The BBC Panorama broadcast ‘Undercover School: Cruelty in the classroom’, which aired on 17th June 2024, covering the physical and psychological abuse at the Life Wirral School, was highly emotive and made for difficult viewing. If you have not seen it, there is a link at the foot of this post. The International Coalition Against Restraint and Seclusion (ICARS) posted … Read more
I recently had a phone call with someone from a withheld number who didn’t want to tell me their name.
The conversation went as follows:
“Hi Mark
I have just been on a training course where the the trainer was heavily ‘pushing’ and promoting the RRN (Restraint Reduction Network) standards and said that: “all schools in the UK need to comply with the RRN standards” and that “any training done in schools can only be done by a BILD Certified trainer who is registered with BILD and the RRN”.
There has been a lot of emphasis by various parties, including some training providers, to ‘push’ organisations to comply with the RRN (Restraint Reduction Network) Standards, when clearly they do not need to do so.
In some cases this is for nothing more than to generate business for themselves at an expense (in some cases at very high financial cost) that the organisation doesn’t have to comply with the RRN standards.
In other cases it may simply be because the person ‘pushing’ organisations to adopt the RRN standards is either misinformed or has not done their own due diligence as to what organisation need to and do not need to, comply with the standards.
The Negligible Use of Force There is a post on Linkedin that starts with the sentence “Did you know that the 2018 Mental Health Units Act (AKA Seni’s Law) permits ‘negligible’ force?” However, that sentence is not exactly true as the following comment shows from Eric Baskind who is a senior lecturer of law and an esteemed expert witness: “”Did … Read more
Many of you will be aware of the recent letter sent out by the RRN, CQC, HEE and Skills for Care, dated the 18th November 2020 and entitled ‘RE Certification of Training in Restrictive Practices’.
This is a video interview I did with my good friend and professional colleague Tony Bleetman on the 18th November 2020.
In this video Tony takes a look back at how far the UK has come in the last twenty or so years in relation to restraint and how far ahead the UK is compared to many other countries.
We talk about the history of restraint, where it came from and how each different sector decided upon its own restraint training based on their own specific objectives and requirements.
The transcript that follows this brief introduction is from a talk given by Nicola Lochery that we recorded on our last refresher about the RRN (Restraint Reduction Network) standards. Nicola has done a lot of work mapping her training over to the RRN standards. She has also been looking at how some NHS trusts are only going to get a … Read more
As many of you will know NHS England have made it a condition of contract that anyone providing training to a NHS Trust with a Mental Health Unit in England must have the new PI certification by April 2020.
The above is the headline of an exclusive article in HSJ Magazine that was published on the 18th December 2019 by Matt Discombe.
In that article Mr Discombe highlights that the HSE have carried out inspections at 20 health and care providers after three health workers in the last five years have died after being assaulted by patients.