The recent public outcry about care standards for the elderly and disabled, started with the BBC Panorama expose of a Bristol care home, was added to with the report on poor standards given by some care providers to people in their own homes.

For more than ten years we have worked closely with Age Concern Essex on a variety of support services for the older person. In fact we hosted its adapted mobile toe-nail service vehicle for years at our old home in Broomfield Road, Chelmsford.

For the past three years we have shared our facilities with Age Concern’s home help service operating from Rochford, and share also its ethos of “the best you can afford, not the cheapest you can get”.

Our reputation for training disabled people and carers is supported by our accreditations, and the 60 years we have been involved in care and support.

We have now gone one step further and formed a partnership with two three-star providers to produce a unique business-charity partnership, very much more than the Big Society.

This will give users a quality service, with a quality- based training charity, involved in getting the best standards of staff training.

Well trained staff equals excellent care. Ahead of the game?

Surely, it shows there is an alternative to handwringing?

As always, we just get on with it.

Richard Boyd
Chief Executive Officer
Disability Essex
Centre for Disability Studies
Rocheway
Rochford