Alice Leahy Trust Letters to the Irish Times, News and Press

A life less ordinary

Madam, – Saturday’s Irish Times never fails to challenge us to “Think Anew” especially when reading the page dedicated to people departed. July 17th was no exception. These days one could be forgiven for thinking that older people are a problem to be solved, the cause of our current state and blocking progress. The life of Daisy Burgess clearly challenges that myth.

We had contact with Daisy for a number of years when she visited us in Trust.

While it is not our policy to pry, we heard something of her interesting life, her distinctive accent and lovely hair clearly identified her as being different. Daisy last visited us about 15-20 years ago. She was one of three extraordinary women known to us over the years who lived out their last years in St Mary’s Hospital, cared for with exceptional kindness by the staff there. All three women refused to fit definitions drawn up by experts, all challenged and inspired in equal measure.

In our rush to achieve success and “force” people to conform – all in the name of progress, especially in the field of homelessness, we are rapidly losing or ignoring the wisdom so essential for debate and progress. We need to reflect on and debate these issues to allow people to question, challenge and wonder at the world we live in, where all have a contribution to make.

Incidentally, when Daisy visited us in Trust, usually for a bath, she always declined tea or coffee, preferring instead a piece of fruit. We never had avocado skins to put in the bath for her to soak in, so she always brought her own. – Yours, etc,

ALICE LEAHY

Alice Leahy Trust Irish Independent, News and Press

Protecting the vulnerable

Sir —

“We failed to provide well enough for the mentally vulnerable when money was plentiful. So what chance now?”

Colum Kenny so rightly poses the question in his excellent reminder of how we as a nation treat our most vulnerable citizens (Sunday Independent, June 20). Over a quarter of a century ago, the then Health Minister Barry Desmond TD published the grand strategy Planning for the Future, and many patients in psychiatric hospitals were literally made homeless because no adequate community care services were provided as envisaged in the plan. We at Trust can testify to that because we still meet many of them as they are counted among people who are still homeless today.

In the past, hostels and night shelters became the dumping ground for people with serious problems — is there any reason to believe that the same will not happen in some of the housing likely to come on stream in the near future?

This will happen if there aren’t adequate support services put in place to ensure that the people discharged to live in the community are treated with dignity and respect.

At a time when state services for the most vulnerable people in society are being outsourced to the voluntary/private sector, serious questions need to be asked.

The ‘centres of excellence’ now widely referred to can make us feel something is happening.

When quoting from the report of the Mental Health Commission on the appalling conditions, it is worth noting that many people are still expected to deliver humane services in these conditions, and many have done so over the years and continue to do so today.

Alice Leahy,

Trust director (and co-founder),

Dublin 8

Alice Leahy Trust Irish Examiner, News and Press

Nothing has changed for mental health sufferers

THANK you for highlighting the plight of people with mental health problems through Jennifer Hough’s excellent piece (June 7). However, I find myself once again saying “the more things change the more they remain the same”.

In your editorial you rightly point to the fact that facilities are unfit for human habitation, much less recuperation, while acknowledging the determination of minister John Moloney. Ministers come and go, and so too personnel working in the field. Many leave for promotion and others as a result of sheer frustration while those needing improved facilities remain statistics in an ever increasing pile of reports.

Reports do not include figures for people who over the years were discharged to hostel accommodation because they were cheaper to run, or to struggling communities without adequate support. Many people end up on the streets because they have serious psychological and psychiatric problems without ever having received the support required to live in the community.

Many people are scarred by a lifetime in state institutions and all are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect.

More than a quarter of a century ago the then Health Minister Barry Desmond published a grand strategy, Planning for the Future. Many patients in psychiatric hospitals were literally made homeless because no adequate community care services were provided as envisaged in the plan – without support many ended up on the streets. We can testify to that because we still meet many of them as they are counted among people who are still homeless today.

At a time when state services for the most vulnerable people in society are being outsourced to the voluntary/private sector, serious questions need to be asked. It is not surprising that many are sceptical of programme plans.

Minister Moloney urgently needs the support of all government departments. This will cost money. Support services need to be put in place – it is not just about doctors and nurses where it would appear there is a welcome relaxation of the recruitment embargo. The rush to fill vacant apartments must not now result in another dumping ground – this will happen if adequate support services area not put in place.

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights asserts that everyone is entitled to dignity and respect – something we should not forget in these challenging times for all.

Alice Leahy
Director and Co-founder
TRUST
Bride Road
Dublin 8

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Thursday, June 24, 2010

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/archives/2010/0624/opinion/nothing-has-changed-for-mental-health-sufferers-123205.html#ixzz0rrPAkdy6

Alice Leahy Trust Letters to the Irish Times, News and Press

Why do people become ‘cases’?

Madam, – The edition of June 17th makes for depressing reading. “Homeless woman arrested after forced release from jail” (Front page) and “Three psychiatric hospitals ordered to cease admissions” (Home News), written by excellent journalists Conor Lally and Carl O’Brien; and “Officials took trips paid for by HSE staff training fund”. All three must be looked at together.

In recent times, isolating social issues in separate Government departments, often just to facilitate allocation of grant aid, has allowed these awful situations to develop. People have become statistics to be moved around and “cases” to be managed. Real debate has been stifled, prophetic voices silenced, often lost in the excessive use of meaningless jargon while real people with complex needs suffer.

We in Trust have been for 35 years involved in working with people who are homeless and during that time, despite the so- called Celtic Tiger years, we have, through many of the people who come to our door every day, witnessed the results of the running down of services. Many of the men and women we meet plead to get back into prison, and others plead to get a bed in a general or psychiatric hospital.

Mindful of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states “that everyone is entitled to dignity and respect”, something we should not forget in these challenging times for all, we need to ask, why have we reached this stage? But more importantly, how can we now move on with energy and commitment? This can only be done if we are prepared to acknowledge where we are now – a depressing place; and that it is possible to do something if the commitment is there. – Yours, etc,

ALICE LEAHY,

Director Co-Founder,

Trust, Bride Road,  Dublin 8.