Your opportunity to tell the Labour Party what you think about charging for care

[Sarah Thomas]

What do you think about the present system of charging people with dementia for personal care??

The Alzheimer's Society thinks that charging people with dementia for personal care is unjust and discriminates- we want to bring about change.

We have an opportunity to try and do this by influencing the Labour Party’s next general election manifesto[/U][/B]

But we need your help- we need you to register your support for our campaign on their website and add your views.

The Alzhemier's Society’s campaign to end charging for care can be found at: http://www.labourspace.com/campaign.php?whichcampaign=38

Registering your vote only takes a few minutes. The voting ends on the 15 November 2006 and we hope that our site registers the most support, so that the Labour Party is aware of the strength of feeling behing this campaign and we win the opportunity to present our campaign face to face.

Please make as many people as possible aware of this campaign and encourage them to pledge their support.

Many thanks

For further information or enquiries please contact me, Sarah Thomas, on 0207 306 1185

 

[Brucie]

Thanks Sarah!
been there, done it!

 

[jenniferpa]

Me too!

Jennifer

 

[KenC]

Labour party and charging for care

Hi all,

I've been there too and got no where.
I think our old dog used to take more notice than they did. We went to the day of protest in London and our MP was informed, we even got a letter from his agent to say he was willing to se us. But when we got there he did not have a clue what we wanted, nor did he know what NICE was doing. We had to give him the information that we had printed off the internet. He was then supposed to contact us within a few days. We are still waiting.

Regards
kenc

 

[Sarah Thomas]

vote for our campaign

Dear All

Many thanks to all of you who have pledged your support to the Alzheimer's Society's campaign on Labourspace.com.

We currently have 218 votes- which is great but not good enough unfortunately. We must get more pledges.

So I would greatly appreciate it if those who have not already done so register their vote (and add a comment if you can) and tell your friends and family. It will only take a minute.

Go to http://www.labourspace.com/campaign.php?whichcampaign=38.

Many thanks

Sarah

 

[ElaineMaul]

Just voted .... but very frustrated at the heavy editing I had to do to my comment to get it to fit in their tiny box!!!
Still, Good Luck with the campaign. Let's hope something good comes of it.
Elaine

 

[Norman]

Sarah
done it!!!!
Might get expelled!!!
Norman

 

[TinaT]

Fair play

Can't vote as it asks me for a security code when I tried to register my vote and comments. Please help so that I can get my vote counted as well.

 

[TinaT]

sECURITY CODE

jUST REALISED THAT ALL i HAD TO DO WAS TYPE THE WORDS AT THE SIDE WHICH WERE JIGGLED UP SORRY!!

 

[May]

Done it too, not enough room for my comments though
Just a thought Sarah, post a link on the other boards to this thread, I don't always visit this one, maybe others don't either.

 

[Sarah Thomas]

vote for campaign!!

Thanks May for pointing this out- i will do that today

 

[Clive]

Need more votes

Yes I have voted and commented as have my family and some friends. But why is the number so low. Only 285 people have voted.

Possible one reason I found was that some friends just voted, and never got to the page where you need to put in the security code, so presumable their votes did not count.

But why is there no mention of this Labour Space campaigned on the Alzheimer Society web site Home Page? (or if there is I could not see it).

If only 285 people have voted it would suggest that a lot of the Alzheimer’s Society staff and the volunteers who go into the branches and help each week have not voted. It is one thing trying to get the general public to vote, but why are the people close to the society not voting?

 

[Clive]

Where are the votes

I am surprised that I did not get any reaction to my last posting. Only another 13 or so people have gone to the Labour space site and bothered to vote for the cause. Either those of us who believe that Care for Alzheimer’s sufferers should not be charged for are not interested in trying to change the Government’s thinking or something is wrong in our communications. Are people who have paid employment with the Alzheimer’s Society banned from voting? Do all the kind volunteers not have access to the Web?

Whilst I know from my own experience that people have voted but failed to put in the security code, this cannot be the reason why so few people have registered their vote.

Does anyone have an idea what is going on?

It is so easy to use the link if you know about it.

As a reminder it is:

http://www.labourspace.com/campaign.php?whichcampaign=38

Can anyone help to get the figure up to two thousand, which is only a very small proportion of staff and members.

 

[Brucie]

I am surprised that I did not get any reaction to my last posting.

You might wish to take a longer peek at the content of some of the posts here on TP. Members are carers for the most part, and involved in the full time job of caring and when you are beating back the flames, you can't take time to tell the town hall that more firemen are needed, even though it may be blatantly true. Many members can only find a short time to get on TP at all.

Yes, changing the way political parties and society view dementia is critical for all of us, but some folks have both hands plugging the dyke with none left for campaigning.

... it might also have something to do with the fact that political parties rarely listen. If they appear to, then it is to promise things that they know they won't even try to deliver. Hence low pattern of voting at elections.

Having said all that, yes, I did vote when the thread was first posted.

Like the Lottery or Premium Bonds, the likelihood of winning big time is infinitesimal, but you have no chance at all if you don't participate.

 

[Grannie G]

I have registered my vote and as a member of the Labour Party, am embarrassed at having had to do it. It is an issue I would have expected the Labour Party to have already resolved.

 

[Amy]

Hiya Clive,
I have just voted - though nearly gave in. I do not think that it is very 'user friendly '.
When you get to the bit where you vote, it simply says "Do uou agree?" - I think it meant do I agree with the campaign or not?

The box where you can type bits in, I presume that is for the type of comments that I read from individuals on Page 1 - again it is not clear.

Then as you have pointed out, it requires you to type in a code - I only understood what to do because have seen this before - the site does not make it clear.

I went on with the purpose of registering my vote - but nearly didn't bother.
We are not all computer literate; we are not all used to registering votes; we may be frightened of being asked to give our names and postal codes out. I don't think that the site is as consumer friendly as you think.

Helen

 

[alfjess]

Hi Clive
I agree with Helen. It is not very user friendly. I emailed friends and family asking them to forward the link to everyone whom they thought would be interested enough to vote, which I am sure would have been quite a lot.
I then discovered I had not voted myself, because I didn't verify the security code to submit my vote.
Can anything be done to make things easier. It would be such a tragedy if the campaign failed because it is difficult to vote
Alfjess

 

[Clive]

Hi Alfjess and Bruce.

Yes I agree the LabourSpace site is too difficult to navigate, and I am trying to find the right address to pass on my concerns. I had about 14 family friends who said they had voted, but a good few expressed amazement when I asked them what letters they had put in the security box, so obviously their votes had not been registered.

I also agree with Brucie that us carers have our noses to the grindstone and we unfortunately miss out on the politics of lobbying for what our loved ones need. This is why the Alzheimer Society is so important.

However it was not the lack of votes from family carers that troubled me. I just find it difficult to understand why there can be only 312 votes registered when there are more than these numbers of people actually employed full time by the Alzheimer’s Society.

I have read the annual accounts and, armed with a little knowledge which is possible dangerous, I concluded that the Alzheimer’s Society has 265 branches, employs 416 full time staff and a much larger number of part time staff.

Am I the only one who thinks it is strange that the number of votes recorded is lower than the number of people actually employed by the Alzheimer’s Society? If the people who are employed by the Society have not voted then there is not much chance of getting the general public to vote.

Thanks for reading my post. Just feel a little frustrated!!

Regards

Clive

 

[Sarah Thomas]

Campaign of the week!!

The Alzheimer's Society's campaign to end to NHS discrimination against people with dementia is campaign of the week on Labourspace.com

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THE WEBSITE:
http://www.labourspace.com/

Big thanks to everyone who supported this campaign.

 

[noelphobic]

just been there and voted but agree that there is an appallingly low turn out. I also notice 3 people voted against the proposal!