Our Trip To London for the Healthwatch Conference 2024
AN EARLY MORNING...
London. Tuesday the 12th of November 2024. The annual Healthwatch conference was due to start at around 11AM, and we had to get there. What exactly does that entail? Waking up at around 4am, getting ready over the course of 2 hours because you're going about as half as fast as you should be (Due to the time of day, really), enjoying a caffeine laced breakfast at 6am and having a mad dash out the door to make sure you're at Wigan North Western by 7am for a 2 hour train ride! Don't forget the occasional late bus, uncharacteristic 6.30AM traffic and the fact your headphones are on their way out and wired pairs cost £10 from the only shop open this early and it started to seem a bit like I wasn't going to make it. (Really though, £10? I thought they'd get cheaper as they got antiquated, but apparently not...).
So, I get into Wigan from the bus station and it's about 5 to 7. I have - realistically - about 5 minutes before I need to be at the train station which is about a 10 minute walk away, so I put on my best speed-walk and got rolling. I think I made it in about 7(?) minutes, which isn't too bad. Plug in the detour for headphones and it turned out pretty well. About a minute later, Lacey pokes her head out from the door then another 30 seconds and Andrea appears speeding down the pavement. Great, everyone made it in weirdly quick succession. Now, we stare at the pretty sky, wait for the train and ask ourselves...
WHAT EXACTLY IS A HEALTHWATCH CONFERENCE, ANYWAY?
The annual Healthwatch Conference is a fun little event ran by Healthwatch England, recently held exclusively in London but has been anchored in Manchester once or twice before, the conference is the yearly meeting of all 152 local Healthwatch's, like us or Healthwatch Bucks, or City Of London. Wherever there's a locality, there's a Healthwatch and they all meet here!
Usually, this event is more for the board and the Chief Officers - like ours, Karen - but this time around we sent some of our more regular staff around as the event has been opened up to everyone in Healthwatch! It has a few workshops, a few networking breaks and a speech or panel or 2 with guest speakers and Louise Ansari the Chief Executive of Healthwatch England. It's a fun little event with loads of faces to meet and information to gather.
We use it to share feedback with Healthwatch England about how they manage us, share a few tips and tricks with our local teams and hear Healthwatch's strategies for the next few years. Plus, teams who do well or have a win in their area get a little shoutout (Like we did! But more on that later...).
DAY TRIP TO LONDON!
Did you know trains have wireless chargers in their tables now? That, plus every type of USB to the side. It's cool and I'm probably out of the loop on trains but it surprised me. So, cue the 2 hour ride then we're off at London Euston meeting Yemi (Holmes.) who'd got there first. We stand around for about 10 minutes waiting for a taxi and I dash across the road to grab a newspaper. To my shock, my horror - even my dismay - it was... A newspaper for taxi drivers. It's called The Badge. I don't think I should have this.
Luckily, I didn't tell Gary, our cockney taxi driver with a 40 year long career and a disdain towards electric cars - due to personal experiences with the batteries only lasting 3 years and costing £2,000 to replace. Lovely guy, honestly. What else was lovely was the insane quality of the black cabs in London. Driver controlled doors, card readers telling you the drivers name, fancy buttons - I should of got a photo in all honesty. Sure, they ask for a tip, but maybe it's worth it for the cabs of the future? It's a shame we don't have them in Wigan or Leigh to be honest.
London is so very alien for someone not used to cities or London itself. It's massive, incredibly busy and feels like it's 10 years in the future, the the architecture is 200 years in the past. It's quite literally colourful, everything is some bright shade of something and the people are all dressed as stereotypically as you'd expect. Lovely, don't get me wrong, but I see why other countries think we wear top hats, because someone was!
Some lovely views of London landmarks plus some Christmas markets with lovely little fairy lights later and we're there! The Queen Victoria Conference Center in Cambridge, nestled right near Parliament and Big Ben. It's about 10.56 so our little rush in stopped us from taking photos, I'm afraid.
THE CONFERENCE BEGINS!
And so, it begins... We walk into the first floor of the building, sign in, get our badges and lanyards thinking 'damn, these are sweet' then have a chat with a few colleagues before we set off. Specifically, a fella from Healthwatch Richmond And Tyne with a cool earpiece and the chairman from Healthwatch Portsmouth and his snazzy 70s style sort of psychedelic shirt! Cool dudes that didn't follow us into the elevator which is probably for the best as we kept getting off on the wrong floors. Past our herculean challenge of navigating the modern world of elevators and we were in! Toilet break, then taking a table. It was really busy, mostly full of board members, engagement officers and chairs, but we figured something out. We, as 4 upstanding Wiganers, were the biggest team there! Oh well, I said as I eyed up a mans top and asked him 'where exactly is Healthwatch Bracknell Forest'. Bracknell Forest, he said, and I uttered to him in response 'So who lives there? Pixies? Fairies?'. 'No - unicorns.'. Funny guy, Nick. He and Yemi then chatted about Asset Based Community Development! See him later in the big photo-dump! This little interaction is how I knew everyone here was brilliant, which they were. It is Healthwatch after all, you can't be evil doing this.
After that we met Kate from Healthwatch Westmoorland And Furness, discussed the intricacies of local borders and went up to the conference room after a quick photoshoot. The first speaker was David Croisdale-Appelby. A nice older guy, he's the chair of Healthwatch England, and to put it simply, he was impressed. He's only been around 17 months, but in that time he's loved the work we were doing, specifically shouting out Healthwatch Bristol with their youth work!
'It is of vital importance of listening to our people and our communities and putting their voices at the center of our care, for it was them the NHS was created for'
Next up, the keynote speaker, Parlimentary Under-Secretary Of State Of The Department Of Health and Social Care. Baroness Merron. The Barroness is a politician in our current government (if you couldn't tell) so journalists beware, here are the meaty quotes! According to her, patient satisfaction is at an all time low, under a quarter of people are happy with the NHS and two thirds agree the NHS is broken.
'The NHS has suffered too long from politicians saying everything is okay, when it's not okay' - Paraphrased, from Baroness Merron.
According to Merron, to rebuild the NHS, patient trust and feedback is vital to make it 'Fit For The Future' - which Healthwatch Englands Chief Exec, Louise, chairs!
'If patients aren't satisfied, the government isn't satisfied' - Baroness Merron
She also talked about the importance of engagement with communities and people, a key role of Healthwatch which not many other organisations do!
'Patient voices will be the cornerstones of these new foundations' - Baroness Merron
And about how feedback shouldn't only come from the people, but the NHS too. Apparently, only 50% of the NHS staff feel like they could speak up about NHS problems and have something done about it
'NHS Staff must feel empowered to talk about problems' - Baroness Merron
Finally, she touched on the Dash Review of many organisations, including Healthwatch, and how the NHS is getting more funding in 2025/2026, how they're putting eighty-six million pounds into disability grants and how in April the carers allowance will go up from £151 to £191!
'There are appalingly low levels of public support, but the NHS is broken, not beaten. We will put user voices at the heart of what we do.' - Baroness Merron
MORE OF THE MEAT: THE PANEL...
Now we get to the panel with 3 speakers and Louise Ansari asking questions. Baroness Marron, Sarah Woolnough the chief executive of The Kings Fund and Cheryl Tackie, the chair of NHS Englands Cancer Programme Patient and Public Voice Forum.
In this panel we heard many things. How they believe digital platforms are badly utilised throuought the NHS
'All the technology is there, but the usage is not consistent nationwide'
Or how the NHS needs to move from treating sickness to sickness prevention. About how 'It's not about how long you live, but how you live' and how healthy life expectancy has actually got worse!
'This is our one chance to get it right' 'If the patient voice isn't there, I don't know how we're gonna do it.'
Cheryl herself had an interesting story. About how she was diagnosed with cancer during the height of COVID-19, but she never was never negative due to her faith in our NHS. This experience lead her into wanting to be part of it and put her very much into patient advocacy. As a carer for her father on top of everything else (Seriously, this woman not only dressed to kill but does a heck of a lot) she understands the little things in these processes matter too - something we like to think we understand and cater to.
In all honesty, the quotes were the meat of the panel. Some interesting bits here and there, but the main point was this - we need patient voices, and we're all patients. Also, that it is very likely politics will get in the way of the Fit For The Future 10 year plan.
After this we got a shoutout! (Yes, us!) Baroness Merron mentioned she'd visited WWL and how they were great at listening! Louise then asked if we from Wigan came, we waved our hands and later got called 'The Heroes From Wigan' by Healthwatch Buckinghamshire. A nice ego boost, if I do say so myself.
NEXT UP: THE DIGITAL WORKSHOP...
The conference had 3 workshops. One about ADHD and autism, one about social care and another about Healtwatchs digital future. This is the one I and Yemi attended, alongside Grainne from Healthwatch Redding and Carrie from a few of them including Hull and Licolnshire! The key points here are simple.
- Healthwatch has been making improvements on it's digital systems
- They're looking into AI usage
- Healthwatch England get 40,000 feedback forums a month!
After the talks from Colin, we started giving feedback to Healthwatch England on post-it notes. Yemi was a superstar, as per ususal, in this activity and we ended up telling them all sorts about our thoughts on how Healthwatch needs one unified database and how maybe Healthwatch England collecting feedback on their site could potentially be overshadowing local Healthwatchs.
The main debate, really, was about QR codes. Can we get them in GPs to link to us and surveys? Will people use them? Is there better means to collect this feedback? That, and how AI should be used to revamp how we collect feedback, like could we just use a photo and AI could break it down into information for us to use? Very futuristic stuff.
END OF THE (TRAIN)TRACK...
It's half 2ish, we're all exhausted. We have to miss the end of the conference to get our train. We're stuck in prime traffic and the taxi cost £40. The conference was brilliant, it was a productive day, but wow, personally, I'd clocked out a while ago. Turns out trains in London don't tell you the platform you get on until 5 minutes before they set off, to stop congestion. Thanks Andrea for that info, our new Healthwatch tour guide in London! Euston was packed, but we got on the train, sat down, and I genuinely don't remember the next 2 hours. I was out of it. My only memory? A man snoring like a goose on the train.
And so concludes this mega-article for us. A long, fun day. We made new friends, learnt some things and saw London from some windows. But we know what you're really here for. Don't worry, here's the photos!
