Our University of Birmingham friend had phoned earlier in the morning and we decided that as time was rather pressing, he would call around this afternoon. So we spent a pleasant hour or so in the sun at the front of the house, regaling ourselves with tea and a pastry our domestic help had thoughtfully given Meg this morning. The afternoon passed so much more quickly when we had the best of company and we spent a certain amount of time our interactions with social work and care agencies.
The meeting with the social worker and care agency staff in the middle of the day turned out to be 'interesting' I had requested the review visit because both the Admiral nurse (who specialises in Meg's condition) and the care agency staff themselves thought that there was a case for a fifth visit on Meg's care package to cope with the occasions when Meg is very agitated and stays awake for hours after she has been put to bed. However, by adjusting the timing of the late evening medication and adding on some Piriton, we have had a succession of nights when Meg has got off to sleep more easily. The long and the short of it all was there was no extra funding for a fifth visit and although I could go through a long ad complicated review process, the likelihood of ultimate success was small. The underlying message seemed to be that as you are coping as well as you are even with Meg's declining condition, there is no justification for further support. Paradoxically, if I had pleaded a complete inability to cope, I was at the end of my tether etc, then some extra resource may have been forthcoming but there was no guarantee of this. All of this reminded me rather of the fact that I had been here before. In my 20's, I was hit at a T-junction by a driver who had fainted at the wheel but the day after fled to the USA. After attempting to sue the individual through is insurance company, the chances of success were only 50:50 as one had to prove that an unconscious person is at fault and all of the legal precedents were against us. One had to prove though, how badly injured one was in order to maximise the likelihood of substantial damages. I actually rehabilitated pretty well despite two broken legs and therefore the amount of compensation was radically reduced. To complete this story, I accepted £2,000 of which £1,400 went back to Leicester Polytechnic leaving me with £600. The essential similarity between the two scenarios of both then and now is that the more one can show one is rehabilitated/can manage then the less the available resources will be. So I am rather left in a sort of abandoned state, but also wondering whether I am subject to a dependency culture and I should be grateful for every element of help that I do receive.
There is a major stand off brewing this evening between a massive global conglomerate, DP World and the government. The government's Investment Summit has suffered a major blow after ports and logistics giant DP World pulled a scheduled announcement of a £1bn investment in its London Gateway container port, following criticism by members of Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet. Sky News understands the Dubai-based company's investment was due to be a centrepiece of Monday's event, which is intended to showcase Britain's appeal to investors and will be attended by the prime minister and Chancellor Rachel Reeves. In March 2022, P&O caused huge controversy by sacking 800 British seafarers and replacing them with cheaper, largely foreign workers, a move it said was required to prevent the company from collapsing. Announcing new legislation to protect seafarers on Wednesday, Ms Haigh described P&O as a 'rogue operator' and said consumers should boycott the company. In a press release issued with Ms Rayner, Ms Haigh said P&O's actions were 'a national scandal' and Ms Rayner described it as 'an outrageous example of manipulation by an employer'. While Ms Haigh has previously criticised P&O's actions, the strength and timing of the ministers' language undermined efforts by the Department for Business and Trade to make the Investment Summit a turning point for the government and the economy. There is a real difficulty here in the way that governments deal with multi-global conglomerates who have massive economic leverage. The way that P&O Ferries operated at the time was scandalous by sacking their long established, generally British crews and immediately replacing them with labour typically from India. Hundreds of business leaders and investors, including representatives of US private capital and sovereign wealth funds, will attend the event in the City of London, as the government tries to drum up billions of pounds in foreign investment to fund its plans. But is the government forced to turn a blind eye to the most outrageous of employment practices in order to curry favour with a big investor?
© Mike Hart [2024]