LGBT+ People and Spouses: Social Care

Debate between Tulip Siddiq and Helen Hayes

Tuesday 12th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the treatment of LGBT+ people and their spouses in social care settings.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Robert. I sought this debate because of the horrific experience of my constituent Ted Brown and his late partner, Noel Glynn. Ted is present in the Public Gallery this afternoon. Ted and Noel were together for almost 50 years. They met at the first Gay Pride event in 1972, which Ted helped to organise. They were civil partners; they were devoted to each other. Sadly, Noel developed dementia in older age and, in 2018, he was placed in Albany Lodge care home in Croydon after Lambeth Council was unable to find a place in a care home any closer to Ted in Brixton.

One day, Ted noticed that Noel had suffered bruising and a cigarette burn to the back of his hand, and two whistleblowers at Albany Lodge confirmed that Noel was being subjected to homophobic abuse from some of the staff. The whistleblowers recounted two staff members asking him, “Are you a gay man? Do you like gay men?” before dragging him to his room, where other residents heard a disturbance going on and Noel’s voice. In January 2019, Noel told a social worker, “I don’t like it here—they beat me up”. The social worker recommended moving Noel to another care home, but he remained at Albany Lodge for nine more months. Throughout that time, Ted was paying £1,400 a month to Albany Lodge for Noel’s care. Ted told me that staff at the care home refused to recognise his relationship with Noel, and that he was warned by two other LGBT residents in the home not to tell staff that they were a couple, because, “It won’t be good for either of you”.

Noel was a vulnerable man with dementia. He should have been safe in Albany Lodge. The abuse he suffered was horrific and inexcusable, and it was a clear breach of his human rights. That was recognised in a court judgment against Lambeth Council, which placed Noel in Albany Lodge, that awarded the couple £30,000 in compensation. Sadly, Noel died in 2021 before the compensation was paid.

Ted told me that when Noel was first placed in Albany Lodge, there was a delay in undertaking a necessary medical assessment. He contacted the care home to chase this on Noel’s behalf and received an email notifying him that an assessment would be done that day on his father. He was not invited to attend this appointment, which would usually be supported by a spouse or close family member since the aim of the assessment was to gather information about the person’s health history, including matters such as allergies and eating habits. Noel, by then, had dementia.

Ted went to the home anyway and was initially not allowed into the room with Noel, despite bringing documents demonstrating their civil partnership, his power of attorney for Noel and evidence that they had been partners for 49 years. As Ted waited outside the room, he could hear Noel calling out for him. This utterly distressing situation speaks to a total lack of dignity for LGBT+ couples in the care system that urgently needs to be addressed. Prior to being admitted to Albany Lodge, Noel initially received care at home. Ted believes that Noel was also subjected to homophobic abuse by one of the carers, who he observed treating him roughly. In an indication that these experiences are not at all uncommon, Ted also told me that prior to the carers coming in, he had been warned by a friend to remove all traces of his relationship with Noel as a couple from their home.

In a report titled “Stripped of all Pride”, Compassion in Care documented 486 reports of homophobic abuse in care settings and of LGBT+ staff who were afraid to disclose their sexuality. I strongly encourage the Minister to read the report, if he has not already done so; the testimonies are shocking and devastating. One whistleblower wrote:

“There was one gay resident in the home, staff were so cruel to them, some staff treated this poor man as if he had something catching. I saw one staff member spit on this man whilst telling him to repent as he was a filthy pervert. Another staff member slapped this man around the back of his head, really hard. I reported it, I was horrified. The staff started shouting at me are you a pervert lover? Are you gay? Nothing was done, I went to the authorities and left”.

That is hate crime, happening behind closed doors and being perpetrated against some of the most vulnerable people. There are many similarly shocking testimonies in the Compassion in Care report.

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is giving a powerful and emotional account of her constituents. I welcome Ted to the Chamber; I wish it was under happier circumstances. I want to raise something that happened in my constituency a few years ago. A gay couple were taunted with offensive and degrading questions about their sexuality on a bus in West Hampstead. They were then brutally attacked. It was in the news, so my hon. Friend might have heard about it. This year, Rainbow Europe announced that the UK has fallen to 17th place in terms of safety for LGBTQ people. Nine years ago, it was in first place. Does my hon. Friend agree that crimes that are targeted at someone’s LGBTQ identity should have tougher sentences?

[Helen Hayes]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention and for raising that shocking case, which I remember from media reports at the time. We cannot ever take progress on equality for granted, and it is vital that we take seriously that drop in protections for LGBTQ+ people and that the current increase in hate crime is met with the toughest possible sanctions that can be delivered.

Perhaps even more shocking than the testimonies in the Compassion in Care report is the fact that, of the 486 services involved in the testimonies, 481 were still rated as good by the Care Quality Commission. A 2016 CQC-commissioned report found that older people were hiding their sexual orientation and gender identity because of fears of discrimination. The abuse that Noel suffered and the abuse documented by Compassion in Care are utterly abhorrent, and there should be no place for them anywhere, still less in settings that are trusted to look after our most vulnerable loved ones—older people who are physically frail or suffering the disorientation of dementia.

For the current generation of older LGBTQ+ people, such abuse can also be a re-traumatisation. Those aged 75 and older were adults before homosexuality was decriminalised in 1967. They lived through the long years of section 28, have experienced life in a deeply homophobic society, are very likely to have spent a significant period of time concealing their sexuality, and have lived through the trauma of the HIV/AIDS epidemic—suffering the loss of much-loved partners, friends and community members while society stigmatised them. Older people who are LGBTQ+ are also disproportionately likely to have become estranged from family members and may lack people around them to advocate on their behalf in the care system.

I am particularly concerned about the poor response to Noel’s case. Once the horrific abuse he suffered was identified, it should have been the job of the care home, the local authority, the CQC and the Government to ensure that it could never happen again, but the reality was far from that. When Noel’s abuse was reported, staff were suspended, but Ted understands that they were allowed to return to work on a different floor of the same home. Following inspections in 2019 and again this year, the CQC continued to rate Albany Lodge as good. The fact that one local authority placed Noel in a care home in a different local authority has also presented problems in ensuring accountability.

No one should have to fear that they or a loved one will be abused in a place that has a responsibility to care for them. No one should have to fear that their sexuality or gender identity might result in such abuse. In 2016, the CQC recommended that commissioners, providers, and health and care staff should

“consider the needs of LGBT people in planning and delivering end of life care services”,

that health and care staff should

“communicate openly and sensitively about sexual orientation and gender identity as a routine part of their delivering good quality, personalised end of life care”

and that commissioners and providers should

“collect data on sexual orientation and gender identity as part of an equalities approach to monitoring end of life care outcomes.”

The Government also mentioned the need for improved monitoring in their 2018 LGBT action plan, but there is little evidence of progress. There are examples of good practice, both in the delivery of LGBT affirmative retirement housing, such as Tonic Housing in Lambeth, and in the Pride in Care quality standard championed by Care England, but it is unacceptable that monitoring the experiences of LGBT+ residents is not a mainstream part of CQC assessments. Albany Lodge should not have continued to be rated “good” while an LGBT resident was being abused under its roof, and it certainly should not have continued to be rated “good” after that abuse had come to light.

What progress does the Minister believe has been made following the publication of the Government’s LGBT action plan five years ago in 2018? What action is he taking to protect the rights of LGBTQ+ residents in adult social care? Will the Government ensure that gathering the experiences of LGBTQ+ residents and their spouses forms part of the CQC inspection framework for care homes? Will he take steps to ensure that no care home or care agency found to have allowed homophobic, biphobic or transphobic abuse can continue to be rated “good” by the CQC? Will he consider further support to roll out the Pride in Care quality standard to more care homes across the country?

When Ted spoke with me about Noel’s experience, he told me about the guilt he feels about being unable to protect the man he loved from abuse. I am sure all of us can understand that guilt, even though it is entirely misplaced. Ted should have been able to trust Albany Lodge to care for Noel and that trust was fundamentally broken. We cannot undo what happened to Noel, but we can work to ensure that it does not happen to anyone else. I hope that the Minister will set out the meaningful action that he will take to this end.