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A caretaker’s job is more than changing light bulbs
• YOU can’t fit a square peg in a round hole.
It has to be accepted, like a bitter medicine, that caretaking services are overstretched for the duties that they have to carry out.
Any further cuts to the service at all would greatly affect tenants all over the borough in a detrimental way. It is not all about cleaning or about changing light bulbs, which are in themselves important aspects of the caretakers’ duties, but it is also very much about the “care” side of things too.
Perhaps something that we have forgotten about until something is not right, or a tenant who has not been seen by neighbours for a couple of days, or we need help ourselves to change our own light bulbs.
Something was not quite right in our building. A long-standing tenant had not been seen for two days, could not be contacted by phone, and hadn’t left note as usual to say they were away.
Pretty soon it was raising concern among neighbours, who in turn raised their concerns to the local housing office.
Within 15 minutes the caretaker was on the job. He looked through the letterbox, called out and listened to hear if anyone was inside unable to come to the door, exhausting avenues of investigation to try and trace the resident, and listened to neighbours’ concerns.
Thankfully it was a false alarm and the missing tenant turned up fit and well, if not slightly embarrassed by all the fuss that had been made, and residents concerns were put to rest.
Everyone could breathe again, including the caretaker. Although this at first worried residents, the response from the caretaking service and in particular caretaker Frank Murphy has reminded us here at Somerton House how lucky we are to have such a service, and the safety and security it gives to tenants who are not necessarily vulnerable but just live alone.
S LAMROCK
Chair, Somerton House Tenants Association
Dukes Road, WC1
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