Clare Pelham, CEO of Leonard Cheshire, is resigning.
She’s resigning without another job to go to.
She’s a career politician. She was previously first chief executive of the Judicial Appointments Commission, the body charged with introducing more diversity into the Judiciary, and was under fire in the Select Committee on Constitutional Affairs for the Commission’s poor record in the first year. (She restricted appointments to her commission to existing Civil Servants, thus perpetuating the lack of diversity.)
Before then Clare Pelham held senior civil service positions at the Cabinet Office, the Home Office and the Department for Constitutional Affairs. She has also a senior manager at IBM and was a member of the Executive Committee of Coca-Cola.
She has given no reasons for leaving her £150,000 job at Leonard Cheshire. I don’t need a reason, I can celebrate without one. But I smell a rat. I simply can’t see a career person like this leaving her job without some other well-paid, ego-stroking job to go to, without a serious reason.
I think she is leaving before the shit hits the fan.
OR somebody has finally GIVEN HER THE PUSH!
Leonard Cheshire are in financial trouble.
They have written to staff telling them that any Leonard Cheshire home may close, citing increased costs due to the need to pay their carers the Government’s new “National Living Wage” from 1st April. They are closing Honresfeld home with indecent haste and “an uncaring disregard for the wellbeing of residents” according to the Council and CCG, citing economic factors.
I think Clare Pelham can see the writing on the wall, doesn’t want to be associated with this looming PR disaster (she doesn’t give a stuff about the residents and staff, of course) and is escaping quick before she gets mired with the resultant bad publicity. (After all, her career and public profile were always her prime motivation anyway.) She perhaps has in mind the indecent spectacle of her predecessor, Eric Prescott. LCD brought him in as a “hatchet man” to cut costs, but left halfway through after staff morale hit rock bottom – tales of groups of staff forced to cluster round speakerphones to listen to recorded messages about the future of their employment were not confidence-inspiring.
Either that, or Leonard Cheshire have realised that her indifference to the charity’s own services has sabotaged them, and is thus giving her the push.
Leonard Cheshire didn’t prepare for the National Living Wage.
Leonard Cheshire didn’t even begin the process of asking Councils for extra money due to the increase in costs caused by the mandatory National Living Wage (due 1st April 2016), until December 2015. We already know that they hadn’t bothered asking for more money to enable them to pay their carers the (entirely different) Living Wage Foundation’s Living Wage, until I forced them to do so (in a desultory and non-comprehensive fashion.) Councils have either refused due to their shrinking budgets, or told Leonard Cheshire it will have to wait for a decision pending multiple fee review meetings.
Worries for staff and residents
So LCD have done too little and left it too late. Now staff round the country are demoralised and worried for their jobs, and care home residents around the country (+ their relatives etc.) (with whom Leonard Cheshire have not deigned to communicate on this matter) are left not knowing if their home will be shut in two months with all of them evicted.
This situation is looking increasingly like a repeat Southern Cross. Yeah, thanks for that, Leonard Cheshire Disability.
I quote the founder again:
As time passed, professionalism advanced, and trustee numbers rose. In 1985 the trustees debated proposals which in Cheshire’s eyes “seemed to be based on the assumption that the foundation was moving towards being run by full-time professional staff, with the trustees responsible only for broad policy“. He opposed this, predicting that it would lead to “a radical change in the foundation’s way of thinking.” There would be less local involvement, diminished local fund-raising and a decline in voluntary help. Against this, core costs would rise, and the foundation “would become more and more like the NHS or social services“. (my emphasis)
Do Cheshire Homes have a future?
I suspect you have as usual hit the nail on the head with a ruddy great sledgehammer Doug. We have a LCD Home nearby, and not only are all sorts of rumours flying around (from plausible to implausible ones) but the home has been seeking volunteers, preferably with cars, to take residents on days out, visits etc. Now I maybe an old cynic, but using unpaid volunteers means you need fewer staff. Fewer staff means less financial outlay. I so hope I’m wrong, but……..
That’s not new, Harry, LCD have always attempted to use volunteers for day trips or going out. Scandalously, no volunteers usually means never getting out, with the possible exception of hospital trips.