Social care ‘postcode lottery’ shows huge variation in support across England<\/a><\/p>\n ![\"L](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/844854.webp\")
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Alexander Millington-Cotes, 31, is seeking to raise \u00a355,000 towards legal fees required to “locate and safeguard” Sir Ranulph.<\/p>\n
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\nGofundme<\/p>\n
Veteran BBC correspondent John Simpson, a close friend of the explorer, is among those who has called for more information about Sir Ranulph to be disclosed.<\/p>\n
He wrote on X: \u201cHorrified to hear what\u2019s happened to my good friend Ran Fiennes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d like to tell the relevant authorities everything I know about the way he\u2019s been treated. He\u2019s the world\u2019s bravest man, and he\u2019s vulnerable. We must know what\u2019s happening to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adventurers Bear Grylls and Ben Fogle have also joined the chorus expressing concerns for his welfare.<\/p>\n
Grylls described Sir Ranulph as a \u201ctrue British icon\u201d and a \u201cpioneer, a humble warrior and a good friend to so many of us\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe never failed to support me when I needed help. Now is our time. We have been desperately trying to connect with Ran for a year now to no avail.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said the reports of his isolation were \u201cso deeply disturbing\u201d and called for the Office for the Public Guardian (OPG) and police to \u201cinvestigate urgently\u201d.<\/p>\n
Fogle has also called for the OPG to investigate the case, saying he is \u201cdeeply disturbed by stories concerning my friend.”<\/p>\n
\u201cThat such a great man, hero of mine and a national treasure, should be treated in this way, isolated and kept away from family and friends, is very troubling.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last night the Telegraph reported that Mr Millington-Cotes was contacting police in the locations where he thinks the explorer could be to take up the case, including Cheshire Constabulary and West Mercia Police, but with “no luck so far”.<\/p>\n
Cheshire Constabulary, reportedly said it could \u201cneither confirm nor deny\u201dwhether officers had visited the care home in Cheshire, and West Mercia Police did not respond to questions. <\/p>\n
It was reported on Friday that the owner of one of the care homes where the retired adventurer was living raised concerns about his wellbeing to authorities and contacted the police.<\/p>\n
Family have reportedly questioned a do not resuscitate document that she provided.<\/p>\n
The newspaper reported that Mrs Millington-Cotes told one care home in Wales that her husband was \u201can ex-SAS man whose life might be in danger from extremists\u201d and claimed staff at a previous care home had tried to kill him – which subsequently were found to have amounted to a deprivation of his liberty.<\/p>\n
She also allegedly made visitors sign non-disclosure agreements before seeing him, and forced him wear a hat, sunglasses and gloves in public to prevent anyone from recognising him.<\/p>\n
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The newspaper reported that Mrs Millington-Cotes told one care home that her husband was \u201can ex-SAS man whose life might be in danger from extremists\u201d and claimed staff at a previous care home had tried to kill him.<\/p>\n
Picture:
\nAlamy<\/p>\n
In a message posted on the fundraising page, Alexander Millington-Cotes said: “Ran has spent his entire life pushing boundaries for others and representing the best of human endurance. Now, he needs us to fight for him.”<\/p>\n
He added the funds would go towards securing specialist legal representation and advice, preparing court documents and “costs related to determining his exact location”.<\/p>\n
The 31-year-old, who is estranged from his mother, alleged he had been forced to visit his stepfather in secret after the breakdown of the relationship with his mother. <\/p>\n
\u201cSince being asked to leave the family home and not come back, I can only imagine the amplification of Ran\u2019s difficulties and isolation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis isolation would consist of being effectively annexed in the other end of the house, with relatively minimal contact.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember him gleaming the occasional times I would appear unannounced with some sweet treats, which I\u2019d had to haul with me as I climbed over the seven-foot industrial entrance gate.<\/p>\n
He added that he had tried “multiple avenues to find Ran and be able to have a simple conversation with him, or to be able to take him for a brief coffee.”<\/p>\n
“The last time I saw Ran was when he whisked me away while I was walking up the drive on one of my infrequent post-2018 visits, sadly neither him or I realised that it may be the last time we\u2019d see and hug one another. This is the moment he told me he was proud of me, a sweet moment in my memory.”<\/p>\n
Fiennes married Millington-Cotes in 2005, a year after the death of his first wife, Ginny.<\/p>\n
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Sir Ranulph Fiennes has been ‘missing’ for two years.<\/p>\n
Picture:
\nAlamy
\n<\/a><\/p>\nSir Ranulph, widely regarded as the world’s “greatest living explorer” has undertaken several legendary exploits.<\/p>\n
In the 1980s he became the first person to visit both the North and the South Pole on foot during the groundbreaking Transglobe Expedition, and he became the first person ever to completely cross Antarctica on footIn May 2009, at the age of 65, Sir Ranulph climbed to the summit of Mount Everest.<\/p>\n
He has suffered various health scares over the years, including a heart attack in 2003 which led to him undergoing emergency bypass surgery. <\/p>\n
In 2019, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease but did not reveal the diagnosis publicly until 2022.<\/p>\n
Care Inspectorate Wales, the independent regulator of social care, said: \u201cCare Inspectorate Wales is committed to promoting the safety, wellbeing and rights of people who receive social care services across Wales. It would not be appropriate for us to comment on an individual\u2019s personal circumstances or care arrangements.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alexander Millington-Cotes, 31, is seeking to remove the lasting power of attorney held by his mother, Louise Millington-Cotes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":906765,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,63,99,186,184,185],"class_list":["post-906764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=906764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/906765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=906764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=906764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=906764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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