I’m emailing you in regards to what the procedure would be on reporting a regional director for discrimination and bullying? As well as harassment and disregarding a resident’s right to making a decision for themselves. For example, the regional director has been forcing residents to get up earlier then they’d like and stay up longer then they’d like, as well as forcing them to sit in certain rooms and refusing entry to other rooms because it “looks better”.

Answered by Sheila Scott

Dear S, thank you for your email. You don’t say in your email what your role is or whether the regional director is harassing and bullying you or a resident. Either is serious however but the approach is different. Firstly, if there is someone more senior that the Regional Director you need to speak to them, for example, the Managing Director or Nominated Individual.  Write down your concerns to help you remember when you speak to them. Your organisation will have a procedure for raising concerns about the care of residents which should be covered in your safeguarding policy and also your whistleblowing policy. If you have someone who manages safeguarding and you don’t feel comfortable speaking to your regional Director’s manager, you must speak to them. If you can’t speak to anyone, you need to raise a safeguarding and you can do this either by contacting the Local Authority safeguarding team or CQC. You can do this anonymously as a whistleblower but you will need to give details so that they can investigate. If the Regional Director is bullying, harassing or act discriminating towards you or other staff, you will need to follow your organisation’s grievance policy and procedure. I appreciate that this can be stressful and worrying and if you need more help or information to do this ACAS have some helpful information and a helpline https://www.acas.org.uk/disciplinary-and-grievance-procedures. I do hope you get this resolved.