Over on Facebook, my friend John Popham draws attention to an innovative Dutch scheme that allows students to live in nursing homes rent-free (as long as they keep the residents company). "The university students pay no rent and in exchange spend at least 30 hours a month with some of the 160 elderly who live here, doing the things professional staff cannot always do".
Here in the UK, an Order was (fortunately) made by the High Court on Friday, 13 March 2015, halting the far-reaching and controversial changes being made by Camphill Village Trust (CVT) to the living arrangements of three of the learning disabled residents of Botton Village – a community administered by CVT – in Danby Dale.
Botton Village was established in 1955. Disabled villagers live alongside unpaid volunteer carers in a shared community. Around 280 people live at Botton, 130 of whom are disabled and who are encouraged to play a full part in village life, giving them value and self-respect.
In May 2014, all of the volunteer carers at Botton, some of whom have lived there for over 20 years, were told they would have to accept paid employment or be forced to leave the community. They were also told they would have to move into separate accommodation, away from the people they had cared for and shared their lives with.
CVT say that they are compelled by HMRC to make these changes from volunteer to employee status. The assertion is dubious to say the least. The move by CVT Trustees is a fundamental breach of the founding vision, values and character of Botton and other villages managed by CVT.
More widely, the whole notion of volunteering is at stake, primarily it seems because the rules under which Care Quality Commission inspects care-providers only allows for a commercial, individualistic model of service-provider (i.e. employers and employees) which makes no sense in a setting which is community and volunteer-based.
The notion of a conductive 'intentional community' for adults with cerebral palsy, run on the lines of Botton Village, has long fascinated me. More so, I have returned many times to the idea (without success, I might add) of how Botton-style principles allied to conductive practice might be applied in ordinary community settings as distinct from the 'village' setting like Botton. In my own mind, if no-one else's other than a couple of colleagues, the adult section at Paces ("Leaping the Void") in partnership with Abbeycare was a first faltering attempt to actually explore possibilities when my daughter Sarah moved into her own (shared with 2 others) home two years and more ago. That now seems improbable. (Paces Campus offering some of the advantages of Botton Village; whilst living independently in the community).
Apart from the commitment to conductive living, the absolute key would be volunteering and volunteers, the co-worker of Botton Village, not the employee of the CQC, HMRC (maybe) and the CVT Trustees.
One hopes the Minister will act to protect intentional communities and the vital role of voluntary co-workers; the High Court throw out the threatened changes.
The Dutch project, perhaps, shows one way in which such a community-based scheme might actually be implemented.
As to Botton Village:
>>> take a look at the website "Action for Botton", the news, the FAQs, the life at Botton.
>>> 'Like' the Facebook page
>>> sign the petition to the Minister
‘The well-being of a community of people working together will be the greater, the less the individual claims for himself the proceeds of his work, i.e. the more of these proceeds he makes over to his fellow-workers, the more his own needs are satisfied, not out of his own work but out of the work done by others’. Karl Konig, founder of Botton Village, the first Camphill Community.
If you have a wider interest, you might like to check out the website of the Housing and Support Alliance.