Portsmouth LINk – The Future
The Portsmouth LINk has entered a new era. Change is already upon us with with our support services now being provided indirectly by the Council and we have moved our base to Community First Portsmouth. Moreover, our next year brings the challenge of participating in the design of Local HealthWatch in accordance with the Health & Social Care Bill.
Unlike the change from Public & Patient Involvement Forums (PPIFs) to Local Involvement Networks (LINks) when the government shut down the former and took a year to develop LINks, the Portsmouth LINk will continue to function while Local HealthWatch (or whatever its name becomes) is developed. This ensures that important work can continue and indicates that the LINk is seen as a key building block in the foundations of Local HealthWatch.
During the three years of its existence, the Portsmouth LINk has taken shape and developed according to local needs, and has progressed even further and faster during this year. We are becoming known around the city and beyond, and people and organisations are now contacting us with issues big and small. We have established links with hard-to-reach groups and broadened our connections and membership well beyond anything that Forums achieved. We have also achieved healthy working relationships with service provider organisations and are beginning to reach out to care home providers, ‘detox’ centres and others.
People are now seeing results achieved by LINk scrutiny, initiatives and support at a number of health and social care centres – hospitals, GP surgeries, substance misuse services, care homes, to name just a few.
Members of Portsmouth LINk believe that this is a substantial contribution to bring to Local HealthWatch and we ask for your continued support in developing the next system of public scrutiny of health and social care services. This gives you a voice. We also believe it’s vital to fight for the involvement of individual members of the public in controlling and guiding what HealthWatch does in our communities. At the moment, we believe from what we have seen and heard that Portsmouth City Council is sincere in its commitment to the LINk and to ensuring that HealthWatch builds on what the LINk has achieved, as well as extending the reach of the new organisation into even wider numbers of individuals and groups in our communities.
The new financial year has started and, as for all local organisations, there is less money available – we have lost about a quarter of what we had – and our budget will have to cover the development of HealthWatch. Nevertheless, not having to pay that whole amount to a single support organisation should work in our favour and using the support of existing local groups and networks may even be to our advantage when it comes to reaching out to the community. Our office has relocated to Community First Portsmouth in Commercial Road. As you can see, our website continues to give us an on-line presence. However, there may be “some interruption to normal service” until we become re-established … which will actually mean business as usual to many of your core group LINk workers! We are working to get a blog going to bring you more immediate information about Health and Social Care matters.
Please, please, please continue to give your support. Without you, your input and your contacts in the community, the LINk cannot maintain its work. Our annual report of the last year’s activities shows the progress the Portsmouth LINk has made. Let’s keep that momentum going and get HealthWatch off the ground faster and more effectively so that those needing local health and social care services will benefit.
