Southern Cross Healthcare are a bunch of tosspots

Southern Cross Healthcare operate 710 care homes in the UK. They’re keen to trumpet their commitment to eradicating abuse of the elderly. They’re key contributors to this campaign, launched by Action on Elder Abuse.

John Murphy, Chief Operating Officer commented on behalf of Southern Cross Healthcare, ‘Our commitment has been unwavering to protect people and staff in our care. We continually strive to improve our provision of training to raise awareness and welcomed the launch of the Dignity in Care Campaign in November 2006 as it clearly reinforced the need to continually highlight that indignity in health and social care must be eliminated. We are proud to be part of this unique pilot helpline project and have the full support of our stakeholders – our staff, our services users and their friends and families”

Since they’re so keen on treating people in care with dignity, they might be horrified by this court ruling.

In a bitterly-fought landmark case five deeply divided Law Lords ruled by a majority of 3-2, that an 84-year-old woman with Alzheimer’s disease threatened with eviction from her care home, did not enjoy the protection of the Human Rights Act given to residents of local authority run care homes.

The decision could affect up to 300,000 residents throughout the country who have been placed in private homes by their local authorities.

The legislating away of a dementing 84 year old woman’s human rights has appalled not just civil liberties groups, but even the Orwellian types at Nude Labour:

The civil rights group Liberty condemned the ruling saying urgent legislation was now needed to change the Act to prevent local authorities from “contracting out of dignity for Britain’s elderly”.

Help the Aged said it was “a sickening blow to older people and their families everywhere” and that it left “vulnerable older people open to neglect, abuse and eviction, without redress through the Human Rights Act”.

The Government, who had argued in favour of the woman’s case through the Lord Chancellor, were also disappointed. Baroness Ashton, Minister for Human Rights said they were now “carefully considering the implications of this judgment”.

What sicko pursued this case all the way to the Lords so they could have the right to toss dying people out of their care homes?

Her home, which cannot be named for legal reasons, is run by Southern Cross healthcare, a private sector provider of residential and nursing services.

She has now been allowed to stay at the home after an agreement was reached.

A spokesperson for Southern Cross Healthcare said: “I am delighted to learn that the House of Lords has decided that private bodies such as Southern Cross, who contract with local authorities to provide care and accommodation to vulnerable adults and others, are not to be treated as carrying out functions of a public nature by providing such care.”

Tosspots.