St John Ambulance

Brooks Newmark Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sir Roger Gale]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is sitting on my right, but as those remarks have not yet been made, it might be polite, if nothing else, if he were to wait until I have said what I am going to say. I can say to him that I am sure that the St John briefing notes, which I have seen, will have been well and truly read into the record by the time that we are through.

I will not detain hon. Members for too long, but I need to illustrate with broad brush strokes what has gone wrong and then, as the subject of the debate is the regulation of St John Ambulance by the Charity Commission, set out why the commission has been unwilling, or unable, to intervene in a manner that might have been expected in the interests of those supportive members of the public who have so generously given many millions of pounds over the years to the St John Ambulance service. It is not my style to say under privilege anything that I would not be prepared to say outside Parliament on the record or in public. Nor do I propose—this might come as a relief to some—to name names or to besmirch individual reputations. There is, however, a collective responsibility at the very top of St John that has to be held to account. My understanding is that, in recent years, the St John accumulated reserves have suffered from a near catastrophic 30% loss. I am sure that that figure will be disputed and that “reasons beyond our control” will be offered for the failure to protect the charity’s funds properly.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I do not want to pre-empt anything that he might say, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) did, but will he recognise at least that these have been tough economic times for many charities? St John is no different from any other charity that has had to restructure itself to ensure that it can protect front-line services. The evidence that I have seen in my constituency, in Braintree and Halstead, and throughout Essex is that that is exactly what St John has been doing.

[Sir Roger Gale]

I get the sneaking feeling that my hon. Friends on either side of me are reading the next paragraphs of my speech.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Roger Gale]

I apologise that I did not see the hon. Lady come into the Chamber. I had said that I would give way to her the moment she walked in because, for reasons that everyone in the House will understand, she has to leave for a long-standing commitment elsewhere. She is, however, one of the three Members who pitched for the debate—my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury and I were the others—and I thank her for her support.

I happen to be a supporter of a significant international charity with which I am fairly heavily involved, so I am aware that fundraising in times of austerity is not easy, that returns on investments may be low and that great care and caution have to be taken to protect assets, staff, and the aims and objectives of the charitable organisation. The reaction of St John Ambulance to the situation it faced—due, I believe, to mismanagement—appears to have been draconian and, to say the least, badly handled. It has cost the charity many members and loyal staff, as well as much support in the country.

Faced with severe losses, St John embarked on a national reorganisation in 2011. It said that that was undertaken following full consultation, but as one who was only remotely and peripherally involved, I am in a position to say that no one within the mantled ranks of the priory appears to have been listening and that such consultation as did take place was tardy, inadequate, unheeded and designed to promote and implement decisions that had already been taken. I believe—in fact, I know—that I am not alone in that experience.

On the lines of an experiment conducted by the UK branch of the Red Cross, the St John counties were abolished, with eight regional organisations put in their place. As my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (Mr Newmark) indicated, any organisation faced with difficulties has the absolute right to restructure. St John, however, might have heeded the results of the Red Cross adventure, which showed that the loss of local ownership led to a loss of membership, support and local income. That process ended with a reversal of the decision.

[Mr Newmark]

I understand what my hon. Friend is saying and I will not contradict—

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On resuming—

[Mr Newmark]

Mr Turner, I was in full flow before the Division, and I have almost lost my train of thought. I do not contradict the point my hon. Friend is making about Kent, but does he accept that there may be regional disparities? When I heard about this debate, I spoke to my local contact in Essex, our mutual friend, Janie Siggers, and tried to obtain an understanding of what is going on in Essex. The issues that my hon. Friend is raising are not reflected in Essex. Does he accept that there may be some regional disparities?

[Sir Roger Gale]

I accept that. I know the lady to whom my hon. Friend refers and she is extremely hard-working. I concede that there may well be regional variations, and I will come to that precise issue almost immediately, but I cannot help feeling that the fundamental malaise comes from the very top, and that while some organisers have chosen to interpret instructions in a particular way and successfully, others have been perhaps less successful or felt that they were put under pressure. I am not suggesting that the people doing the job are bad people, except perhaps at the very top, and even then I do not mean that they are bad people in that sense.

We now move into uncharted territory, and I will offer the House some observations that have been made to me, not only from Kent but from East Sussex, the midlands and Yorkshire, as examples of precisely this effect of top-down diktats. When events such as this debate reach the public airwaves, testimony also emerges. During the past week, I have taken phone calls and received written communications from people whose details I have but whom I propose to anonymise for the record.

From East Sussex, a volunteer with 35 years’ service under their belt speaks of a branch that in 2008 had a membership of nearly 86, but which has now declined to just three or four. They also tell me of some 13 units whose headquarters buildings are to be sold, and that is in just one district. Another volunteer tells me of training that has gone downhill, with sessions booked from a centralised HQ in Aylesbury that is out of touch with the rest of the new region. In the former area, there were 146 trained emergency ambulance crews; in the corresponding new administrative area, there are only 86. I was told of headquarters premises sold by St John for £80,000 to a developer, who cleared the site and sold it on for £220,000. St John’s justification for that seems to have been, “We’re not property developers.”

It has been suggested to me—of course, the accurate figures must be available within St John—that the result of reorganisation has been a loss in Kent alone of perhaps as much as 75% of the membership. That is all anecdotal, of course, but it is a matter of record that on Thursday 24 January 2013, a special resolution was tabled calling for a vote of no confidence in the priory and the priory council of St John. That resolution was defeated, but in circumstances that the record suggests were, at the very least, bizarre.

Instead of citing telephone calls, I will quote directly. From Kent:

“We learned of the reorganisation in 2011 and that the new structure would be in place by October 2012.

Kent became part of the South East Region on 1st October 2012 being administered from the Regional Office in Aylesbury.

Our County HQ at West Malling was closed and almost all of the loyal staff made redundant.

All funds that were held in County accounts were amalgamated into the Regional Pot.

The feeling among the membership is that the new Regional Directors are trying to run St John as a commercial company and that making a profit is their main aim.

A small number of local events that we covered for a small donation are now not able to run because St John wants to charge them a commercial price and they cannot afford it.

Each Division would raise funds to buy a new Ambulance; they took pride in their vehicle, kept it clean and well stocked and were proud to display their Divisional name on the side of the Ambulance. Those Ambulances have had the names removed and no longer belong to the Division but are moved around the Region with no-one taking ownership for their cleanliness and equipment.

Kent was one of the best-run Counties in the Country with a very strong membership providing thousands of hours of voluntary service to the public of Kent. Sadly, the membership is declining fast and it appears that what has taken over 1000 years to establish the new management have destroyed in just over a year.

I would be interested to know where the funds that we held in Kent have disappeared to.”

From the east Midlands, a long-standing and very faithful divisional superintendent gave the following reasons for his recent and unexpected resignation from St John. I am quoting from a minute:

“That the commercial side of St John was taking over and using the voluntary arm, for financial gain, neither of which is within the spirit of St. John.

To achieve this end there is no regard or concern for the volunteers. We have not been consulted about anything, decisions are made over our heads even when affecting our Units personally, even including the decision to close down a particular unit.

The Leaders of East Midlands Region say whatever is suitable for the occasion, even if it’s not the truth and even if they’d said the total opposite before.”

That is followed by something that is even more disparaging and I will not read it out. It continues:

“The need for change in St. John is understood but the harsh, inconsiderate manner, with few explanations and little consideration of the volunteers, is not an appropriate way to introduce these changes. A more humane, considerate approach could have produced a better outcome.”

Another volunteer from Kent said that

“having been a member for almost 38yrs I am totally confused with this ‘restructuring’. All I see is an excuse to take all Divisional funds away from the Divisions into one large pot… Divisions virtually have to beg for funds and they are a long time coming if they come at all.

We now have a District Manager in Kent telling us he wants us to work with local authorities and KCC and his vision is to cut out event cover completely! Our whole ethos…for the past 1000 years has been to give help to the sick and since we were reformed in 1877 in England we have always covered public events assisting the injured. Our Division has some events we have been covering over fifty years.

I am very sad that everything St. John stands for is being undermined.”

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[Mike Wood (Batley and Spen) (Lab)]

I rise to counter the damning speech we have just heard from the hon. Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale). This is prompted not by any national part of St John, but by members of my local group, for whom I have always had enormous respect and whose service in my constituency has always been of the highest order. It is on that basis that I want to put their views on the suggestions made in the lead-up to this debate about the present management and direction of St John. None of the people I have spoken to within St John is in any way resistant to the idea that the Charity Commission has some responsibility for overseeing the charity, and they would welcome any investigation that might be thought necessary. This is not about thwarting the intention that I assume is behind the debate; I want to provide a wider, more rounded picture of the present state of affairs.

As we know, St John believes that too many people die—in my area as much as anywhere else—who do not need to, and who would not if first aid was available at their time of crisis. My group believes that, since the reorganisation, it is even more committed to St John’s mission, which is available on its website and seems close to the heart of every member of my local St John I have ever dealt with.

The mission is

“to provide an effective and efficient charitable first aid service to local communities”—

my group does that—and

“to provide training and products to satisfy first aid and related health and safety needs for all of society”,

which my group certainly does. The final aim is

“to encourage personal development for people of all ages, through training and by membership of our organisation”,

and my local group’s membership is growing.

I ask the hon. Members for North Thanet and for Canterbury (Mr Brazier) to understand that while they speak for communities in Kent, St John extends throughout the country. It was an important admission that local disparities in service might very well be part of the problem, and that could be an issue when forming a picture of the organisation and its recent management that is perhaps not as complete as it might be. We know that the organisation was, in essence, £9 million in deficit by 2011 and that that deficit was growing. Any organisation has to face the reality that if it is that much in the red and things are not getting better, change is needed. I understand that there might be some objections to how that deficit arose, but it is instructive that, by the end of 2014, this organisation that was recently £9 million in the red will be registering a small surplus. St John has quickly got on top of a financial situation that was unacceptable.

[Mr Newmark]

On that point, the hon. Gentleman might be interested to know that although my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale) made points about the cuts and their impact, the delivery of services has improved, especially for young people—perhaps in the same way that the Government have made cuts yet improved productivity and delivery—and the training of young people has increased by 37% in the past year alone.

[Mike Wood]

I am grateful for that intervention because it makes my next point for me. In spite of what has happened, and against that background, my understanding is that the organisation nationally—this is certainly my experience locally—has improved its performance. It is training more people and functioning in a much more open fashion, and it has listened and taken note of the report it sought on its governance. As I understand it, the report was independent and said that the organisation was too bureaucratic and complex, that it lacked clear governance policies and lines of accountability and that, essentially, there were too many committees and too many roles. Perhaps that is inevitable in an organisation split over 41 semi-autonomous bodies but, none the less, St John sought to improve that state of affairs after hearing the view of the expert body asked to review it. Again, my group, which is based just over the border into Wakefield, at Ossett, has welcomed the improved situation in which it now functions.

It is also important to look at information from bodies such as the Care Quality Commission. It has continued to provide inspection reports that have shown, certainly in my area, that St John is providing a service of a very high standard. Obviously, if the two hon. Gentlemen from Kent—the hon. Members for North Thanet and for Canterbury—have misgivings about the organisation and management of a St John home in their area, it is their responsibility to make those concerns public. Nobody has any misgivings about that, or any opinion other than that that is exactly the right thing to do. I would have done the same about something in my constituency, but to extrapolate from that a wholesale belief that the organisation is far away from its objectives and delivery targets, as was suggested at the start of the debate, seems to be neither sensible nor safe.

May I make a rather partisan, north-south point? The two hon. Gentlemen from Kent who proposed the debate—they are supported by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), who came and went, who I understand was born in Kent—perhaps might just, in their more charitable moments, accept that the world extends beyond Kent. I think that they have to be told that there is life north of Watford.

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[Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

I am chairman of the all-party group on first aid, whose administrative support comes from St John Ambulance. So far 25 MPs and peers, from all parties, have obtained the certificate in essential first aid here in the House.

I am delighted to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Sir Tony Baldry) and the hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Mike Wood), in putting on the record both personal opinions and facts. I shall not venture into the Kent debate set out by my fellow knight, my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale), because I believe that it needs to be dealt with as a constituency matter. St John Ambulance representatives will read Hansard tomorrow and see what he had to say. I hope that in some respects they will take on board his concerns about what he senses is a lack of localism in Kent, and the other points he made.

My first involvement with St John was more than 50 years ago, when I was a young scout and trained in first aid. I recognise and echo all that my right hon. Friend the Member for Banbury said about that. Notwithstanding the criticisms that have been made—one might have thought the organisation was dying on its feet—there is a remarkable expansion going on, with 30% more young people trained last year than the year before. That is a record of success and achievement. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet said, there are concerns, and I hope that St John Ambulance at national level will consider how it can address them and encourage the localism that I see at the Colchester branch. I occasionally visit the branch—not just the adult training but the Badgers, which is the youngest group, aged five to 10, and the cadets who are aged 10 to 16. The organisation is remarkable and it has evolved.

[Mr Newmark]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will indulge me with one last intervention. As a fellow Essex MP, he will know the tremendous work that the new St John branch in Halstead does. I went on my very first training course in first aid, which was excellent, and I was surprised at the number of young people on the course with me. Will he join me in paying tribute to that work and does he agree that St John Ambulance does an excellent job training young people in basic first aid?

[Sir Bob Russell]

If the Halstead experience is like the Colchester one—and both towns are on the river Colne—the hon. Gentleman is fortunate to have an excellent St John Ambulance centre in his constituency.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Banbury gave some dramatic statistics, and I will add some more. Community first responders attended 31% more call-outs in 2012 than in 2011, supporting the NHS ambulance service. In addition to youngsters, unemployed young people are going through the training system. An initiative launched in the past year by St John called “In their community” enables youngsters between the ages of 14 and 17, including cadets, to use their skills to deliver first aid training to others—that is self-help among young people. In another programme, “Your first aid”, cadets are given a chance to volunteer at events.

We must accept that St John Ambulance, like many other organisations, needs to remain fresh and vibrant. The Scouts and Guides have already gone down that path, and so have political parties. St John Ambulance will evolve to keep in step in society and to meet changing challenges. St John, facing significant financial losses that could have brought the organisation crashing down, tried with the help of operational front-line volunteers and others to find a way not only to save the organisation but to give it a future. I suggest that that is what the restructuring has done, but I think—referring back to the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet—it needs to find a way to retain the ethos of localism. After all, that is what all political parties want—localism is part of their agenda. One way of saving money is to acknowledge the fact that the semi-independent divisions were costing money. We all recognise that not everyone welcomes change, but new arrangements mean more team working and sharing resources.

This is a welcome debate. The circumstances are unfortunate, but we have on the record the good things about St John Ambulance, and I hope that St John will listen carefully to the criticisms and build on its strengths.