Learning from listening

I watched the film ‘The Colour Room’ the other day, the true story of factory girl Clarice Cliff who became a celebrated and famous ceramic artist.

Clarice was a young working-class woman in the 1920s, who left school at 13 destined for a life of menial ‘paintress’ work in the Staffordshire potteries, but instead set her sights on becoming a ‘modeller’. This was a more skilled role, that only men at the time did, and Clarice had to fight to get her ideas heard: facing sexism, sneers and obstacles.  

She eventually managed to take her Art Deco ceramic pottery line, called ‘Bizarre’, to the annual trade fair, where the industry placed orders for the year. But it tanked, with the buyers pointing out that women wouldn’t buy Clarice’s cheap, cheerful and contemporary pottery, and the lack of any sales sent the pottery company close to bankruptcy.

But Clarice realised that all the buyers were men and were making decisions about what women wanted on their behalf. Although she faced an uphill struggle, she wasn’t deterred and found a way of talking directly to women about what they wanted and did her own market research.

And after finding a way to sell direct to women she eventually sold more than 8.5 million pieces all over the world. Her ‘cheap and cheerful’ pottery are now collector pieces and coveted the world over, including by me!

Clarice’s creative skills were matched by her flair for business, but most of all, her story highlights the importance of hearing directly from the people you are trying to reach.  The male buyers in the 1920s were not going to be in the best place to know what tea services women wanted unless they talked to them, and in the male dominated world of the period, that simply didn’t happen. It is obvious that the best way to understand people is to listen to them. We learn from listening.

This is something we’ve been giving thought to as well. Our board recently had a really productive development session with Ben Woffenden, head of patient and carer experience and engagement, about patient stories and how we can weave them into a wide range of areas and activities across our organisation to support our work. As well as supporting people who tell their stories, we need to have the chance to really reflect on what we’ve heard and make the sharing meaningful.

What does the story tell us? Do we need to change anything as a result? How should it influence what we do? So, with Ben’s leadership, we are developing our approach across the organisation, including the use of patient stories at board.

We had a really powerful patient story at the board meeting this Wednesday. It was the first one since before the pandemic and a reminder of how much we’d missed the patient voice in these meetings. Those of you who attended the AGM last month will have experienced the immense impact of hearing a patient story first-hand. They move, inspire and affect us. Whether it’s empathy, sadness, hope or motivation, the patient story can help us see things.

At the board meeting, the patient spoke movingly about the panic attacks, terrible thoughts, shame and sorrow that his obsessive compulsive disorder caused, which affected every aspect of his life. At the point of giving up any hope of being able to manage the disorder, he was referred to our democratic therapeutic community (DTC) specialist service which he said ‘changed his life’.

He spoke so eloquently about being able to open up to others in the DTC group who, for the first time in his life, really understood how he felt. He now works with both our DTC and patient advice and liaison (PALS) services and feels he has ‘found his purpose, in helping others find their voices’. 

It was wonderful to hear such a thoughtful and intelligent young man talk about the respect and kindness in the DTC group, but his story also highlighted issues around referral and access. One story can flag up challenges that many may face.  

And it’s not just patient and carer stories that are important to hear. We need to hear staff stories to help build an open culture where everyone feels able to speak up. They create a more positive and productive workplace and lead to solutions we won’t find if we just ignore one another.

Our six staff networks have an important part to play in shaping our culture and behaviours through the feedback, ideas, advice and knowledge they can bring. We’ve launched a new women’s network and also multi-faith network group, helping to ensure a really diverse range of views are fed up to our board. We’ve also just appointed an exec sponsor for each network to support this work.

Jaco Nel has sadly had to step down as chair of the positive ability network group due to ill health, and I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank Jaco for the amazing job he has done in helping to establish, support and lead this thriving network.

The base of every successful organisation today depends mainly on two things. The first is transparency, and the second is listening to everyone's experiences and opinions. We only have to look at Yorkshire Cricket Club to see the consequences of not doing this, in terms of both reputation and financially.

The appalling racism scandal has engulfed cricket, and now, as the cricket world stands amidst the ruins of its reputation, it faces a watershed moment. It should have been a watershed moment 10 years ago, when Azeem Rafiq started reporting this and was labelled a troublemaker and ignored. He has now shared his story with the world, and it is time for the world to listen. And then more importantly, to act.

Let’s all keep speaking up and listening – and sharing our stories.

Best wishes

Claire

You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2

A delicate balance of hope and doubt

This is how Barack Obama perfectly summed up the climate change challenge at the COP26 summit. He called on young people to "stay angry", but to channel their anger and harness their frustration, as he urged them to keep pushing harder against the dangerous lack of urgency. He also warned that it would be a marathon, not a sprint, and that they would need to accept imperfect compromises along the way.

We all need to do our bit of course. Nicky Tamanis, our finance director and Stephen Jameson, our director of estates recently attended a Greater Manchester climate change conference about the region’s green agenda.

Our new sustainability manager, Kehinde Aina, has also started this week and will be working on a green plan for our Trust. It will be ready in January and cover how we are going to reduce our carbon emissions, contribution to air pollution and use of plastic, as well as how we will improve recycling.

But when Obama said, “There are times when I feel discouraged, there are times when the future seems somewhat bleak” in his COP26 speech, I’m sure I wasn’t alone in thinking that he could have been talking about the NHS, as the immense service pressures continue to escalate across the land.

It certainly feels as if the NHS is walking a precariously narrow and tricky path at the moment, balancing a sense of doubt about our ability to tackle the scale of the challenges, whilst wanting to be hopeful about the future.

It’s understandable that there is a lot of concern and fear across the NHS system as to whether we can turn things around and make a difference. But, there is equally hope in the dedication and hard work you all continue to do and your achievements.

Obama’s speech has been described as a ‘call to arms’, and there has also been publicity this week about the chief executive of Addenbrooke’s Hospital holding an emergency meeting as a ‘call to arms’, to deal with a hospital which he described as barely coping. He said that if there is not a change in the way that they currently work, it is in “real trouble”.

Another NHS leader has also talked about the NHS now getting, “slaps, not claps” as public expectations rise. In fact, many nationally recognised and respected chief execs are speaking out about the relentless pressure, and warning that whilst regulators and politicians seem to think the war is over and we can go back to operating in ways we did before the pandemic, it isn’t and we can’t.

Those who attended our AGM last week will have heard my emphasis on stabilisation. I know how challenging it is out there for you at the moment. We are going to have to lean into this challenge and think about what we can do differently, because it’s simply not sustainable to carry on like this.

So, as I described in the AGM, our focus in the short term will be on those things that address the most pressing and urgent issues, with a high priority on supporting people’s well-being and ensuring we have a sustainable workforce.

And, we’ve now just had an extra potential workforce worry thrown into the mix, with confirmation that covid vaccines will be mandatory for NHS staff from April 2022. We know there is unease amongst some colleagues about having the vaccine, but we’ll need to await national guidance and information before we are able to share any detailed information about what exactly this might mean for our different staff groups. We will of course keep you fully updated and informed as soon as we know more.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the AGM contained that delicate balance of hope and doubt. Whilst it is important that we recognise the reality of where the pandemic has left us and the concerns people have, there was much to feel hopeful about. Our review of the year video highlighted that, amidst the fear, stress and pain of the pandemic, there were many uplifting moments and inspiring achievements.

I was so struck by what a lot had been achieved by you in spite of the most challenging of circumstances. And Alison’s powerful patient story was a shining example of hope following horrific experiences and long-standing challenges. I know I was not alone in my complete and utter admiration for the way she had turned things around, and for her courage in telling her story to us all.

So, whilst like Obama, there are undoubtedly times when we feel discouraged and the future seems somewhat bleak, we can try hard to leave our ‘negative knickers’ in the drawer and pull on our ‘positive pants’ - and take a moment to feel pride in what has been achieved and what we are capable of. 

It's not us and them, we are them

Claire Molloy (top) and
Chantal Basson (bottom)

We are continuing our series of guest blogs with a wonderful contribution from Dr Chantal Basson, lead consultant clinical child psychologist.

In her guest blog Chantal talks openly about the challenges she has faced as a child, student and adult: from Burnley to the Middle East and soon to the Caribbean. 

She also covers her passion about the job, the CAMHS name change and the humbling and inspirational impact of working with incredible colleagues and brave families.

Dr Chantal Basson, lead consultant clinical child psychologist

I came into CAMHS as a psychologist for children and families affected by learning disabilities. I’ve been really lucky to have had a really rich career in Pennine Care and am grateful for all of the opportunities that this has brought my way. In particular, Sara Barnes and Jason Smith really helped me pave my way.

I feel particularly privileged due to having started out in very poor areas of Burnley and Stockport. Life changed dramatically when my dad secured a job in the Middle East when I was four. Suddenly, I was on the beach every day and learning to water ski! When I was six I became partially deaf through illness and learnt to adapt to a new sense of balance and hearing.

Mental health services are close to my heart as, having experienced some intergenerational trauma in my family and as a university student and young adult, I accessed mental health services to help me understand some of my experiences and internal struggles.

I am passionate about working with children in CAMHS, because I know that the earlier we help families and children with their emotional wellbeing and mental health, the better their outcomes. I feel that my own experiences have made me want to champion child mental health, but also to work on the stigma of mental health: that it’s not us and them, and that we are them.

I hear so many inspiring stories from colleagues about their own experience of services, and yet I feel that this is an area that is still not spoken about enough. We know that more staff than ever are accessing our wellbeing services, and I am so relieved to hear this. I’ve also accessed some wellbeing sessions from the resilience hub, and have found them enormously helpful in getting through the difficult time that the pandemic has brought for all of us.

Changing our name will help our families, communities and partner agencies understand who we are and what we do, as well as being aligned with our Greater Manchester partners. And while we are changing our name, we aren’t changing our enthusiasm and passion. Our services are filled with the most incredible staff that I’ve had the privilege to work with and I gain my inspiration from them every day.

I’ve been lucky to grow with Pennine Care for the last 15 years and, in that time, I’ve worked with some incredible families.

One that comes to mind is a family where a young person had experienced an asthma attack at age 14, and who had developed a severe brain injury. Working with the parent in their time of severe grief was one of the most humbling and rewarding pieces of work I’ve done in my career.

Another time, I worked with a parent who found it really hard to access services for her son with a moderate learning disability. We never managed to make it to a comfortable place and, although she attended appointments, it was really hard for us to make progress together. I still see her in Tesco from time to time. It was still an enormous privilege and each family I have worked with has a small area in my memory where I keep hold of them. The bravery and perseverance of so many individuals I’ve worked with is incredible.

During my time in CAMHS, my hobbies and family have also grown.

I’m passionate about wellbeing and try to look after myself, as well as others in our services. With a love of all things outdoors, my husband and I were avid rock climbers and snow-boarders when I came into CAMHS, but since then we’ve taken up kite surfing, paragliding (given up because it’s terrifying) and scuba diving. Our daughters (2½  and 6) now climb, and I’m looking forward to getting them scuba diving when they’re old enough.

I am soon to be off on my own new journey and adventure, living and working in the Caribbean. I’ll be working with children and families who experience a variety of mental health difficulties, but some of which is the result of intergenerational trauma and difficulties rooted in the history of slavery.

With the amount of investment in and transformation across our systems, I am really hopeful about the future of CAMHS and hope to leave a little of my ideas in the planning for this.

Thank you.

Life and plans, retirement and journeys, soul and roles

 “Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.” 

I’ve said before that this line from John Lennon is one of my favourite quotes. With our world being turned upside down by covid, it feels more poignant than ever. 

After the excitement of agreeing our five year plan in early 2020, who would have envisaged that we would then spend so many long, hard months grappling with this pandemic rather than taking forward our big ambitions.

It’s given us all perspective on what’s important in life and it’s certainly made me reflect deeply on the future and my life going forward.

Sometimes we have to take a deep breath and make decisions that are right for us personally, even if it impacts on others. There’s never an ‘ideal time’ to step away in a job like this, as there’s always more to do.

A continuous improvement mind-set means we could just keep going and going. But I do think it is the right time for me to step down now.

It has been an emotionally draining and difficult decision to retire after nearly 30 years in the NHS, but steering Pennine Care forward into the next chapter of its journey is a longer term job that will better suit someone able to throw themselves completely into that challenge for the next few years.

I will treasure my time with the NHS and this organisation, and the memories and amazing people I’ve worked with will stay in my heart forever. As they say, I’m going to try not to cry when it’s over in six months, but smile because it happened. 

In the truest sense of the John Lennon quote, my NHS journey was never planned. I did science A levels and went to University doing a science degree (microbiology and pharmacology), with the notion I would probably end up either doing research into new treatments or as a pathologist (for the older readers, I watched a lot of Quincy when I was younger!).

But I met my husband in my first year and, even though he had been told he couldn’t have children as a result of cancer treatment, we found out at the start of my second year he could! So I dropped out of university when I was pregnant with my daughter at the tender age of 19.

I then started a series of jobs to literally pay the rent and survive, eventually going back to university as a mature student to do something completely different - business studies.

When I graduated and was looking for jobs, the NHS appealed as it brought together my interest in science with my degree in business studies - even though the NHS is far from the sort of business most of my friends ended up in.

But most importantly, I was looking for an organisation that valued diversity and wouldn’t discriminate against a 30 year old graduate with two kids. The NHS is such an inclusive institution compared to some others, and I felt intuitively that it was the right place for me.

I secured a place on the NHS management training scheme and over three decades have been fortunate to work in a wide range of different organisations and places: acute, primary, community and, of course, mental health and learning disability services. When I finally got into mental health and learning disability services I felt like I had really found my ‘home’. And home is where the heart is as they say.

I’ve always tried to take jobs that are challenging, where I could make a positive contribution, and where there was personal learning, but most of all, where you have fun. We spend a lot of time in work, so it’s been hugely important for me to enjoy my job. And I have been incredible lucky that in the main, I have.

I’ve been put at risk seven times in my career (the not so enjoyable bit), but although painful at the time, I wouldn’t ever have been a CEO if this hadn’t happened. And for this I am so thankful, as it has definitely been one of the most enjoyable and rewarding roles I have done.

There has been such a lot of other change during my thirty years. We’ve had 12 different health secretaries over my NHS career (the first being Virginia Bottomley for those who remember her), and I’ve worked for eight different bosses. I’ve been so lucky they have all been inspiring and brilliant people. And my last job, here with you, has absolutely been one of the most rewarding.

Having been chief exec at two previous organisations before I came to Pennine Care, I felt I was able to bring the confidence and clarity that you personally get from learning and making mistakes. I hope I was able to make a better fist of being a CEO in this organisation as a result of this. Mistakes definitely have the power to turn us into something better than we were before. That’s how we grow.

I hope that the work I’ve led here around about our culture and values has been seen as positive and inclusive, as you are the culture and these are your values. The chief exec may set the tone and direction of travel, but can never do it alone. Lots of people contributed to this, and you will continue to live and breathe these values long after I retire.  No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it.

I’m not skipping off into the sunset yet; there’s lots to do over the next six months, for example recalibrating our five year plan as the pandemic has understandably impacted on this. We want to be aspirational, but we definitely need one foot in the reality of where the last 18 months have left us.

So I want to be able to retire knowing I’ve done as much as I can to ‘bake in’ our philosophy, style, and direction of travel, and not start to wind down or defer any decisions. It’s important that your next chief exec can pick up a strategy that we’ve committed to and we’re already on our journey.

And in terms of my successor, we’re going to look for a permanent position straight away. Evelyn our chair is leading this and if there’s a gap between me going and the new person starting, then Clare Parker my deputy – who has been with me since the start of my journey here – would stand in as a very able interim chief exec in the meantime.

It’s all about the team and, although I know we’ve had some other leadership changes recently, there are many other talented and committed members to keep steering our ship forward.

I love the quote “Be defined by your soul, not your role”. It has been a privilege to use my role as chief exec to lead this organisation, but what I hope you have seen more than anything is, regardless of whatever role we hold, that we all have the capacity for kindness, compassion and to make a difference.

Best wishes

Claire

Loss, legacy, love and looking back as well as forward

Claire Molloy (top) and
Sara Barnes (bottom)

I’m delighted that Sara Barnes has written a guest blog for this week. After three decades in the NHS, Sara has just retired and is sharing some of the changes, challenges and joys over 32 years of unstinting commitment.

Sara began her career as a mental health nurse, before moving into management and then senior leadership roles in mental health services. She has been with our Trust since its formation and has always led with gentle humility, big-hearted kindness and insightful compassion. She has inspired everyone to be caring and respectful, and for that reason, has always had the great admiration of colleagues. 

Thank you for bringing out the best in us Sara. We wish you a wonderful retirement. Enjoy all of the exciting adventures ahead of you.

Sara Barnes

Retiring from the NHS after 32 years as a nurse and a leader, and losing my mum so close together, has made me think a lot about legacy and reflect on my own journey.

My mum was a child and family social worker and she taught me, through her actions and her words, that it’s ok to make mistakes (especially if you have someone to pick you up and cheer you on), to always do the right thing even if it feels the hardest option, to make the most of what you have, and to fiercely and passionately do what you can to help those without a voice be heard. 

I’m really proud of the imprint she has left on so many children and families lives over her career, as well as of course enriching our own family’s lives with her tenacity, her love and her laughter. I hold firm to these beliefs and can see them in my two daughters as they set off on their own very different careers.

Young Sara and her mum

One of my really strong memories of my adolescence was of my mum taking on the role of animal rescuer in her social work team. I recall many after-school trips to houses where an often sick or neglected dog or cat was placed on my knee in the car for us to take home, restore to health and either keep or rehome. Of course, this would not happen nowadays, but I loved having this small window into her work world and met many inspirational families who through poverty, domestic violence, mental health or physical health needs could no longer care for their pets and had made the brave decision to give them up. 

Little wonder then that I followed mum into a caring profession. 

After wanting to be a vet from the age of two, I realised after dramatically failing my A levels that I really wasn’t very good at science and should probably rethink my choice of career; something that felt devastating at the time but I now realise led me onto a more fulfilling path.

Unsure of what I wanted to do, I was fortunate enough to find a course that combined a degree in psychology with mental health nurse training.  From the outset, what got me up in the mornings was being a nurse, but doing both really enriched my learning and was a wonderful experience. 

During my training I also worked as an agency nurse, mainly in elderly mentally infirm nursing homes, and had my first experiences of seeing incredibly compassionate care, but also very poor quality and harmful care that I vehemently challenged. Sadly I’m not sure there was the regulation and governance in place for my challenges to make a real difference, but the feeling of determination to always champion high quality and safe care remains with me to this day.

Once I qualified I knew I wanted to move back to Manchester, having lived in London during my training, and so I worked at The Priory in Altrincham for a while until I found a role in Stockport CAMHS.

I recall very clearly the first time I stepped into the Stockport CAMHS service to take up my D grade staff nurse role. I knew I had found where I belonged. It felt then (and still does today) a privilege to be able to spend time with young people and their families, to hear their stories of adversity and survival and to provide care and support to help them achieve their goals. I couldn’t believe my luck getting a job as a nurse and spending my days being with young people.

I remained in Stockport CAMHS for many years as both a clinician and a manager and I’m really proud to have been a part of the exciting transformation journey that CAMHS underwent to reach more young people, reduce waiting times, implement care pathways and engage young people and families as partners in their care.

During this time, I met many amazing young people and their families and worked with very committed and compassionate colleagues; as I changed job roles, taking me further from the frontline delivery of services, their experiences and voices stayed with me keeping me grounded and connected to the core purpose of our work.

In 2006, Stockport was the last borough to come into Pennine Care and this allowed all of the different CAMHS teams to come together in a directorate to share experiences and learning, foster creativity and, most importantly, have a strong sense of togetherness and community. It also inspired me to seek a role where I could make a difference through system leadership and, whilst it was a wrench, I left Stockport CAMHS and took on first a CAMHS Trust wide role and then a wider leadership role including additional services and boroughs.  

Over the next few years there were some pivotal points of change both for me personally and for the way mental health services were delivered.  Greater Manchester devolution allowed us an opportunity to do things at scale and feel part of something bigger and better connected across health and social care; but more importantly, it allowed Pennine Care to recognise, celebrate and share the amazing care being delivered, despite the longstanding lack of resources and ever-increasing demands.

This meant we led the way in the development of a number of care pathways across Greater Manchester and made our case to bring in resources to redress the resource gap and achieve our own ambitions for our services.

The Manchester Arena attack in 2017 tested the resilience and connectedness of the system, and I can proudly say everyone came together to do the right thing and the Manchester Resilience Hub was born. It has gone from strength to strength, offering care and support to those affected by this and other traumatic events, including most recently focusing on the impact of covid on health and care professionals.

There are so many people I am grateful to that I can’t do justice to them all in these few words. I do want to thank all the people - both staff and service users - that have inspired, challenged, humbled and touched me over the years with their resilience, courage, hope and can-do attitude in the face of adversity and challenge. 

I also want to thank all the people who believed in me, let me be myself and most importantly believed me when I said they could do anything they wanted to.

The last two years during covid have been the hardest, but also the most inspirational and proud years of my career. I have seen people dig deep and come to work day after day, not knowing what they would face and having the wellbeing of their family and friends constantly on their minds. I’ve seen people adjusting their lives significantly to bring their work into their homes and families, and I’ve had the opportunity to work with lots of different people and see that integrity, respect and compassion form the backbone of Pennine Care.

During this time, I’ve also seen my mum courageously battle Lewy Body dementia and receive compassionate high quality care from those very services that I have been so proud to lead.

I approach retirement with sadness at so many endings, but anticipation and excitement about what will come next, and knowing I have an interesting, fulfilling and varied career to look back on with pride, gratitude and laughter, and have many people and achievements etched in my memory.

I’ve included a photograph of me in what I consider my natural state out in the countryside with my dogs, and I am looking forward to spending more time with my dogs and with my family making more memories.

Black History Month: the beauty of diversity, hearing the pain, looking in the mirror

Claire Molloy (top) and
Amraze Khan (bottom)

It’s Black History Month and this year the theme is ‘Proud to be’. 

It’s so important show our support and foster an understanding of Black History. We also need to recognise that the fight for equality continues, as well as celebrate Black experiences and achievements.

I’m therefore delighted that Amraze Khan our new head of equality, diversity and inclusion has written a guest blog for this week.

Amraze Khan

I sit here listening to a song by Kerala Settle, from the magnificent musical, The Greatest Showman. I remain so attuned to what she is saying. She screams from the top of her lungs, “This is me” and I agree with every single lyric, nodding along passionately. Being proud of who you are is the key theme of this year’s Black History Month. 

We have so much beautiful diversity in our society, in our communities and across our population, yet there are still moments where people are not celebrated and championed for who they are.

Black History Month remains a pivotal event to ensure we recognise, understand and educate ourselves on the contributions of people from the Black community on British history. In an ideal world we would not have to celebrate Black History, but many things, including the murder of George Floyd, has shown us that racial injustices are still prevalent in our society and we must proactively become anti-racist to route this behaviour out. 

Obviously you’ll see that I am not from the Black community. I do not have and do not proclaim to have endured the experiences that our Black colleagues, peers, friends and service users have experienced. But I’ve heard the pain Black people have gone through.

I’ve seen the impact it has on people’s lives and I stand shoulder to shoulder with our Black communities and workforce as a proud ally to make a difference. To tell every single person affected that I will listen, that I care, that I want to know how we can make things better for you, how we can ensure you have equitable access to our services, and to ensure the colour of a person’s skin does not determine your experience of working at Pennine Care. 

As an Asian man myself, I know I hold my own privileges. And when I say that out loud, some people have asked me, why that is the case, because after all, I’m part of the BAME community.

The phrase BAME is a danger itself. It provides the view that we all have the same experiences - that because we are part of marginalised groups, the inequalities experienced are all the same and that is not true whatsoever. Each community badged in the phrase ‘BAME’ have their own challenges and battles they come across and I know my Black colleagues, friends and service users face a more difficult experience than many of us.

Data suggests that Black people are four times more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act than White people. Black women are still four times more likely than white women to die in pregnancy or childbirth in the UK, and women from Asian ethnic backgrounds face twice the risk. Black people were eight times more likely than White people to be stopped and searched by Police in 2018/19. Black students remain the lowest group in achieving a first or second class degree from a Higher Education Institute, 17% lower than their White counterparts.

The numbers are truly shocking. The stories I’ve heard are just as heartbreaking.

I’ve heard from Black peers and colleagues, the instances when people cross the road when they see them walking because they are stereotyped a particular way. Or a colleague mentioned to me fairly recently that she tells her children not to wear hoodies because of how they are perceived. Yet some of us from other communities would not batter an eye lid in wearing hoodies.

These are some things I’ve heard about and seen myself. And you might be thinking, ‘So what Amraze?’ You may have heard these figures before and have been alarmed. But what have you done personally yourself to make a difference?

I want you to hold that mirror up and really challenge yourself and see what part you are playing in this. We all hold privileges. Simply saying you are not racist, is not good enough. You must proactively be anti-racist, to challenge yourself, your colleagues, your family members and friends to break down behaviours and attitudes. Let’s all use our platforms to educate people, to champion diversity and embrace difference. 

So during this Black History Month why not learn more about the work, compassion, determination or the loving qualities of amazing Black leaders and role models?

We’re undertaking a range of activities which we hope you can take part in and also have a Race Equality Network to allow our diverse workforce come together, to discuss ideas, innovations and to engage, advise and scrutinise our work to embed improvements.

This is me.

Devastation, danger and desperation – Hamida’s story

One of Bruno Catalano’s sculptures

I saw one of Bruno Catalano’s extraordinary and powerful ‘Les Voyageurs’ sculptures last week. He’s a French artist, born in Morocco to a Sicilian family and a former sailor, and his eye-catching bronze sculptures depict realistic human travellers with large parts of their bodies missing.

 

Each has some sort of bag or suitcase with them and it is clear they are on a journey, but it’s as though in making the journey they have left a part of themselves behind that will never come back. They have arrived somewhere new but part of them has been left behind, they are there but not yet whole somehow, and that is what makes them so beautiful, so unique.

 

It made me think even more about people who have left their countries for better lives or because they haven’t had a choice and it has been necessary for their own safety. In particular, we are watching with horror and sadness at what is currently happening in Afghanistan and people trying to flee the country; a land which has faced decades of appalling conflict. Some of you will remember Marzia Babakarkhail who spoke at our annual general meeting two years ago. She was a judge in Afghanistan who was driven from her home by the Taliban and found herself alone and struggling with her mental health after settling in Oldham.

Marzia spoke movingly at the AGM about our Oldham Healthy Minds team helping to get her life back on track and has since been working as a passionate women’s rights activist in the UK. Marzia has become the voice for hundreds of terrified female judges forced into hiding in Afghanistan and fearing for their lives.

As well as patients, we have some colleagues who have also made difficult and traumatic journeys. Our staff come from an incredible 109 different countries, and each will have their own unique story.

Hamida Sakhi is one of our cleaners at Fairfield Hospital and fled Afghanistan with her family twenty years ago. Her story is truly remarkable and absolutely heart-breaking and it is a privilege and honour to have Hamida for our ‘guest blog’ this week.

Hamida Sakhi

 

I was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1969, the youngest of eleven children. My childhood was wonderful until the age of eleven when everything changed.

My father managed oil for the government and was a very wealthy man; we lived on a big private estate with chefs, cleaners and gardeners. I remember playing so happily in our garden which had a river running through.

But the Russians invaded in 1979 and little did we know that this would be the start of a continuous state of civil war until today. My beautiful country and my heart have both been torn apart by these conflicts.

Russian soldiers came to our home and shot my brother and his wife who were living on our estate with their children in a separate building. It had been snowing and I remember seeing the red blood in the snow. My brother was a doctor, saving people’s lives so it was incomprehensible why he would be killed. I still cry every time I think about losing him and my sister-in-law.

After I married, I moved to a village near Kabul with my husband and started teaching geography and history in the local school.

But there was soon more trauma and tragedy for my family. Two of my brothers, who were identical twins, were thrown in jail for criticising the government. We were still so devastated about the murder of my other brother that they had understandably been voicing their anger.

They were given jail sentences of 18 and 20 years without any proper trial and were beaten and tortured. They were set free after three years, when a new government came in and they then fled to Pakistan - but the emotional and physical scars remained. One of the twins had been finishing his last year in law at university and the other was a writer who never recovered from the torture. It haunts him.

A few years after my brothers had fled to Pakistan, the Mujahidin starting burning down schools. My husband was a businessman and had to flee across the border to Tajikistan as his life was in danger. I had three children by then, two sons aged six and four and an 18 month year old daughter. There were rockets and bombs every day which were terrifying, especially for my children.

These years were so incredibly hard and the family loss continued with the murder of my brother-in-law and his 26 year old son by the Taliban. My sister was also injured in a suicide attack in a Kabul school where she worked.

I knew that I also had to leave the country and join my husband in Tajikistan. We faced horrible prejudice in Tajikistan however, with my husband even being beaten up and robbed when he was bringing vital medicine back from the pharmacy for my sick son.

And so, we made plans to try and get to England where we knew we could finally be safe. As a multi-cultural country, known for its inclusion, we hoped we would be accepted.

We had no idea what lay ahead though; an unimaginable 11 months where we would face fear, cruelty, hunger, cold, imprisonment and even death almost every day. Twenty years on, we still have nightmares about this journey.

After paying $26,000 for the journey, we spent the first three months hiding in Moscow. There were 57 people in our group, most were Afghans like us. We then tried to cross over into Hungary from the Ukraine several times, but kept getting caught.

It was the start of winter and bitterly cold. Some of the time we had to hide in forests or walk for days, with no food or barely any water. We didn’t have mobile phones, so when the traffickers weren’t with us we had no idea if we had been abandoned and left to starve.

And even when we were housed, it was distressing. Many were freezing, dark, damp rooms with no electricity, a single bucket as a toilet for 57 people, no washing facilities and days without food. My stomach ached for nourishment, but the worst thing was seeing my three children so hungry and not being able to feed them.

We also experienced near suffocation packed together in the back of vans, and dangerous river crossings in tiny boats, knowing we would drown if they capsized as we had no life-jackets and didn’t know how to swim.

When the Czech police caught us and put us in jail for two months, we were so happy to have a shower, blankets and food!

The most devastating event happened to a young Afghan couple in our group. We will never get over this, it was so horrific. They had a very young child and a 20 day old baby, when we were being taken through a wood by the lead trafficker, the baby would not stop crying.  

The trafficker took the baby off the woman saying he would help make it sleep. He then held it tightly to his chest until it stopped breathing and handed the dead baby back. He had suffocated a three week old baby, and we could do nothing about it as he had a gun. The grief and fear was overwhelming.

We never even saw his face as he wore a balaclava the whole time he escorted us. Our hearts broke for the family and I weep every time I think about their tiny baby.

We eventually made it to Calais after several attempts to travel through Germany and were there for three months until we finally arrived in Dover. My husband sold his gold chain, watch and ring and used his last few savings to pay someone to help us get to England by hiding in a lorry, but he disappeared with our money.

And so, after 30 failed attempts, when I finally stepped foot on UK soil – traumatised, exhausted and overwhelmed - I couldn’t quite believe it. It was in 2001, I was 32 years old and on my own with my three young children as my husband was still in Calais as we couldn’t all get on the lorry.

The British police took us to a hotel in Dover and my children were wide-eyed and joyous to see piles of toast at their first breakfast. They couldn’t believe there was enough bread to fill their stomachs.

Thankfully my husband managed to join us two months later and we were housed in Radcliffe whilst our asylum applications were processed.

One year after arriving I had another son, followed by a daughter in 2009. We then moved to Bury in 2011 which has been our home for the last decade. My father had died when I was 16, but mother was thankfully able to join us although she died three years ago. I still miss her so much.

My husband now works as a taxi driver and I have been a G4S cleaner contracted to Pennine Care for the last three years. I feel very proud to support the NHS and work with so many amazing, lovely people.

But my heart is so heavy. The return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan is devastating. For the first few days we were crying non-stop as we watched the news unfold; unable to eat or sleep properly.

I have some family members still over there who are now in hiding and I am terrified for their lives. My identical twin brothers, who eventually returned to Afghanistan after Pakistan, are both in hiding. My nephew is a police officer and hiding with his family and the fiancé of my second son can’t get out of the country. She is petrified as apparently the Taliban know that my son, who she is engaged to, is an actor and has been in a US Netflix film called ‘The Outpost’ which makes her more of a target.

I love my country. The UK is my second home and I have my children and husband here with me, but a huge part of my heart will always be there. It runs through my blood and my soul. It is unbearable seeing what is happening on the news and feeling such hopelessness and despair. It’s impossible to shake off the dread and distress.

I just pray that the western world doesn’t turn its back on the people of my country.

We see you, we hear you

We can look at reports crammed with facts and figures that indicate increasing levels of pressure on staff and services, but nothing replaces seeing and feeling that pressure first hand.

To hear from frontline staff and service managers about the exhaustion, hurdles, challenges and worry they are facing is stark and sobering. It’s so raw and so real.

The strain that most of our services are currently under is abundantly clear. My service visit to Bury earlier this week, to see teams living and breathing these pressures, really hits home hard. I could have gone to any borough, I know it’s the same for all of you.

We may get a lot of information through our governance routes, but numbers can seem somewhat sanitized and, whilst they inform, they don’t have the same impact as hearing directly from people. They are like a photograph rather than a moving film.

So, I take, fairly and squarely on the chin, any criticism that directors haven’t been as visible as we should have been. We have tried, but it obviously hasn’t been good enough and for that we are sorry. 

Hopefully, with the scaling up of the Board’s service visit programme, we will be able to visit more services and hear directly how it has been for you and what we can do in support. 

Certainly, from the visits I have done over the last few months, I want to say loudly and clearly that I hear you, appreciate where you are and know how tremendously hard it is.

We went into this pandemic with historic chronic underfunding and all the difficulties that come with that. And that’s not just our opinion, as the Niche consultancy work clearly showed how bad it was and the huge pressure our workforce was under.

So, after 18 months of a shockingly brutal pandemic which has not only required us to overhaul the entire way that we work, but has added a thick layer of additional pressure on the system, you are of course utterly exhausted. We’ve got increased service demand, waiting lists and backlogs rocketing. 

This weight is pushing us from creaking to buckling in places and we urgently need to do whatever we can to support.

The national narrative for our colleagues in acute hospital services is one of ‘recovery’ with huge efforts going in to tackle bursting A&Es and long waiting lists for surgery and cancer. But, with 1.6 million people currently waiting to access some form of mental health service across the land, we need the same parity of esteem. That 1.6 million includes people waiting for psychological services; to be allocated a care co-ordinator; for CAMHS services, eating disorders and ADHD; and the list goes on...

The case for equal priority is screaming out loudly.

There is thankfully now recognition that the pandemic has had a significant impact on mental health services, with national leads fighting for funding in the Autumn spending review on a par with the acute sector. We actually got to a good position with our local commissioners before the pandemic, helped by the Niche work, but this is about the entire system – nationally, regionally and locally - weighing in with its joint support.

There’s no easy fix I know, as this isn’t just about money. A big fat cheque can’t magic up clinical staff, for example. It’s going to take innovative thinking and effort in a sustained way on these issues. 

So, we are working with service managers to develop stabilisation plans as a matter of urgency to address our most critical areas, while we also work with partners and the wider system to develop longer term plans. There will no doubt be some tough discussions along the way, but we have to have these.

I was very grateful to everyone I met within Bury, when I spent the day there, for being so honest and sharing their experiences of the last 18 months and how it is feeling right now. 

Of course, I heard some immensely worrying things about just how stretched services are at the moment, but I also heard some great stories of achievement by all the teams and came away feeling more hopeful than hopeless, more inspired than helpless.

I appreciated how tired and under pressure everyone was, and will always feel concerned about that, but the leadership and desire to change things by the teams really struck me.

Donna Edgley, one of the managers I chatted with, was keen to strike a balance between the concerns and the positive things the teams are doing. As she said, “We are up for it and motivated, not crying in a bucket”.

I keep thinking about that quote, because as I chatted to staff and patients, some of the achievements were clear. I saw the upgraded Ramsbottom Ward after the eradication of dormitories, looking fabulous and really dementia friendly. There’s outstanding work between our community mental health services and integrated neighbourhood teams, as older adults and access teams work together; and great collaboration between mental health liaison and A&E. 

I heard about some fantastic research projects in psychological therapies and was also invited to the Moving Forward group at our Hope and Horizon unit, so look forward to hearing more about the positive things they are doing.

What struck me most, was that while the challenges are huge, people do have ideas and ways of tackling them. However, there is a level of frustration that it’s not always easy to take these forward, especially in the recruitment and retention of staff. 

While we are limited in our ability to influence the national funding picture or to address national staffing gaps, if there are improvement ideas that are within our gift as an organisation to implement, then we absolutely need to do this. There is surely a lot we can do on recruitment and retention incentives, as well as making the process easier and quicker.

So, I know you are working your socks off. I felt the intensity and the relentless, gruelling pressure you are under. 

You are possibly going through your toughest time of the pandemic, right now. 

We see you, we hear you, and we will do everything we can to support you.

Best wishes,

Claire

You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2

Mountains, medals and mettle

I spent last weekend in the lovely Lake District with my climbing club friends. 

About 70 of us from the Pinnacle Club - the UK’s only rock climbing club for women - gathered in Langdale to celebrate its centenary. There was a fascinating exhibition in Sticklebarn which brought to life the experience and expeditions of the original members after the First World War, many of whom made first female ascents around the world.

Climbing can still have a bit of a macho feel these days, so can you imagine the hurdles, discouragement and prejudice that these fearless women must have faced in 1921. Women were very much a minority in the outdoors one hundred years ago, let alone climbing!

Those early female climbers were true pioneers, all pushing the boundaries with remarkable grit and guts.  The determination and resilience they must have had is inspiring. I was struck by one of the climbers quotes in the compilation film which said, “It did teach me that when you think you’ve reached the end of your endurance, you haven’t.” Given the experience of the last 18 months, we can all take something from that. We may not have had to endure exactly the same challenges as these women did, but in our own ways, we have all had to dig deep into our reserves of energy and resolve just to get through the pandemic.

We still need to show that climbing is not an elitist club for hot shot climbers, and we absolutely need to encourage more diversity as it’s still a very white activity in this country, but we’ve come a long way. A steady climb up but we’re not near the top yet. The diversity gap is not going to magically disappear, but there are lots of initiatives to encourage more ethnic groups to participate. For example, there’s a climbing group in Greater Manchester supporting BAME women called Wanderlust Women. 

And climbing is in the Olympics for first time ever, which is fantastic. 40 climbers from all around the globe will be battling it out across three climbing disciplines of speed, lead and bouldering on the world's most watched wall of the year.

Of course only a few can ever achieve the dizzy heights of Olympians, but if we want to see stories of inspiration, joy, heartbreak, determination, strength of character, disappointment and pride, there is no better source than the Olympics. It’s called the ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ for a reason and again, like the Pinnacle Club pioneers, we can be uplifted by it for our own stuff.

Just take Tom Daley for example. His victory has inspired the strongest emotions across the nation since the Olympics started. All the hope, disappointment and despair Tom had endured these past 13 years was cleansed with his wonderful Tokyo gold. His tears on the podium reflected his long march to Olympic glory - and my, how joyous we all were for him.

Life never unfolds smoothly for any of us, and the way in which Tom Daley sealed his victory with his diving partner Matty Lee, with a series of stunning and seemingly nerveless dives, spoke of his resilience and tenacity. His achievement owes much to a remarkable resolve that's also helped overcome struggles away from the pool. 

Yes, I know the pandemic has wreaked havoc on Olympians wellbeing as well as training schedules, and many medal hopes have been dashed because of the strain, but they are still an inspirational story of endurance and hope. The triumphs are proving bigger than the empty stadiums. And after so long in darkness, it’s magical to watch.

They have a set of impressive values - honesty, teamwork, respect, self-belief, passion and fortitude. And show us that, if at first you don’t succeed, you can try again and that passion can take you far if you want something enough.

We can take our own hope and inspiration for our own achievements. And, like Tom Daley, we can dig deep about things we feel strongly about with that determination burning brightly. Our achievements might not be as exceptional as an Olympic gold medal, but they are still mighty.

Best wishes

Claire

You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2

Click here for more information about the Pinnacle Club.