Busy. Busy. Busy.

Tempting as it was on Friday to go swanning off on a political holiday all swinging-bucket-n-spade it just didn’t feel like the time to crack open the factor 50.

Being someone who carried a copy of Michael Harrington’s Socialism Past and Future (Hardback) to two decades worth of Greek Island beach holidays, there’s something about the political summer ‘holidays’ that makes me very nervous.

As the out of office messages flood into our in-boxes the policy witching hour approaches and the brilliant young things of silent un-negotiated social reform get their busy-on. Union branch meetings shut down and the senior generation of critical thinkers drift off into uncomfortable nights of interrupted sleep. And then the cuts start.  From hundreds of academic jobs to 40% of NHS England staff the grinding process of winding us down and out begins. As the negotiation limbo in health and education sectors drags on, we wait for the bureaucratic knife to fall silently with no regulatory witnesses.

For those of a hopeful persuasion we anticipate that Chatham house discussions continue in the balmy shades of senior management. But for those of us of an ancient persuasion based on past and repeated workplace trauma June tastes like an appetiser for the big cuts ahead.  All the voluntary-not-voluntary wellbeing training and informal chats with management a nod towards the bureaucratic processes that underly the restructuring of the public sector if only remaining in ethos rather than substance. 

Remember the Higher Education summer of 2011? Teachers Pension strike hundreds of us paddling around in quiet compulsory redundancy pools followed by six months of job loss. This almost forgotten dispute enshrined in our bodies, the stuff of hot summer nightmares as the waves of cortisol roll on. 

Our performances’ management is violently busy over the summer when the collective vigilance has died down and the inclusive senior management team meetings scheduled for the long Autumn grass. I know, you think teachers get long holidays but there’s no annual leave from the process that is now underway. 

Many of us engaged with strikes and industrial action are in our fourth or fifth month of 50% or more wage cuts. Many of us are running out of time, depleted and broke. This week is a breaking point in the HE dispute as the marking and assessment boycott reveals itself so dig deep dear reader and show some love to yourself and the people around you. One way or another this will pass and whichever way you fall at the end of your particular political dilemma, this is precisely the moment to roll out whatever kindness and humanity you have left. 

And since being broke, a single parent to a four year old and writing a book this summer discounts me from realising my fantasies of 12 hours straight horizontal on a beach on Paxos I’m keeping still and quietly busy in preparation for what lies ahead.

You’re welcome to join me. 

Cost of living Crisis Survey for Therapists

Please help us understand the Cost of Living Crisis for therapists and counsellors. The CTUK Surviving Work survey ends at the end of Tuesday 13th June please circulate in your networks.

Click here to take the survey.  

National Counsellors Day 24 June 2023

We’ll be presenting initial survey results at the largest therapy event in the UK -  National Counsellors Day on the 24th June. You can book your tickets for low or no cost here.

The Digital Therapy Project

At the end of June we’ll be launching a UK/USA Digital Therapy Project including a survey about the use of digital therapy tools in the UK and USA.  

The Digital Therapy Project Survey has been set up to understand experiences of using teletherapy, online therapy platforms and digital mental health tools from the perspectives of therapists and consumers or users of these technologies. This survey aims to capture the experience of using digital tools by which we mean three categories of ‘digital therapies’ -  tele/video therapy,  mental health and wellbeing Apps and Chatbots and use of online therapy platforms. We are seeking responses both from the UK and USA so that we might establish a series of public and professional discussions about the issues around digitalization and the future applications of digital and AI tools within therapy. 

The Digital Therapy Project research team is made up of Dr Elizabeth Cotton, Cardiff Metropolitan University and Surviving Work, Dr Pauline Whelan, Manchester University, Knut Laaser, Stirling University, Linda Michaels, Psychotherapy Action Network PsiAN (USA) and Maria Albertsen Director of Counsellors Together UK (UK). Information about The Digital Therapy Project will be launched at the end of June and will run throughout the summer. 

AI Therapy in the media

There has been a frenzy of AI journalism over the last month. Some media are clocking into the user debates about AI therapy and the growing use of chatbots. Many of the journalists I’ve spoken to recently are young women who it turns out are holding the critical space on mental health and social media. It’s for that reason that those of us who are ancient and stopped talking to journalists somewhere during austerity and DWP sanctions, have started taking the time to talk through the politics of therapy again. Turns out there are people we didn’t know on our side.

Two pieces came out in the UK’s Politics Home over the last few weeks by @zoenora6

Article about the gaming of performance data in NHS Talking Therapies

Article about the call for a review of NHS Talking Therapies

@mahnoor_akhlaq from Channel4 News did a TikTok version of an interview with me about AI therapy. Yup, fully cognisant I need to up my TikTok game thanks. 

@katewills did our interview with the Evening Standard that came out a few weeks ago about therapy chatbots.

@Daisy_Schofield did an article that got a lot of traction in the USA about AI therapy in i-D Magazine