C.A.B?

[keith lockey]

Is there a Citizen's Advice Bureau in Bedlington...if so...where...and if not...why not?

[Malcolm Robinson]

COZ ITS BEDLINGTON KEITH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I think nearest one of Blyth.  There was going to be one opening in Cramlington.  

[Adam Hogg]

I think there is one in Ashington as well.

[threegee]

There's one here, and we're all far more cost effective than the state one.

 

Maybe I'm wrong, but In this day and age I can't imagine why anyone even vaguely literate would ever need one.

[keith lockey]

Is that an insult, Threegee? Someone asked me if there was one so I said i would ask the Bedlington Community...because i didn't know. I mean that is what this forum is partly about...communication and finding out things if you are uncertain.  

[Maggie/915]

The CAB is a great help to a huge number of people.

The work they do is valuable and worthwhile.

[mercuryg]

"

Maybe I'm wrong, but In this day and age I can't imagine why anyone even vaguely literate would ever need one."]

 

I think you're very wrong!!

[threegee]

It was a question. So what would you go to a CAB about that you couldn't just as easily get the information elsewhere these days?  Give me an example?  Give me as many examples as you want?

 

Without being intrusive I'd have asked the nature of the problem, and tried to help myself; or does everything have to centre around the state and spending ever more public money?  We complain about loss of community, but it seems to me many of us actively connive in the process.

 

It's public money that's being spent, and apparently we don't need one in Bedlington anyway.  If they are so valuable we should know why we don't have one and be pressing for one.  If they aren't valuable then someone needs the courage to say so in the public interest.  "that is what this forum is partly about...communication and finding out things if you are uncertain" - remember?

[Symptoms]

GGG makes a valid point about the ease of access to information and guidance for a large proportion of the population.  However, I understand that a sizable lump of the elderly have no online access at home and so are cut-off from this resource; maybe even the very poor are in the same boat. 

[Malcolm Robinson]

Coming down on one side on this one and its Keith's!  

 

 

If we degrade to such an impersonal level then there's no hope left! 

 

For hells sake there is a world out there and kids are stuck inside glued to little bleeping machines.  No wonder the art of conversation and interpersonal relationships are dying  

Still can't beat a personal empathetic adviser and that's just one role for CAB.  It's also about sign posting and getting the right advice to the person in time.  

 

Bedlington hasn't got one because we are not worthy!    

[keith lockey]

Everybody rein in here!!!

 

I asked...what I thought...was a simple question! Someone had asked me if Bedlington had a CAB. I didn't know so I flagged it up on here. Now WWIII has broke out!! It was a simple question! What is wrong here...am I missing something. It seems that everything on this site nowadays is politically orientated. If it continues them I'm off...It was a ruddy simple, innocent question!

[threegee]

This is the Chat forum not the one with specific Town info. Off topic is allowed here, so asking the supplementary question as to WHY anyone would need a CAB should hardly be controversial or stir any emotions. In any case no one has offered any specific example. I can easily see why older folk who aren't net savvy would need help but maybe it's no longer the type of support that CABs provide?

I'm trying to determine if something needs to be done in OUR town. How is that remotely political, unless there's some hidden agenda here I'm blissfully unaware of?

Lighten up Keith and try to help me here!

 

There are no "sides" here yet Malc, and I'm not at all arguing for impersonalisation of anything - in fact I feel quite the opposite!

[Malcolm Robinson]

It OK keith......

 

Its all in the best possible taste......

 

 

 

 

 

[keith lockey]

It's okay, people.

 

Threegee it was just that one line regarding a CAB in Bedlington...It's public money that's being spent, and apparently we don't need one in Bedlington anyway. 

 

Well if the public money that is being spent is helping the public then I don't see what is wrong with that...as for apparently we don't need one...well who determines if it is apparent that we don't need one?

 

I'm not looking for a fight here...It's just that a lot of people actually do need to sit down and talk to someone over a table to determine the best track to take on some issues. I wouldn't have dreamed of asking this person what their problem was...it's not my business and it may have been a personal matter. The CAB have access to knowledge and organizations that most folk don't know about...and they do have some clout and no there is no hidden agenda...never has been with me. But maybe our town needs a Cab...why have Ashington, Blyth & Morpeth got them yet we don't...maybe there is a hidden agenda that I am missing something here? 

 

Anyway, as far as I'm concerned the matter is closed...the question is answered...Bedlington has no CAB>

 

Thank you all.  

[threegee]

OK, you aren't aware of my normal inherent sarcism then.

 

The apparently we don't need one anyway could have been phrased others seem to believe we don't need one but I suspect dual standards at work there.

 

I'd still like to know what kind of questions a CAB would field.  I'm sure things have changed a lot since they were originally devised.  I'm also puzzled why local councillors can't help, or is this also politicised to the extent that people don't ask people of the "wrong party"?

 

You don't know if an issue is confidential unless you tactfully and respectfully ask, and at some point that person has to confide in someone. If only I'd known is too frequently heard these days - generally well after a tragic event.  The state is very bad at handling such things, and voluntary organisations seem to do much better.  I'm suggesting that an ad-hock voluntary organisation consisting just of one, concerned, motivated person - the person being asked about help - could sometimes be the best and most immediate option.  People may decide not to take things further and simply give up when all they need is a little encouragement; that sometimes has tragic consequences.

 

===============

 

It's the moderators job to close off (lock) threads that have come to the end of their useful life, but it's never a good idea to overdo this.  I've seen boards moderated to death.  Here I'd have split the original topic first to let the discussion run under a new title, then closed off the original thread after a satisfactory answer to the question.

 

That would certainly have applied to other forums, but here I (personally) would have let the thread run.  It's always better if you leave someone else to moderate a thread you are actively involved in yourself.  I'm not suggesting that anyone here would make a bad call, but it avoids any suspicion that someone has been gagged.

[keith lockey]

If you want to let it run then so be it but I won't participate. I don't mean to be rude here. It's just that my question was answered and that is all I needed to know. Cheers lads.

[Symptoms]

I'm all for handbags at ten paces here and will defend the rough-and-tumble to the bitter end ... infact, I'd prefer stronger stuff like nut-kicking.

 

Where could disconnected folks get help and info from in the absence of CABs?  Traditionally, it could have been the the Library (many are now closed or understaffed), the copshop (many are now closed or open for short periods of time), the local GP (many of these have been sucked into so-called group health practices {a money making, get rich scheme for the quacks} with waiting times running into next week).  So is there really an alternative to CABs? 

[threegee]

Local councillors?  In Italy the local politicos are always offering their services to "fix" things - for obvious reasons.  They are the natural go-to. Again, I think it comes back to the nature of the problem.

 

What's at the back of my mind is the huge cuts we are about to face whoever gets in at the GE.  There'll likely be nothing safe - even the supposed ring-fenced stuff will suffer at the hands of inflation. That's essentially what Balls said on the NHS, though it went completely over the heads of the LPC audience, who actually applauded his spin on a post-inflationary cut!

[Symptoms]

Yep, just about everybody is going to get stiffed after the GE, well, maybe not the rich.

[threegee]

...unless we quit the EU fast, cut foreign aid to those few worthwhile projects in countries where that aid is life or death to poor people, reign in quangos and all the state machinery which provides no direct benefit to ordinary people, and put a stop grandiose projects which make this country even more London-centric, etc.  Basically, all the political hobby-horses of a self-aggrandising establishment.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Local councillors?  In Italy the local politicos are always offering their services to "fix" things - for obvious reasons.  They are the natural go-to. Again, I think it comes back to the nature of the problem.

 

 

 

I wouldn't wish that on anyone GGG!  

 

I know several who look to need help getting dressed every morning...........back me or sack me Adam!  

[threegee]

I know several who look to need help getting dressed every morning...........back me or sack me Adam!  

 

I hope the CABs do house calls then - the prospect of their customers catching the #9 bus for that assistance is disturbing!

 

Maybe the Italian system of er... mutual obligation has some good points after all?

[Malcolm Robinson]

Maybe GGG but the Omertà forbids me from saying so……….