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The programme will be broadcast at 10pm on BBC2 tv on Friday 11 May and repeated at 11.20pm on Monday 14 May 

 

 

Appearing in the programme, presented by Victoria Coren, will be comedienne and former psychiatric nurse, Jo Brand talking to "Mad Pride" promoters - Psychologist Rufus May, Southwark Mind Manager Teresa Priest, Mad Pride founder member Simon Barnett and CEO of Creative Routes Sarah Tonin.   Information from the Evolving Minds people http://www.evolving-minds.co.uk./ sound as if it will be recreating the Mad Hatter Tea Party at the Mary Harmsworth Park outside the Imperial War Museum (the site of the original Bedlam Hospital) on 14 August 2006.  See http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SSOtalk/ for picture of Rufus May and others at that event.

 

Information from the BBC website:

 

One Sandwich Short of a Picnic

An exploration of the many crazy words we use for madness, from barmy to basketcase.

Former psychiatric nurse Jo Brand returns to her old hospital - The Bethlem Royal (Bedlam) - to demonstrate how today's worst insults moron, idiot, imbecile and cretin were once official medical diagnoses. But where do today's distinctly odd terms and phrases come from? Who, for example, first went bananas and why? Victoria Coren and Wordhunters seek out the earliest known evidence of the expressions one sandwich short of a picnic, bonkers and duh brain.

 

http://www.oed.com/bbcwordhunt/

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/programmes/wordhunt/onesandwich.shtml

 

One Sandwich Short

From the comic to the dismissive, words surrounding mental health issues can certainly seem very peculiar. Why are bananas the most unstable fruit, and why are brushes considered bats? Can you help enlighten the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) on some of these mysteries?

• Click here to learn the rules of the Wordhunt

bananas

WANTED: Verifiable evidence before 1968; information on the origins on the word

Did you go bananas before 1968? It's one of many fruity terms associated with mental incapacity, like fruitcake and crazy as a coconut. But what's so mad about a bunch of bananas? The OED would like you to set their minds at rest by providing them with earlier datable evidence.

• Click here to read the full OED entry
• Click here to email us your evidence about bananas

bonkers

WANTED: Verifiable evidence before 1957; information on the origins of the word

Were people bonkers before 1957? Or were they just nuts, loopy, or crackers? The OED has evidence from 1948 of the word being used in Navy slang to mean drunk or light-headed, so there seems to be a connection. But did the word change tack before 1957?

• Click here to read the full OED entry
• Click here to email us your evidence about bonkers

daft (or mad) as a brush

WANTED: Verifiable evidence before 1945; information on the origins of the word

Why are you daft as a brush, rather than daft as a mop or a feather duster? Was it a phrase invented by chimney sweeps? Or was it coined by huntsmen in reference to the tail of a fox, an animal traditionally thought to be cunning rather than crazy. Any evidence from before 1945 might help to ease the OED's brain ache.

• Click here to read the full OED entry
• Click here to email us your evidence about daft as a brush

duh brain

WANTED: Verifiable evidence before 1997

Does duh brain belong in the dictionary? If you can provide enough compelling evidence for this playground taunt the OED might be convinced to create a new entry. The oldest duh brain they've found so far is from 1997, lurking within the pages of J-17 magazine. Do your school books, letters, or diaries prove it was around before that?

A draft entry for this word is in preparation

• Click here to email us your evidence about duh brain

one sandwich short of a picnic

WANTED: Verifiable evidence before 1993

This is just one variant of a mass of similar constructions to suggest that a person is slightly crazy. Many of the earlier examples are from Australia, refer to building materials, and date back as far as 1939. But can you find evidence of one sandwich short of a picnic from before 1993?

• Click here to read the full OED entry
• Click here to email us your evidence about one sandwich short

One X Short of a Y?

If you can find one sandwich short before 1993 you'll help rewrite the OED. However there's also a wonderful variety of ways to construct this phrase, from one coupon short of a voucher to one spanner short of a tool kit. Tell us the best and most inventive versions you've heard, and send us the evidence!

• Click here to email us your evidence about new versions of this phrase

==================

posted by

Rosemary

Surrey UK

www.mentalmagazine.co.uk

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine

"Campaiging for good health & social care...it's for everyone"

In his latest documentary series starting on BBC2tv on Sunday 11 March 2007 -

about the erosion of our freedoms - Adam Curtis, includes R D Laing.

Yahoo list intro:

Documentary maker, Adam Curtis, includes R D Laing's anti-family arguments
as part of his latest BBCtv documentary series starting on Sunday 11 March,
about the erosion of our freedoms...

 

As a gesture of goodwill I am disregarding the fact that you also posted the otherwise identical text, which is not in itself original writing, to the Laing list on yahoo, which you ought to be well aware of, Internet protocol is a form of spamming.

 

My reasons for limiting the number of links you have posted is a practical matter, having to do with individuals antagonistic to Laing as a person while having no legitimate scholarly critique to offer nevertheless attempting to use Laing's name in general, and this site in particular, to advance themselves.

 

This is a map of the unique IP addresses* that access the Society for Laingian Studies pages on March 5, 2007.

 
 
Go to a full-size version of today's map by clicking here (It is a link directly to Clustrmaps - doesn't count toward the stats). 

 

When Daniel Burston invited me to co-found the Society with him, we agreed that under no circumstances would the SLS be affiliated with any other institution, college, or association, because of the politics of greed and self-promotion they breed. Staying true to this principle seems to have been a good choice, and I intend to continue preserving the integrity of the Society in years to come.

 

I have no comment about this Curtis fellow, whom I don't know from Adam, (or Natasha) but I find one aspect of this current mini-campaign of yours to be noteworthy:

 

In the yahoo post you wrote,

Documentary maker, Adam Curtis, includes R D Laing's anti-family arguments
as part of his latest BBCtv documentary series starting on Sunday 11 March,
about the erosion of our freedoms, whereas in his 2002 documentaries
charting the use of Freud's theories, Laing is noticeably absent...

 

But what was that 2002 piece about?

"This series is about how those in power have used Freud's theories to try
and control the dangerous crowd in an age of mass democracy." - Adam Curtis
broadcast 2002, available to view online - see links on the Wikipedia site.

 

 

Well, then if it's a film about using Freud's theories for purposes of control then it would make sense that Laing would be "noticeably absent".  

 

After all, Laing's trenchant analysis of the manipulation of the truth is the kind of thing that got him in trouble with those who wanted most to employ these methods. Which you would know if you'd ever actually read any of Laing's work on the subject. I recommend, Mystification, Confusion and Conflict for starters. And not to put too fine a point on it, the essay originally appeared in one of the most esteemed volumes published on the subject: Intensive Family Therapy, Ivan Boszorenyi-Nagy and James L. Framo, Eds.

 

So much for "anti-family". 

But, the kind of comment one has come to expect from you, Rosemary. Absent of  substance, when not plainly libelous, as were the comments you have made in other submissions to the yahoo list about me. It does nothing for your credibility.

 

Well... Personally, I'm a bit tired of having to state The Obvious to people who have not read Laing but feel in a position to make these ill-informed statements. If it is the case that Curtis has taken a malign view of Laing, it seems inappropriate for him to then adopt Laing's own phrasings, when he is quoted in the Guardian article: 'As for what happened to the concept of freedom, [Curtis] says: "I don't think there are baddies in this."', in pale imitation of Laing's own statement:

"As long as we cannot uplevel our thinking beyond Us and Them, the goodies and
baddies, it will go on and on. The only possible end will be when all the goodies have
killed all the baddies, and all the baddies all the goodies, which does not seem so
difficult or unlikely since, to Us, we are the goodies and They are the baddies, while to
Them, we are the baddies and They are the goodies.

 

It seems a comparatively simple knot, but it is tied very, very tight -
round the throat, as it were, of the whole human species."

 

If anything, I'd probably watch it just to see how someone could reconcile in their own mind using someone's words as their own and then seeking to depict that person antagonistically - if he is in fact, the person doing this... one can't help but wonder, if he doesn't "see any baddies in this", then who is undertaking to hold up this "no baddies" film as an example of some sort of negation of Laing's position?

 

On the basis of what you've posted here Rosemary, it appears that either the research on Laing undertaken for this project leaves much to be desired, or it is an effort by individuals trying their hand at 'spin'.  I'm just too busy trying to keep up with positive, interesting and meaningful work to find the time to take interest in that kind of thing.

 

_______________________
* unique IP addresses - refers to the number assigned to a single computer for internet
use. Each visitor is counted only once a day, regardless of the number of different
times s/he visits the page.

 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Rosemary Moore

To: RDLaing@yahoogroups.com ; AllSortsMentalHealth@yahoogroups.com ; SSOTalk@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Saturday, March 10, 2007 2:39 PM

Subject: [RDLaing] The Trap: What Happened to Our Dreams of Freedom, Sunday 11 March 9pm BBCtv

Documentary maker, Adam Curtis, includes R D Laing's anti-family arguments
as part of his latest BBCtv documentary series starting on Sunday 11 March,
about the erosion of our freedoms, whereas in his 2002 documentaries
charting the use of Freud's theories, Laing is noticeably absent, with the
narrative omitting any mention of sixties "anti-psychiatry" and going
straight to the seventies "Me" generation and Werner Erhard's est (Erhard
Seminar Training).....

.

Documentary maker, Adam Curtis, includes R D Laing's anti-family arguments
as part of his latest BBCtv documentary series starting on Sunday 11 March,
about the erosion of our freedoms, whereas in his 2002 documentaries
charting the use of Freud's theories, Laing is noticeably absent, with the
narrative omitting any mention of sixties "anti-psychiatry" and going
straight to the seventies "Me" generation and Werner Erhard's est (Erhard
Seminar Training).

See the article from The Guardian, 3 March, below.

Full details of the two previous documentary series, broadcast 2002 and
2004, as well as information about Adam Curtis can be found on Wikipedia -
and the two previous series can be be viewed online -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_Of_The_Self
"This series is about how those in power have used Freud's theories to try
and control the dangerous crowd in an age of mass democracy." - Adam Curtis
broadcast 2002, available to view online - see links on the Wikipedia site.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Nightmares
subtitled The Rise of the Politics of Fear, broadcast 2004, available to
view online, see links on Wikipedia site.

Sun 11 Mar, 9:00 pm - 10:00 pm 60mins BBC2tv
THE TRAP: WHAT HAPPENED TO OUR DREAMS OF FREEDOM

F**k You Buddy: A series of films by BAFTA-winning producer Adam Curtis that
tells the story of the rise of today's narrow idea of freedom. It will show
how a simplistic model of human beings as self-seeking, almost robotic,
creatures led to today's idea of freedom. This model was derived from ideas
and techniques developed by nuclear strategists during the Cold War. It was
then taken up by genetic biologists, anthropologists, radical psychiatrists
and free market economists, until it became a new system of invisible
control. With some strong language. [S]
Subtitles Stereo Widescreen

http://www.guardian.co.uk/saturday/story/0,,2025578,00.html
CRY FREEDOM
In the cold war paranoia made sense, but a bold new documentary argues that
the west has become trapped in a false idea of what it means to be human. By
Oliver Burkeman

Saturday March 3, 2007
The Guardian

In the mid-1950s, with the cold war growing chillier, paranoia seeped
through the corridors of the Rand Corporation, the fabled military thinktank
in California. After all, to the hotshot young analysts paid to devise
America's strategy in the nuclear standoff with Moscow, paranoia seemed to
make perfect sense. If you assumed that you couldn't trust your enemy - and
you assumed that your enemy felt the same about you - then whatever noises
you made about disarmament, you'd always stockpile weapons, because you'd
assume your enemy was doing the same. Nobody would dare attack, and an edgy
stability would result. Act with trust and co-operation, on the other hand,
and you risked a situation where both sides would claim to be willing to
disarm, but then only you actually did so, spelling instability, then doom.

This was what the thinktank's logicians called the "prisoner's dilemma", and
the more ambitious among them - inspired by John Nash, the mathematical
genius and Rand Corporation scholar portrayed by Russell Crowe in the film A
Beautiful Mind - had high hopes for their newborn theory. Could it be, they
wondered, that stability in everyday human relations was achieved by the
same kind of self-centred suspicion and distrust? To test their ideas, they
recruited the nearest everyday humans they could find: the Rand
Corporation's secretaries. In experiments, they posed various dilemmas for
pairs of secretaries, in which they could co-operate or betray each other.
(A typical question involved the purchase of a Buick; one imagines women in
knee-length dresses, gamely tolerating questions from clipboard-wielding men
in horn-rimmed glasses and short-sleeved shirts.) The theory predicted
they'd choose betrayal, because they couldn't trust the other one not to.
Every single time, however, they chose to co-operate.

Perhaps if the analysts had paid more attention to their secretaries, the
history of the past half-century would have proved very different. Instead,
according to a new documentary series beginning on BBC2 next weekend, the
paranoid theories hatched during the cold war would come to inspire a
peculiar, cold-hearted idea of personal freedom - one that helps explain
everything from the rise of Prozac and Viagra to Labour's obsession with
healthcare targets, from the military crusades of George Bush and the rise
of the Iraqi insurgency to the rampant diagnosis of attention deficit
disorder in children.

This is an audacious hypothesis, even by the standards of the
documentary-maker involved, Adam Curtis, whose 2004 series The Power Of
Nightmares asserted that al-Qaida, as an organised entity, was essentially
an invention of the west. The new series, The Trap: What Happened to Our
Dream of Freedom, argues that we have unwittingly subscribed to a bleak
ideal of liberty that has, ironically, "become our cage", reducing our true
freedom and fuelling a dramatic rise in inequality.
Critics will probably accuse Curtis, as they did after The Power of
Nightmares, of being paranoid himself - of seeing in government policies a
sinister plot to control the populace by tricking them. "But I've never
believed that anyone's bad," the 51-year-old Curtis insists, bouncing
restlessly around the Soho office where he's editing the series. "People do
bad things because they're forced into circumstances. Journalists always
want to find a smoking gun - people sitting in rooms saying 'let's bomb
Iraq'." As for what happened to the concept of freedom, he says: "I don't
think there are baddies in this. I think our leaders, and us, in the belief
that they were trying to find freedom, have gone down a road that's led us
into a trap, towards a world without meaning or purpose. We're complicit."

The cold war way of thinking about human nature, mirrored by the work of the
economist Friedrich von Hayek, inspired the nascent Thatcherites. They were
convinced that civil servants and public-sector workers, while claiming to
serve the greater good, were really just self-centred and out for their own
gain. As in the nuclear standoff, it was best to be honest about the fact
that everyone involved was cold and calculating; the dangerous people were
the ones who claimed to serve some higher ideal. "We're safer if we have
politicians who are a bit self-interested and greedy," says James Buchanan,
the grandfather of this approach, "than if we have these zealots ... who
think they know best for the rest of us." Hence the culture of public-sector
targets, pioneered by Margaret Thatcher and massively expanded by Tony
Blair: give people the right incentives, the theory went, and in pursuit of
their own interests they'll end up helping everyone.

In a typical bit of conceptual long-jumping, The Trap leaps from politics to
the radical Scottish psychiatrist RD Laing, who saw normal families as
hotbeds of strategy and scheming, with husbands and wives manipulating each
other as if they, too, were just like the White House and the Kremlin.
Psychiatry abetted this nightmare, defining people as mad if they rebelled
against the system.

In one famous proof that madness was defined by a patrician establishment,
an American follower of Laing, David Rosenhan, arranged for eight healthy
researchers, himself included, to check themselves in to mental hospitals.
They claimed they could hear a voice in their heads saying "thud". All were
diagnosed as ill; it took Rosenhan two months to get himself discharged. One
hospital chief, defending the profession, urged Rosenhan to send more
impostors and promised to detect them. He agreed, and soon the hospital was
boasting the discovery of 41 fake patients. Rosenhan hadn't sent any.

But in trying to overthrow the old definitions of madness, Curtis
demonstrates, many psychologists gave up looking inside people's brains at
all. Instead, they devised a system of checklists based entirely on
symptoms - the tome known as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. If you
could tick enough boxes, you had the disorder: depression,
obsessive-compulsive disorder, ADD, or the rest. The new way of thinking
allowed people to diagnose themselves, and thus chastise themselves for
experiencing ordinary human emotions, just because they diverged from an
ideal of what was normal. They were free of a psychiatric establishment
telling them how they should be - but they weren't really free at all. They
had become enslaved by paranoid self-monitoring.

In earlier times, psychiatrist Paul McHugh tells Curtis, "people didn't want
to see themselves as in some way psychiatrically injured. But now, they tell
me that they have an ideal in their mind about what the normal person is.
[They say]: 'I don't fit that model. I want you to polish me down to
fit.'..."

Curtis argues that while the radical psychiatrists inadvertently ended up
enforcing a single ideal of the normal human, so too did target-obsessed
Thatcherites and Blairites begin to turn people into the calculating
machines they'd wrongly assumed them to be. The precise results, however,
proved unexpected. The theory of the "invisible hand" of the free market,
first crystallised by Adam Smith, whereby the pursuit of self-interest
results in order, may apply in the world of business - but not necessarily
when artificially imposed elsewhere. Set a target for the reduction in
patients waiting on hospital trollies, and NHS managers are liable to
respond - as some notoriously did - by removing the wheels and reclassifying
them as beds.

"I realise what I said at some times may have over-emphasised rationality,"
an elderly John Nash tells Curtis in an extraordinary interview, after
emerging from years of battling schizophrenia. "Human beings are much more
complicated than the human being as a businessman." In fact, the documentary
notes sardonically, experiments show that only two kinds of people behave
like perfect little economists in every arena of life: economists
themselves, and psychopaths.

The Trap's argument won't convince everyone. The link between all these
ideas and the way "freedom" was used as a justification for the wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq isn't so clear. And the truth about public service
workers may be that they are neither knights nor knaves, but a bit of both,
argues Professor Julian Le Grand, one of the architects of Blair's health
reforms. "The real trick is that you need a system of incentives that
encourages the knight and the knave in each of us, and gets them working in
the same direction," he says. But he agrees with the film's argument that if
you keep treating people as if they were selfish and calculating, that's how
they'll eventually become. "We ... come to believe," as Curtis puts it,
"that we really are the strange, isolated beings that the cold war
scientists had invented to make their models work."

Curtis enjoys an extraordinary latitude in his filmmaking: in a post-Hutton
BBC, it was extraordinary that he was allowed to make The Power of
Nightmares at all. (It put noses out of joint at the corporation, which
commissioned another documentary, The New Al-Qaida, essentially a riposte.)
"I love the BBC," Curtis says. "It's so complex that no-one can control it.
My job is to swim in the chaos and use it to my advantage." The BBC had its
own experience of internal-market culture, with similar effects to the
trolleys-and-beds fiasco detailed in the film. "Actually, though, the
Birtian revolution was fine," Curtis says. "It just meant more chaos."
The Power of Nightmares drew fire from some right-wingers, who accused
Curtis of imagining conspiracies and objected to the parallel he drew
between the evolution of neoconservatism and that of radical Islamism. In
the US, the conservative National Review accused him of fuelling "Chomskyite
visions of 'Amerika' as the fount of all evil". The criticism misses the
mark. The al-Qaida film shows that Curtis believes, above all, in the
political force of ideas; many "anti-imperialist" critics of western foreign
policy see nothing at work but blind economic forces. Where he differs from
the neocons is in pointing out that the consequences of their ideas weren't
the ones they predicted.

"That sort of pissed me off," Curtis says of the conspiracy theory charges.
"There's an affectionate tone in that series. I'm kind of taking the piss
out of conspiracy theories." His trademark filmmaking style, in fact,
undermines any too sinister interpretation of his subject-matter. The story
of the neocons is narrated against clips from black-and-white horror movies,
with appropriate scary background music.

It might also surprise his critics on the right that Curtis doesn't buy the
standard anti-Bush critique that the "war on terror" turned the imaginary
threat into a real one. "There's very little evidence that there actually
has been the rise of an organised al-Qaida network," he says. From the
media's point of view, he argues, "all you have to do is call yourself
Al-Qaida In Islington, and you're part of an organised network." The trick
"is to step back. If there's one thing that links all I do, it's trying to
make people pull back, look at their time. All the news journalists now are
so obsessed by the idea of 24-hour news that they have no idea what it all
means."
The Trap occasionally feels as if it is stepping a little too far back,
wrapping the whole past half-century into a single argument. As Curtis
readily concedes, the old civil service did need replacing; a world in which
psychological disorders are over-diagnosed has also seen thousands of lives
transformed by Prozac. It's not that our old ideas of how to run society
were any good; it's that our new ideas didn't work out as planned.

The most perceptive comment on the situation comes, in Curtis's film, from a
beleaguered bus conductor, in archive footage used as a counterpoint to the
visionary talk of targets and markets and freedom. It could serve as a
general diagnosis of the problem of how best to approach politics,
psychology, culture - the lot. "Anybody that deals with the public, you can
never win," he says, flatly. "You can never win when you deal with the
public. Never."

Under the microscope
1920: Little Albert
In an experiment that wouldn't make it past any university ethics committee
today, researcher John Watson tried to show how early experiences affect the
kinds of people we become.
The nine-month-old experimental subject, Albert B, was introduced to a white
rat, and a rabbit; he showed no fear. Then he was presented with the white
rat while Watson hit a metal bar with a hammer behind his back.
After this happened several times, the baby became afraid of the rat - and
of the rabbit, and of other furry animals and objects. Albert's mother never
gave her consent for the experiment, and the baby left the hospital before
any attempt could be made to eliminate his new fears.

1960s: The Yanomami
The anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon made headlines with his studies of
violence among the Yanomami people of Venezuela and Brazil.
What looked like orgies of aggression, he concluded, actually followed a
strict logic: tribe members defended those to whom they were more closely
genetically linked, protecting them from those who were genetically more
distant.
Doubters had another theory: that the violence was influenced by the
presence of the Western anthropologists. The fighting, they said, was
between village members to whom Chagnon's team had given machetes, and
visiting tribespeople, who wanted machetes too.

1961: The Milgram Experiments
These notorious studies on obedience to authority, by the Yale psychologist
Stanley Milgram, revealed what seemed to be a horrific dark side to
humanity: if told to do unconscionable things by someone who presents
themselves as an authority, we will.
Milgram's subjects were told they were helping to study the effects of
punishment on learning, and would have to administer electric shocks to
another so-called "subject", in another room, who was actually an actor.
The subjects proved willing to administer what they believed were electric
shocks to the actors, up to and including fatal levels, because the person
running the experiment told them that they must.

1971: Stanford Prison Experiment
Philip Zimbardo, at Stanford university, divided undergraduate volunteers
into prisoners and guards, confining them to a mocked-up prison.
Even though everyone understood they were part of a simulation, chaos
resulted as the subjects adapted with alarming speed to their assigned
personas. Guards became genuinely violent and sadistic; the prisoners
rioted, and showed signs of trauma.
Alarmed researchers called off the experiment early - reportedly to the
consternation of some of the guards, who had come to relish their roles.
· The first episode of The Trap is on Sunday March 11 on BBC2 at 9pm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/saturday/story/0,,2025578,00.html The Guardian
3 March 2007

================
posted by
Rosemary Surrey UK
http://johnchurchill.blogspot.com
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AllSortsMentalHealth
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SurvivorsSpeakOut/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SSOTalk/
www.mentalmagazine.co.uk
"Campaigning for good health & social care....it's for everyone"

Comments ("memorandums") are being sought for the All-Party Health
Committee's inquiry into the NHS Patient & Public Involvement Forums
(PPIFs).  These are the monitoring groups set up in 2003 following the
abolition of the Community Health Councils (CHCs).  Information on the PPIFs
and the CPPIH can be found here www.cppih.org .

The Forums themselves will be making submissions but individuals can also do
so.

As with other Health Committee inquiries, oral evidence in public, (some of
it televised and/or streamed on the net and/or audio)
will then be taken from some of the respondents.

Here are the details for the Health Committee and  below that the terms of
the reference of the inquiry:

Staff of the Health Committee
For Media inquiries please contact Luke Robinson, Health Committee Media
Officer
Telephone: 020 7219 5693
E-mail: robinsonl@...

Listed below are the contact details of the staff of the Health Committee.
Telephone020 7219 5466E-Mailhealthcom@...
  020 7219 6182Fax020 7219 5171
AddressHealth Committee
7 Millbank
London SW1P 3JA

RoleNameContact Details
Committee Clerk:Dr David HarrisonAll inquiries call:
Second Clerk:Emma Graham
Committee Assistant:Duma Langton020 7219 5466 or
Committee Secretary:Julie Storey020 7219 6182
Committee Specialist:Ralph Coulbeck
Committee Specialist:Christine Kirkpatrick


Here are the terms of the inquiry, closing dates for submissions 10 January
2007, and a list of the members of the Health Committee, including Sandra
Gidley who is one of the three Co-Chairs of the All-party Mental Health
Group, with Lynne Jones and Tim Loughton.  Details of the Parliamentary mh
group on Lynne Jones' site
http://www.poptel.org.uk/lynne.jones/d0515.july2006.htm

http://www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_committees/health_committee/hcpn061123.cf\
m
Health Committee
23 November 2006
Session 2006-07

New Inquiry - Public and Patient Involvement in the NHS Terms of Reference

On 2 November, the Health Committee announced that it would undertake an
inquiry into Public and Patient Involvement in the NHS (PPIs). It has now
agreed the following terms of reference:

What is the purpose of public and patient involvement?
What form of public and patient involvement is desirable, practical and
offers good value for money?
Why are existing systems for patient and public involvement being reformed
after only 3 years?

How should LINks be designed, including:
. Remit and level of independence
. Membership and appointments
. Funding and support
. Areas of focus
. Statutory powers
. Relations with local health Trusts
. National coordination

How should LINks relate to and avoid overlap with:
. Local Authority structures including Overview and Scrutiny Committees
. Foundation Trust boards and Members Councils
. Inspectorates including the Healthcare Commission
. Formal and informal complaints procedures
In what circumstances should wider public consultation (including under
Section 11 of the Health and Social Care Act 2001) be carried out and what
form should this take?

Organisations and individuals wishing to submit a short memorandum are
invited to do so no later than Wednesday 10 January 2007.

Memoranda need not address all of the issues outlined above.
The Committee requests that evidence should be concise and in the form of a
self-contained memorandum, prepared according to the guidelines set out by
the terms of reference given above and preferably submitted electronically
to healthcommem@... .
Paragraphs should be numbered for ease of reference.
Attention is drawn to the guidance on the submission of evidence which can
be found at
www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_committees/health_committee/guide_to_submitting_\
written_evidence.cfm.
Late memoranda will only be accepted at the Committee's discretion, and may
not be considered for publication.
Evidence sessions are likely to commence in early February 2007 and a later
press notice will give details of these.

================

Members of the All-party Health Committe
MemberConstituencyParty
Rt Hon Kevin Barron (Chairman)Rother ValleyLabour
Mr David AmessSouthend WestConservative
Charlotte AtkinsStaffordshire MoorlandsLabour
Sandra GidleyRomseyLiberal Democrats
Mr Ronnie CampbellBlyth ValleyLabour
Jim DowdLewisham WestLabour
Anne MiltonGuildfordConservative
Dr Doug NaysmithBristol North WestLabour
Mike PenningHemel HempsteadConservative
Dr Howard Stoate DartfordLabour
Dr Richard TaylorWyre ForesIndependent




http://www.poptel.org.uk/lynne.jones/d0515.july2006.htm
All-Party Mental Health Group
Co-Chairs - Sandra Gidley, Tim Loughton, Lynne Jones


==========================
posted by
Rosemary
Surrey UK
http://johnchurchill.blogspot.com
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AllSortsMentalHealth
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SurvivorsSpeakOut/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SSOTalk/
www.mentalmagazine.co.uk
"Campaigning for good health & social care...it's for everyone"

Tomorrow, 17 November, a "plea and case management" hearing for John
Churchill will take place at the Old Bailey in London.

John Churchill was a mental patient under the care of the Surrey &
Borders Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust when he killed John
McKenna in Egham, Surrey.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/southern_counties/4856384.stm
BBC News, Wednesday 29 March
Man, 50, charged after body found
  John McKenna was killed by a single stab wound to the back
A 50-year-old man has appeared in court charged with the murder of a
man whose body was found at a flat in Surrey.
The body of John McKenna, also aged 50, was found at the address in
School Lane in Egham on Monday afternoon.
Mr McKenna, who died of a stab wound to the back, was divorced with
three grown up children.
John Churchill, from nearby Englefield Green, appeared before Woking
Magistrates' Court on Wednesday. He was remanded in custody.

I knew John Churchill and am trying to see that the facts of his
situation are known at the time of the hearings.

The independent report into John Barrett's case has been issued
today and it is the same old story.

More information about John Churchill here  -
http://johnchurchill.blogspot.com/


Rosemary
Surrey UK
hhttp://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AllSortsMentalHealth>
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
www.mentalmagazine.co.uk
"Campaigning for good health & social care...it's for everyone"

The documentary secretly filmed in three mental hospitals in Surrey,
Eastbourne and Leicester will be REPEATED at 4.10am 13 October
(Friday morning).

The comments on the internet boards so far from people who have
experienced inpatient treatment is units across the UK show that the
programme represented the experience of many.

Most shocking for me was the appearance of Professor Kevin Gournay
CBE -

A professor of psychiatric nursing interviewed for the film
describes many cases of psychiatric in-patient deaths as
preventable. He says: "If you had patients dying in medical or
surgical settings from obviously preventable deaths, there would be
an outcry."

Professor Gournay is surely as responsible as anyone for the
appalling conditions in our hospitals.  Gournay is a senior adviser
to the Government and as he himself said during the programme, has
been the expert consulted on many occasions when there have been
fatalities in mental health units.   He is very well aware that
staff are working under extremely dangerous conditions both for
themselves and their patients.  Last year he recommended mechanical
restraints to be introduced to control violent mental patients -
which was reported by David Batty in The Guardian newspaper
http://society.guardian.co.uk/mentalhealth/story/0,,1404142,00.html
("Call for restraint to tackle violent mental health patients").

In a  report that has appeared in the Surrey Comet, one hospital
appears to accept that it is failing:

http://www.surreycomet.co.uk/news/localnews/display.var.966186.0.ment
al_health_trust_boss_sorry_after_tv_expos.php
Mental health trust boss `sorry' after TV exposé
By David Rankin     Surrey Comet surreycomet.co.uk
drankin@...

The chief executive in charge of Tolworth Hospital has apologised
after a Channel 4 Dispatches programme revealed appalling conditions
at its mental health unit.

The South West London and St George's Mental Health Trust, and the
other two trusts filmed, unsuccessfully tried to convince Channel 4
not to show the programme, citing fears it would identify vulnerable
patients. But the film, entitled Dispatches: Britain's Mental Health
Scandal, was shown on Monday night.

The trust's chief executive Peter Houghton said: "I would like to
apologise on behalf of the trust to service users and their families
for lapses in quality of care seen on the film. These will be
investigated and we will take appropriate action.


"My top priority since becoming chief executive in July is to ensure
our services are safe, effective, of a high quality and continually
improving. While our staffing levels are in line with those across
London we are committed to improving them."
Issues raised by reporter Janey Ayoade after her six months spent at
Tolworth and the two other hospitals included women being forced to
mix with men in communal areas, sexual harassment and assault,
overstretched staff and illegally-administered medication.

Chief executive Mind, Paul Farmer, said: "It's hard to believe that
the wards people go to for support when they are at their most
unwell are often scary and dangerous places. Many mental health
wards don't provide a safe environment, let alone a therapeutic one."

Another woman, who did not wish to be named, said inpatient services
at the hospital in Red Lion Road, Tolworth, were "disgusting" and
she had seen examples of filthy wards.

Mr Houghton added: "Filming for the programme was undertaken over a
few weeks in 2005. We have begun a major training programme for
staff to improve their ability to assess the risks of patients.

"The privacy, dignity and safety of all service users is of great
importance to me. All wards have separate male and female sleeping
areas, toilets and bathroom facilities. We support patients in
reporting any assaults to the police."

It is not the first time the unit has been criticised. In March 2000
it was announced control of mental health services was to be moved
from the now defunct Kingston and District Community Health Trust to
St George's. An internal inquiry held trust managers largely
responsible for a seriously flawed culture of care for Alzheimer's
patients on Fuschias Ward.

An independent inquiry by the London NHS Executive followed soon
after, which called for an overhaul of complaints procedures, spot
checks on wards at night and on weekends, training for senior
managers and better reporting of untoward incidents.

=================
This is some information that appeared before the programme was
broadcast on Monday:

Britain's Mental Health Scandal / UKtv C4 Dispatches 9 October 2006
@ 20-00


http://www.channel4.com/listings/C4/index.jsp?hpos=tvlistings

In this Dispatches, an undercover reporter spent six months in three
separate NHS Trusts that care for the acutely mentally ill in
hospital. She secretly filmed conditions on adult general
psychiatric wards whilst working as a healthcare assistant – having
been trained in mental health nursing before going undercover.

http://www.channel4.com/news/microsites/D/dispatches2006/mental_healt
h/index.html

The reporter finds an overwhelming lack of resources for psychiatric
care resulting in understaffed wards that are chaotic, frightening
and dangerous. With women forced to mix with men in communal areas,
the reporter discovers that female patients are vulnerable to sexual
harassment and assault and she finds incidences of overstretched
hospital staff threatening patients and illegally administering
medication.

Patients complain about ward conditions that are dirty and
untherapeutic. One patient sums up her experience by saying: "It's
the best way to make someone have a nervous breakdown, being in this
place." Another says: "If you're not mad when you come in, you will
be by the time you leave."

Dispatches also reveals that in some cases, the hospitals are
failing to prevent patients self-harming on the ward – sometimes
with tragic consequences. The film features interviews with grieving
families who have lost their loved ones as a result of such failures
in in-patient psychiatric care.

A professor of psychiatric nursing interviewed for the film
describes many cases of psychiatric in-patient deaths as
preventable. He says: "If you had patients dying in medical or
surgical settings from obviously preventable deaths, there would be
an outcry."

Dispatches: Britain's Mental Health Scandal uncovers the under-
resourced reality for patients and staff in the part of the NHS that
is so often hidden from public view.

==========================

posted by
Rosemary
Surrey UK
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AllSortsMentalHealth
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
www.mentalmagazine.co.uk
"Campaigning for good health & social care...it's for everyone"

NEWSFLASH

TONIGHT

MONDAY 9TH OCTOBER 2006

8.00 pm   CHANNEL 4

DISPATCHES: BRITAINS MENTAL HEALTH SCANDAL

In tonights edition, a report on conditions in

Britain's psychiatric wards, including allegations of

neglect leading to dangerous conditions for the residents.

----- Original Message -----

From: Rosemary Moore

To: SSOTalk@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2006 7:09 PM

Subject: [SSOTalk] Survivors Speak Out - the aims and objectives

This is a description of the aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK
OUT when it was formed in 1986:

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT INFORMATION SHEET SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT SURVIV
Written by Peter Campbell, published in Newsletter June 1988

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT was set up to improve contact and communications
between groups and individuals involved in mental health `self-advocacy'.
SURVIVORS is the direct result of an initiative
following the Mental Health 2000 Conference at Brighton in 1985 when
recipients of services from England and Wales were notable by their
absence.
SURVIVORS was established in January 1986.

The aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT are:

TO MEET WITH OTHER PEOPLE TO SHARE VIEWS AND EXPERIENCES
TO SHARE INFORMATION ABOUT WHAT IS BEING DONE TO CREATE CHANGE
TO LOOK AT WHAT PROVISIONS AND CHOICES WE WOULD LIKE TO SEE
AVAILABLE TO SUPPORT THE FORMATION OF NEW GROUPS

SURVIVORS is also being increasingly approached to provide
workshops, speakers etc, about the `self-advocacy' movement and aims
to respond to these requests, within the limitations of its current
resources.

MEMBERSHIP
The original membership of the group was 20. Now (June 1988), the
paid-up membership is about 230. SURVIVORS is a non-separatist group
and is made up of `survivors' and `allies' - many of whom are mental
health workers. Currently slightly less than a third
of members are `allies'.
Although many members are involved in existing `self-advocacy'
groups, there are a large number who are not involved in any group.
SURVIVORS not only exists to keep these in touch with what is going
on, but also to encourage them to get together with
others in their area to set up groups.

NATIONAL VOICE
SURVIVORS is NOT the national voice of recipients in the U.K. in any
formal sense. Members join as individuals and not as representatives
of any group they may belong to.
In September 1985 SURVIVORS organised a national conference of
mental health service users and their allies which produced a
charter of needs and demands. This charter (on separate sheet) does
broadly reflect the major concerns of recipients involved in action
in this country.

At present SURVIVORS is principally concerned with communication
within the movement and with increasing awareness of the
possibilities of action by recipients.

ACTIVITIES OVER LAST TWO YEARS
Personal contact is an important element in building an effective
movement. Recipients who wish to change things have often felt
completely isolated and without support.
One of our major contributions so far has been to enable people from
across Britain to meet and get to know each other. In 1986/1987
there were four weekend meetings - for about 20 people - at Minstead
Lodge in the New Forest. It has not been possible to continue these
meetings this year but would plan to pursue this idea in the future
either at Minstead or another venue.
A major achievement of 1987 was the NATIONAL CONFERENCE at EDALE
which was the first national conference of mental health service
recipients in this country.
One immediate result of such personal contacts has been an awareness
of solidarity that is based on shared experience and of the range of
possibilities opening up to individuals and combinations of
individuals within `self-advocacy'.

Communication through information etc. has been another main
activity of SURVIVORS. The very first project that we tried during
the months immediately before the final establishment of SURVIVORS
was a newsletter with articles etc. and although this did not
succeed, a regular quarterly newssheet has been sent to members
since February 1987. SURVIVORS have also run stalls at various
conferences including the MIND Annual conference. These have
provided information and a meeting point for recipients attending
the events. On a day-to-day basis SURVIVORS recieves and answers
continual requests through the post for information about its own
activities and about other groups' work.

===========
posted by Rosemary
Surrey UK

A demonstration against the proposed cuts in service by the South London and
Maudsley Trust (SLAM) and the Lambeth and Southwark PCT will happen on
SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 1-2PM

The poster for the event can be found at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosemarymoore/231116643/

This is the content of the Poster -


ATTENTION ALL MENTAL HEALTH SERVICE USERS, CARERS AND PROFESSIONALS!

SAVE OUR LOCAL SERVICES

LAMBETH AND SOUTHWARK PCT (Primary Care Trust) and SLaM (South London and
Maudsley NHS Trust)
are planning to cut £millions from vital mental health services.
If you are concerned as we are then

JOIN THE DEMONSTRATION
STOP THE MAUDSLEY CUTS!

Meet
1-2pm at Kennington Park, Lambeth SE11
(entrance Camberwell New Road)

WE WILL MARCH ALONG BRIXTON ROAD to WINDRUSH SQUARE

TO SHOW THAT THIS COULD MEAN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH FOR
PEOPLE IN MENTAL DISTRESS

Poster from -
Lambeth Mental Health and Disabled People's Action Group
- Fighting for mental health and disabled service users' rights
Working together with user groups across Lambeth and Southwark

===========

posted by Rosemary Moore (Surrey UK)
www.mentalmagzine.co.uk
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
"Campaigning for good health & Social Care....it's for everyone"
Owner & Moderator of
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SSOtalk/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SurvivorsSpeakOut/


----- Original Message -----
From: Rosemary Moore
To: SSOTalk@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, September 06, 2006 6:56 PM
Subject: SSO meeting at Diorama in London - 20 September 1pm

Currently Survivors Speak Out meetings are happening on the third Wednesday
of the month at Diorama in London
NEXT MEETING:
Wednesday, 20 September at 1pm
Venue:
DIORAMA
34 Osnaburgh Street, London NW1 3ND

More details from the Secretary:
Bill Collins    email: billcollins1943@...
Tel:  0207 978 2348    mobile: 0798 666 5071
By post -
60 Carfax Place, Clapham, London SW4 7BQ
SEND STAMPED, SELF-ADDRESSED ENVELOPE IF A REPLY IS REQUIRED
DO NOT SEND MONEY

=============
posted by Rosemary Moore
www.mentalmagzine.co.uk
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/mentalmagazine/
"Campaigning for good health & Social Care....it's for everyone"
Owner & Moderator of
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SSOtalk/
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SurvivorsSpeakOut/


----- Original Message -----
From: Rosemary Moore
To: SSOTalk@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2006 7:09 PM
Subject: [SSOTalk] Survivors Speak Out - the aims and objectives


This is a description of the aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK
OUT when it was formed in 1986:

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT INFORMATION SHEET SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT SURVIV
Written by Peter Campbell, published in Newsletter June 1988

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT was set up to improve contact and communications
between groups and individuals involved in mental health `self-advocacy'.
SURVIVORS is the direct result of an initiative
following the Mental Health 2000 Conference at Brighton in 1985 when
recipients of services from England and Wales were notable by their
absence.
SURVIVORS was established in January 1986.

The aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT are:

TO MEET WITH OTHER PEOPLE TO SHARE VIEWS AND EXPERIENCES
TO SHARE INFORMATION ABOUT WHAT IS BEING DONE TO CREATE CHANGE
TO LOOK AT WHAT PROVISIONS AND CHOICES WE WOULD LIKE TO SEE
AVAILABLE TO SUPPORT THE FORMATION OF NEW GROUPS

SURVIVORS is also being increasingly approached to provide
workshops, speakers etc, about the `self-advocacy' movement and aims
to respond to these requests, within the limitations of its current
resources.

MEMBERSHIP
The original membership of the group was 20. Now (June 1988), the
paid-up membership is about 230. SURVIVORS is a non-separatist group
and is made up of `survivors' and `allies' - many of whom are mental
health workers. Currently slightly less than a third
of members are `allies'.
Although many members are involved in existing `self-advocacy'
groups, there are a large number who are not involved in any group.
SURVIVORS not only exists to keep these in touch with what is going
on, but also to encourage them to get together with
others in their area to set up groups.

NATIONAL VOICE
SURVIVORS is NOT the national voice of recipients in the U.K. in any
formal sense. Members join as individuals and not as representatives
of any group they may belong to.
In September 1985 SURVIVORS organised a national conference of
mental health service users and their allies which produced a
charter of needs and demands. This charter (on separate sheet) does
broadly reflect the major concerns of recipients involved in action
in this country.

At present SURVIVORS is principally concerned with communication
within the movement and with increasing awareness of the
possibilities of action by recipients.

ACTIVITIES OVER LAST TWO YEARS
Personal contact is an important element in building an effective
movement. Recipients who wish to change things have often felt
completely isolated and without support.
One of our major contributions so far has been to enable people from
across Britain to meet and get to know each other. In 1986/1987
there were four weekend meetings - for about 20 people - at Minstead
Lodge in the New Forest. It has not been possible to continue these
meetings this year but would plan to pursue this idea in the future
either at Minstead or another venue.
A major achievement of 1987 was the NATIONAL CONFERENCE at EDALE
which was the first national conference of mental health service
recipients in this country.
One immediate result of such personal contacts has been an awareness
of solidarity that is based on shared experience and of the range of
possibilities opening up to individuals and combinations of
individuals within `self-advocacy'.

Communication through information etc. has been another main
activity of SURVIVORS. The very first project that we tried during
the months immediately before the final establishment of SURVIVORS
was a newsletter with articles etc. and although this did not
succeed, a regular quarterly newssheet has been sent to members
since February 1987. SURVIVORS have also run stalls at various
conferences including the MIND Annual conference. These have
provided information and a meeting point for recipients attending
the events. On a day-to-day basis SURVIVORS recieves and answers
continual requests through the post for information about its own
activities and about other groups' work.

===========
posted by Rosemary
Surrey UK

This is a description of the aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK
OUT when it was formed in 1986:

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT INFORMATION SHEET SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT SURVIV
Written by Peter Campbell, published in Newsletter June 1988

SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT was set up to improve contact and communications
between groups and individuals involved in mental health `self-advocacy'.
SURVIVORS is the direct result of an initiative
following the Mental Health 2000 Conference at Brighton in 1985 when
recipients of services from England and Wales were notable by their
absence.
SURVIVORS was established in January 1986.

The aims and objectives of SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT are:

TO MEET WITH OTHER PEOPLE TO SHARE VIEWS AND EXPERIENCES
TO SHARE INFORMATION ABOUT WHAT IS BEING DONE TO CREATE CHANGE
TO LOOK AT WHAT PROVISIONS AND CHOICES WE WOULD LIKE TO SEE
AVAILABLE TO SUPPORT THE FORMATION OF NEW GROUPS

SURVIVORS is also being increasingly approached to provide
workshops, speakers etc, about the `self-advocacy' movement and aims
to respond to these requests, within the limitations of its current
resources.

MEMBERSHIP
The original membership of the group was 20. Now (June 1988), the
paid-up membership is about 230. SURVIVORS is a non-separatist group
and is made up of `survivors' and `allies' - many of whom are mental
health workers. Currently slightly less than a third
of members are `allies'.
Although many members are involved in existing `self-advocacy'
groups, there are a large number who are not involved in any group.
SURVIVORS not only exists to keep these in touch with what is going
on, but also to encourage them to get together with
others in their area to set up groups.

NATIONAL VOICE
SURVIVORS is NOT the national voice of recipients in the U.K. in any
formal sense. Members join as individuals and not as representatives
of any group they may belong to.
In September 1985 SURVIVORS organised a national conference of
mental health service users and their allies which produced a
charter of needs and demands. This charter (on separate sheet) does
broadly reflect the major concerns of recipients involved in action
in this country.

At present SURVIVORS is principally concerned with communication
within the movement and with increasing awareness of the
possibilities of action by recipients.

ACTIVITIES OVER LAST TWO YEARS
Personal contact is an important element in building an effective
movement. Recipients who wish to change things have often felt
completely isolated and without support.
One of our major contributions so far has been to enable people from
across Britain to meet and get to know each other. In 1986/1987
there were four weekend meetings - for about 20 people - at Minstead
Lodge in the New Forest. It has not been possible to continue these
meetings this year but would plan to pursue this idea in the future
either at Minstead or another venue.
A major achievement of 1987 was the NATIONAL CONFERENCE at EDALE
which was the first national conference of mental health service
recipients in this country.
One immediate result of such personal contacts has been an awareness
of solidarity that is based on shared experience and of the range of
possibilities opening up to individuals and combinations of
individuals within `self-advocacy'.

Communication through information etc. has been another main
activity of SURVIVORS. The very first project that we tried during
the months immediately before the final establishment of SURVIVORS
was a newsletter with articles etc. and although this did not
succeed, a regular quarterly newssheet has been sent to members
since February 1987. SURVIVORS have also run stalls at various
conferences including the MIND Annual conference. These have
provided information and a meeting point for recipients attending
the events. On a day-to-day basis SURVIVORS recieves and answers
continual requests through the post for information about its own
activities and about other groups' work.

===========
posted by Rosemary
Surrey UK