Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Better homes for Haringey - well not for older people!
Harringey council or whoever owns the council stock really need to speak to people living in the property before carrying out changes. A few months ago our elderly next door neighbour had double glazing and a new front and back door fitted. He is delighted with the double glazing and feels much safer, the door however is causing him untold stress its one of those stupid triple lock jobs and he simply doesn't understand how to use it. I am sure some people will find this a fairly trivial matter - its really not, I have found him outside in tears on some times totally confused and unable ot get into his own home, he doesn't understand how lock the thing and is now left even more vulnerable and isolated as he hates going out. We constantly have to let him in and show him over and over again how to use the front door - I will be pretty honest and say that as a fairly with it person I to am baffled by the front door and its quite often pure chance that I get the thing open for him.
I have started to notice a steep decline in his behaviour since the door was fitted, he often comments that he forgets his new keys or doesn't know which key is which and can't undertand why after 38 yers things need to change he has even started drinking quite heavily - something which other neighbours who have also noticed his distressed behaviour have commented on. this all came to a head about two weeks ago when at 2am we were woken up by him shouting an banging on the door. He had been out there for some time, drunk and had bought hid old keys with him instead of the new keys. The council were not interested when we phoned their emergency line to explain that an elderly person was locked out - we ended up calling an emergency locksmith who arrived at 3am and let him in. We have reluctantly agreed to keep a spare front door key for him. We had a similar incident on Friday where another neighbour found him upset on his doorstep at about 7pm unable to unlock his door, she mentioned that a few other elderly residents had also really struggled with these doors - does anyone actually stop for a minute to think about these things before making an elderly persons a life a total misery!
I have started to notice a steep decline in his behaviour since the door was fitted, he often comments that he forgets his new keys or doesn't know which key is which and can't undertand why after 38 yers things need to change he has even started drinking quite heavily - something which other neighbours who have also noticed his distressed behaviour have commented on. this all came to a head about two weeks ago when at 2am we were woken up by him shouting an banging on the door. He had been out there for some time, drunk and had bought hid old keys with him instead of the new keys. The council were not interested when we phoned their emergency line to explain that an elderly person was locked out - we ended up calling an emergency locksmith who arrived at 3am and let him in. We have reluctantly agreed to keep a spare front door key for him. We had a similar incident on Friday where another neighbour found him upset on his doorstep at about 7pm unable to unlock his door, she mentioned that a few other elderly residents had also really struggled with these doors - does anyone actually stop for a minute to think about these things before making an elderly persons a life a total misery!
Tags for Forum Posts: older people
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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Tamara, who are your local councillors? Might it be a good idea to ask them to visit/speak to some of the elderly residents to find out more about the problem and take it up with Homes for Haringey? There's also an email for commenting feedback@homesforharingey.org to write directly to HFH.
HFH have a website here with various contact details on.
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Permalink Reply by Vic H on
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It might be better to call social services as they might be able to keep an eye and collate information which can then be fed internally to the housing. I'm a social worker in Islington (I live in Haringey!) and it would be the kind of thing I'd love to know about so I could have a go at housing but more importantly check out that everything else is running ok for him and just to keep an eye on things especially if they have changed.
I can only think about how things work in Islington and I can't imagine the housing team would be desperately interested but social services can certainly (and have) given them a 'nudge'.
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Tamara
I work for Homes for Haringey who manage this stock. Can you please message me the details so I can sort this out.
Thanks
David
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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Hi Tamara, sounds like you're looking after this neighbour - interesting coincidence between your post and this one earlier today.
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Permalink Reply by Tammy Palmer on
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Thanks for all the usggestions! I have e-mailed David so hopefully we can get some help with this. I have to say in defence of Homes for Harrigay we did call them just after the door was fitted as we thought the problem was just the door being a bit stiff they came out within an hour and loosened it up and talked our neighbour through opening and locking again. It's the age old (excuse the pun!) problem of being used ot something for so long and thne not beign able to adapt quickly to something new. This door is much sturdier than his old door but just a little complicated. David has just phoned me and has been very very helpful so I am hoping something positive will happen for our neighbour.
Hugh this is very similar to the other discussion and I the one good thing that has come out of this is that I have gotten to know my neighbours a little better over the last few weeks. The guy next door has no-one, no family, few friends and is terribly lonley, he rarely cooks for himself and seems to have limited contact with the outside world, obviously the neighbourhood has changed and people come and go very quickly, are busy with their own lives, may not speak English etc and so he has just been forgotten about its a very sad story but of course is not an isolated story. I worry very much about him broken into, or letting people into his home - he is so keen to chat and talk to people. We moved in about two years ago and try to keep an eye on him - whilst respecting his indpendence, I always make him some homemade cake and chocolates for Christmas - he spends it alone, and if I make a big casserole I drop some round for him, In the winter we just keep an eye out - if I don't see him or see the lights on for a day or two I knock and make sure he is ok. Its not a lot and doesn't take a lot of time but it makes a difference to him. There is however a fine line here and having to sit up till 3am with someone who is drunk when you have to get up at 7am crosses it - which is why I was reluctant to take his key I don't want him to start to become reliant on us - we might be out for example!
There are not easy answers to this but if we all do our bit we can make our neighbourhood a betterplace for our older neighbours
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