Better support for Havering care homes during COVID-19

Havering Labour Group Leader Councillor Keith Darvill

Day by day, the impact of the Coronavirus pandemic is changing people’s lives. We, as elected opposition councillors, need to ensure that the council is doing its best to ensure the safety of all Havering residents at this critical time. That is our role.

We understand the challenges and difficult decisions that now have to be made by the Tory council but we need to be able to scrutinise and question decisions so that the best outcomes are implemented for everyone’s benefit.

Havering has 60 plus residential care homes and an older than average population. These demographic factors are not new but have been intensified by the chronic underfunding of the health and social care sector for the last ten years. We, as Labour councillors, have been lobbying the government for years to increase the funding.

Now, the situation in Havering care homes is at a critical stage. Those serving our elderly and vulnerable residents put their own lives at risk because of a lack of protective equipment. They are poorly paid with little job security. We hear of people being released from hospital back into care homes without being tested, putting staff and other residents at risk.

And now information is being collated at a national level that is stoking our worst fears.

1. The Guardian and Telegraph have reported that major care operators have seen a steep rise in deaths and infections.
2. The soaring cost of PPE could bankrupt care homes. The Head of the National Care Association says that some care homes have to pay as much as £8,500 a week to keep staff and residents safe.
3. Care home residents have been told that they are unlikely to be offered ventilators if they are admitted to hospital with Coronavirus.
We in the Labour Party want to support the government and our council in its measures to fight this pandemic. However, as local councillors we need to have much more opportunity to ask questions. A desultory one-hour report back is not adequate. The group leaders’ one-hour slot is too short and limits probing questions.

All Havering councillors need to have full access to the true facts about the situation in our care homes and be able to ask questions which our casework has thrown up.

We want to serve our community at this time of uncertainty. To do that, we need full access to accurate and current information

Do we need an inquiry into the deaths of BAME people dying due to coronavirus?

By Councillor Tele Lawal, Heaton Ward

Throughout the world, communities are affected by the global health pandemic which has disrupted all parts of citizens’ day-to-day lives. Coronavirus does not discriminate. It sees no race, age, class, sex, or religion.

As we mourn those who have sadly been taken by the silent killer, emerging figures highlight that coronavirus appears to be disproportionately affecting black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities – while this might be an uncomfortable truth for many, this revelation is no surprise to me, and to many who identify as BAME.

While the government recently announced an inquiry into why people from a similar background like me are disproportionately affected by coronavirus (led by the NHS and Public Health England) – I fear this is merely a token gesture, somewhat a tick box exercise.

Many of us already know the underlying cause of the disparity, and what the conclusions of the review will reveal. If we discuss the robust correlation between socioeconomic status and health, it is widely known that individuals of lower socioeconomic status are more likely to suffer from poorer health, than those in the higher social hierarchy.

Those individuals in the UK are usually BAME people who are overrepresented in overcrowded/poor accommodation and insecure, low-paid employment. All of which contributes to why BAME people have a lower life expectancy and serious underlying health issues in the UK. It is already confirmed that coronavirus preys on those with underlying health conditions.

BAME people are more likely to be employed in frontline roles, like the NHS. Such keyworker roles will put them at greater risk of contracting coronavirus. The first ten doctors in the UK to die from coronavirus were from BAME backgrounds.

This health pandemic has removed the plaster once again and has shown these deaths are the consequence of inequalities deep in our society, that the government has not addressed, review after review. Clearly, we have not learned from the Grenfell Tower inquiry or the Windrush report.

We do not need another report catching dust on the government’s website and used as mere references in academic research papers or political speeches. We need life-changing action. While these underlying causes cannot be addressed in the short term to save lives, the government can start capturing the ethnicity on the number of people who have died as a result of coronavirus – at the moment age and sex are only recorded. This will enable us to explore how best to protect communities.

Havering Council should not hesitate to join the conversation and take action. Coronavirus Equality Impact Assessments (EIA) should be carried out to assess the impact on different communities protected under the Equality Act 2010. Labour Councillors have already suggested that a temporary overview and scrutiny committee should be formed to look at COVID-19 related issues, such as this, thus allowing Councillors to put forward life-saving policies and recommendations, based on information from the EIA and other sources.

I believe that communication is a powerful tool. Havering Council should produce a coronavirus information sheet, electronic or otherwise, targeted to BAME communities. This will help reaffirm the facts about how the virus is and isn’t spread – and tackle myths too. Havering Council should work with charities, organisations, and local groups to ensure those who are not known to them are receiving the relevant support during this period.

Once this crisis is over, we do not need another roundtable discussion or committee formed to analyse the report. I hope for my future and those from similar communities, we will see real legislative changes, backed with proper central government funding. But, I won’t hold my breath.

Councillor Tele Lawal | Heaton Ward
Committees : Crime & Disorder | Children Services

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