In this latest NCF blog, Liz Jones recaps on the latest member tour to Yorkshire:
In the middle of July, Vic, our CEO, and I had a little road trip to Yorkshire to visit some NCF members up there. We were blessed with good weather and the hospitality offered by the members we visited – the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust, the Royal British Legion and the Camphill Village Trust.
It is always brilliant to see the breadth and diversity of the care and support services our members across the NCF offer and our visits remind us every time why this variety is so important in making sure that people do have real choice and control over the lives they are being supported to live and in the places where those lives can flourish.
There was a huge level of creativity and innovation going across all the places we visited, as well as an interesting and stimulating environment for the people living here.
Our first visit was to Hartrigg Oaks, a fascinating continuing care retirement community, supporting over 300 older people, across a 21-acre site, with 152 bungalows and The Oaks Care Home at the centre, providing dementia and nursing care. The Trust believe that they have a unique care model at Hartrigg Oaks; they call it the Continuing Care model, which means when someone joins them, the cost of their bungalow will also cover the person’s future accommodation at the care home. This could be on a short-term or permanent basis, depending on needs at the time. We met a number of people who live in the retirement community – some were creating artworks and crafting for the 25th anniversary celebrations later this year and others were organising the hosting of the BBC’s Any Questions programme on 23 August!
Our next visit was to Lister House, a Royal British Legion dementia care home in Ripon exclusively for the Armed Forces community. It has 76 ensuite rooms, with a specialist dementia care wing, with Admiral Nurses and a vibrant relationship with the local Royal British Legion branches, resulting in a wide range of volunteering and community involvement that the home has developed. Lister House is also formally recognised as having Veteran Friendly Framework status, providing specialist care to veterans. It also has an award-winning head chef! Brian Preston is the National Association of Care Catering’s Care Chef of the Year 2023. What a legend!
Our final visit was to the Camphill Village Trust’s Croft Community in Malton which is committed to exploring different ways to make their community more sustainable as part of its ‘Greencare’ mission. This is a vibrant supported living community, supporting adults ranging from their 20s to their 70s, with a range of needs – learning disabilities, people on the Autistic spectrum, individuals with mental health needs, physical disabilities, visual impairment, and older people’s needs. Croft Community run an impressive range of supported work opportunities and enterprises. These include a Market Garden, a Café and craft workshops. It was a lovely sunny day, and we met a range of people working in the garden, doing different crafts in the craft workshop, producing candles, pottery and other craft items, a texture workshop with quilting and cushion making and we had lunch in the Kingfisher Café which operates as a commercial café in the centre of Malton and is staffed in part by people that are supported by the Croft Community.
As well as feeling incredibly proud of our NCF members in delivering very person-centred care and support, a golden thread running through our visits was the huge value of the not for profit model, the difference a focus on ‘people not profit’ makes with the sense of focus on individuals and how they want to be supported to live their lives and staying connected to their communities.
We thoroughly enjoyed our ‘Yorkshire Tour’ and would love to organise more regional visits to members so please do get in touch with myself or Vic if you’d like to show off your amazing care settings
