Cornwall’s STP: Why we need to see what’s going on and what games they are playing

When we are told ‘Don’t worry: no decisions will be taken before the public are consulted’ we have every reason to worry!

Right now work is going ahead on preparing a Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) for health and social care in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. Under the brand name Shaping our Future (SoF), a team of people are beavering away to produce a ‘plan’ of some kind. It seems that this is due to be unveiled in a few months’ time and is to take the form of a Pre-Consultation Business Case.

For anyone who is concerned about what the ‘plan’ will mean for them and their family and neighbourhood, the problem is this: During the planning process, as in all planning processes, things happen to narrow down the options that are available at the point when the public are eventually consulted. For example:

♦  Time and staff resources are used up. Once a deadline has been set, there is simply not the time and manpower to go back to square one and start again. If no alternatives have been investigated and considered, there is no time now to investigate them. Even if alternatives have been considered, these will have been reduced to a shortlist, and it won’t be possible to resurrect any that didn’t make it on to the shortlist.

♦  The staff working on the plan become psychologically committed. They take decisions about the kind of plan they want to see, and about working methods, i.e. how they are going to produce the plan: to go back on these decisions, and write off some of the work that has been done, will generate stress and involve loss of face. Similarly, people make assumptions and become wedded to these: even if evidence turns up that shows that their assumptions were unrealistic or – like budgetary limitations – could have harmful consequences, they may disbelieve and deny that evidence (the phenomenon of cognitive dissonance).

Continued at https://cornishstuff.com/2017/09/13/cornwalls-stp-why-we-need-to-see-whats-going-on-and-what-games-they-are-playing/