Making Your Voice Heard.. The first decade of the Eastern Health and Social Services Council

Contents

In the beginning ... 1991-1992 Getting down to business ... 1992-1993 1993-1994: Progress through information and advocacy 1994-1995: Monitoring services through effective research 1995-1996: Building better systems for managing complaints 1996-1997: Developing a culture of public participation 1997-1998: The first casualty watch 1998-1999: Breaking new ground - the citizen's jury 1999-2000: Quality and the charter mark 2000-2001: A new Millennium - and beyond ...

Forward

As the Eastern Health and Social Services Council has been in existence for 10 years we have taken this opportunity to review our achievements in a decade of representing the interests of the public. It is not possible to cover all of the Council's work in this short report but we hope that it provides a snapshot of our activities. In addition, it is not possible to list the activities of many Council members who have, over the years, provided a valuable contribution in a voluntary capacity. A contribution that to us remains largely unrecognised.

Health and Social Services are currently a prominent item on the political agenda and many long awaited reforms and decisions are beginning to be made. However user and public involvement has received little attention in a co-ordinated way, unlike England, Scotland and Wales where there has been major consultation on this subject. The success of attempts, to date, to put service users at the centre of service delivery has been patchy and can only be overcome by building the necessary skills at individual, community and organisational level.

The Council's role, powers and resources no longer meet the requirements of modern demands for user ownership of and involvement in services across the range of service provision. We recognise the need to change and would welcome a proactive dialogue on how our role could change to meet modern demands. We would wish to see a service where a user focus is embedded in the culture of all organisations. To make this happen the views of service users, carers and the public must be given the same priority as clinical standards and financial performance.

We look forward to the challenge of making this a reality.