WINTERBOURNE VIEW HOSPITAL

Many readers will have read accounts on the report by Dr Margaret Flynn and Vic Caterella, on the events which lead to the closure ofWinterbourneViewHospital.  The report, which is more than 150 pages long, could only be published after the conclusion of the prosecutions against 11 former staff at Winterbourne.

Winterbourne was a new, purpose built facility which opened in 2006 and closed within 5 years.  Closure only happened after BBC’s Panorama programme “Undercover Care: The Abuse Exposed”  in May 2011.  The report includes many revelations which will

disturb and disgust readers. They include:

Dr Flynn said “the silencing of complaints by victims was scandalous”.

Castlebeck Limited, who owned Winterbourne received £3,500 a week from the NHS for every mentally ill patient placed in Winterbourne.   Despite this there was no registered manager for two periods, one of 7 months and the other for the 18 months prior to the closure of the hospital.

One problem sometimes associated with serious failures is lack of cash, but turnover was £3.7 million.  The report’s verdict was that “Castlebeck appears to have made decisions about profitability, including shareholder returns, over and above decisions about the effective and humane delivery of assessment, treatment and rehabilitation” and “took the financial rewards without any apparent accountability”. 

Castlebeck has now closed Winterbourne and 2 of its other residential homes.

There are a number of recommendations in the report which include:

 Extracts from the Daily Mail and Brunswick’s Healthcare Review Volume 7 Issue 30.