ListenUp. Whats inside... for Human Rights at Westminster Palace. Issue 2 Autumn David Howarth MP visits. Lincolnshire advocacy success story

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1 Issue 2 Autumn 2007 Speaking Up for Human Rights at Westminster Palace Whats inside... Spotlight on Nottingham Advocacy service Speaking Up Speaks Out on Parents with disabilities David Howarth MP visits Speaking Up Lincolnshire advocacy success story

2 now... Successful Parliament campaign is backed by David Howarth, MP! Cambridgeshire Parliament have been campaigning for more accessible toilet facilities as part of the Mencap Changing Places campaign. It has recently been revealed that the developers of the new Cambridge Arcade shopping centre have decided to fit toilet facilities for people with severe disabilities in the new shopping centre. David Howarth MP, who visited Speaking Up in September about the campaign said This is fantastic news. People with severe disabilities have been waiting a long time for appropriate toilet facilities in Cambridgeshire and now Susanna Patterson, who has been campaigning for this, and others with similar disabilities will have some of the facilities they need to enjoy Cambridge s city centre. Susanna said I m really pleased because now I ll be able to shop till I drop! MANAGEMENT BULLETIN At the end of August, James Baddeley, previously Deputy Chief Executive left Speaking Up after eight years. James said Whilst working at Speaking Up was always challenging, it's been an extremely rewarding experience. I feel very lucky to have had the opportunities I've had and will carry forward what I've learned at Speaking Up for the rest of my life. I want to wish everyone connected with Speaking Up the best of luck for the future. Taking over the role is Kathleen Cronin, who will be starting on the 5th November. Kathleen is currently CEO of small national charity British Youth Council. In the last four years I have developed and grown the British Youth Council to reach greater numbers of young people. I hope my experience in developing innovative programmes and networks will provide added value to Speaking Up. I am looking forward to starting in November and meeting my new colleagues! 2007 Big Day Out Speaking Up now employs over 100 staff across the country. We all got the chance to attend workshops, discuss the future of advocacy and get to know each other at the Speaking Up 2007 Big Day Out on 13th September. Susanna and David 2 If you have any suggestions for stories for queries about Listen Up, please contact the editor: rosie@speakingup.org/

3 SpeakingUp Champions Getting a Life project pilot success The pilot of a YPSU Cambridge based pilot project called Getting a Life was so successful that the project won a national award for the best Youthbank funded project in the Eastern Region. This award Lily Hewett meant that YPSU have been funded 42,500 by the local authority to continue and expand the project. The project was devised by young people who wanted the opportunity to do fun social activities within their community. Benji, Shaz, Clive and Andy. Graduates from Young People's Next Steps. Next Steps Celebration of Achievements! Six young people members and seven members from the 25+ group celebrated graduating from the Next Steps programme at a ceremony on the 24th of July. The graduates will now move onto different opportunities; several members have secured paid jobs, while others are pursuing voluntary placements and further learning. Speaking Up at Westminster Palace Representatives from the Centre for Participation, including Speaking Up, presented evidence about issues affecting people with learning disabilities to the Joint Human Rights Committee on the 9th of July at Westminster Palace in London. They discussed disability awareness, voting and the human rights of people with learning disabilities based on research that they had carried out. Amy Forgacs, a project worker from Young People Speaking Up and a previous MP of the Cambridgeshire Parliament, said I asked the committee to imagine what it would be like if you were handed a leaflet you couldn t understand you would miss out on opportunities. It would be better if more people with learning disabilities were involved with making information accessible, as no-one knows about it better than we do. 3

4 Spotlight on... Nottingham Advocacy Service 4 FACTFILE Speaking Up's Nottingham Advocacy Service provides advocacy for people with learning difficulties, mental health problems and has an Independent Mental Capacity Advocacy Service. A new Senior Service Manager was recently appointed to begin on October 16th Kate Taylor will be heading up the team, while Don Cattell will be Service Manager for IMCA. Amanda Platt is a Nottingham based exservice user who has been involved with with advocacy in Nottingham for the past 7 years. Advocacy has helped me to be more confident, to live more independently and it has given me the opportunity to work alongside lots of different people. In May this year I was elected by the East Midlands Regional Forum to represent the region at the National Forum for people with learning disabilities. My role is to speak out for people in the area and find out and report on what is happening nationally. Over the last year I have been on 2 interview panels for Speaking Up. One for the new business development manager for the north region, and one for the independent mental capacity advocates. I enjoy this type of work. I think its very important for people with a learning disability to be involved and have a say in how services are run. Working as an IMCA Being an IMCA puts me in the fortunate position of supporting and representing vulnerable people, and allows them to be heard and their wishes and views to be taken into account. I like being part of a process where decisions made are as close to what a person would have liked if they could decide for themselves. I enjoy meeting a diverse range of people clients and professionals. The work itself is never the same and every referral so far has been different to any other. Working independently, with a great, supportive team makes the job very rewarding, and the challenges I have experienced so far have encouraged me to learn more about advocacy and the needs of vulnerable people. Anu Sharma, Independent Mental Capacity Advocate The Speaking Up Nottingham team

5 SpeakingUp Speaks Out Speaking Up Speaks Out On Involving Service Users Deciding the Future in Nottingham: Katherine Langridge, Advocate Advocates from Nottingham were part of enabling people with a learning disability to get involved in writing the commissioning strategy for the city council. At a meeting on 23rd July, advocates from Speaking Up met with commissioners and policymakers to discuss the issues in strategy making and how people with a learning disability could be involved in writing the strategy for At the meeting the commissioners and policymakers agreed that it is important to get people with a learning disability involved in writing the strategy rather than being consulted on a finished product. We will be meeting again in September to begin planning so here s to the start of an exciting journey! Michelle Mansfield, an ex-service user and a Trainer for Speaking Up had her son Callum on the 2 August Here are her thoughts and experiences on being a parent with learning difficulties. I was shocked when I first found out that I was pregnant. I was worried and scared but I felt excited too. At first I had some concerns about the amount of support I would need. I don t think I would have done as well without having the amazing support of my family and partner around me. Things would have been much more difficult. When I went for my scan, the midwife said she needed to tell social services about me. I asked why. I thought it was unfair for her to do that, but she said that she had to. Luckily, Social Services knew me and knew that I would be able to cope. It could have been different if they hadn't known me though, and if they didn t know how much good support I had around me! Anyone with a learning difficulty who is thinking about becoming a parent needs to realise it s a full time commitment, and every day will be different. I wouldn t have gone through with the pregnancy if I thought I couldn t cope - I knew it would be a big responsibility and my life would change. Life is very different when you are a mum now Callum always come first in whatever I do. Its important that people with learning difficulties think a lot about whether they have the right support to become a parent my mum and partner have both been so strong for me throughout and this has really helped. People with Learning difficulties should be given a chance to become parents it shouldn t be assumed that they can t cope. Michelle Mansfield and her son Callum. The article also appeared in the 13 September edition of Community Care magazine. 5

6 SpeakingUp - In Focus - Overcoming anxiety The following Mental Health Advocacy story focuses on a case that was conducted by Glenn Gibbs, one of our advocates in Lincolnshire. Glenn Gibbs, Advocacy - Lincolnshire For many years it had been Hannah s dream to join the army. It wasn t long after joining that her ambition and passion led her to become an Officer. Sadly, while serving in the Army, Hannah sustained a serious injury which led to her becoming permanently disabled. The injury was not her fault, but her disability meant that Hannah was discharged her dream of an Army career was over. Hannah applied for a disability pension from the MOD, as she was unable to work again. Following the incident, Hannah suffered from depression and used secondary mental health services. Anxiety became a major factor in her life and tasks she took for granted that she could very ably perform before her accident became much more difficult, even impossible in some cases. Hannah s initial request for assistance from an advocate was to help her to prepare for a pension appeal hearing as reading transcripts regarding her case caused her such anxiety and distress that she could not write what was needed without support. The advocate and Hannah arranged regular structured meetings for her to comment on information she had been given and made summaries at each stage to incorporate her views in a final statement. At first Hannah could not even look at the information without becoming anxious and emotional. However, as time progressed and with the support of the advocate, her confidence grew and she began to tackle and challenge the intricacies of her complex case. Over time she began to write notes on the summaries she and the advocate had written and finally she felt able to put together her own personal statement for her hearing. The advocate s approach to supporting Hannah meant that she felt able to tackle issues that were difficult, and felt impossible for her before. Hannah attended the hearing, and in doing so, increased her pension award, which will enable her to have a better quality of life. Equally as important is the fact that she has now regained the skills she thought she no longer had....her confidence grew and she began to challenge the intricacies of her complex case... 6 This is an abridgment of the advocacy case and does not represent the complete process. Names have been changed.

7 Why work... in Training and Consultancy? John Woodhouse is our Training Co-ordinator. Here he talks about his journey from service user to supporting a team of trainers. 1. How did you start working for Speaking Up? Years ago I was shy, so I joined Speaking Up as member of Young People Speaking Up which is advocacy for young people and so much more. After being a member I got more involved with Speaking Up as a volunteer doing all kinds of things including helping out with Parliament - an important meeting where people with learning difficulties speak up for other people with learning difficulties in Cambridgeshire. I helped out with Louder, which is a newsletter that goes out to people with learning difficulties, and I did some Consultancy and Training. There was also a time when I was on the Board of Trustees, first as a Trustee, then as a Chairperson. Then there was a job in Speaking Up, so Speaking Up gave me an interview for a job and I got it. I am still working at Speaking Up today with a lot more confidence as a Training Coordinator. In my job I support a small team to deliver training. 2. What do you enjoy most about your role as Training Coordinator? In my job, I enjoy helping people to develop and get to where they want to be. We do this, by creating training that is right for them. We get to help all kinds of people including people who don t work directly with people with disabilities - the Police, Social Workers, Nurses, Psychologists - by doing Disability Awareness training. We do training for staff who work with people with learning difficulties to help them work in a more empowering way. We train people with learning difficulties for support with interviews and meeting training, that includes trustees training or forum training. We also get to help people with Consultancy by listening to people with learning difficulties and providing information about what people with learning difficulties want. We also get to help people with making their information accessible by doing advice or training or working on their document. In Consultancy and Training there is someone else who leads publications where the projects that Speaking Up do are packaged up and sold as products that tell other people how to do it. In Publications there are also accessible booklets made by and for people with learning difficulties. 3. What kind of challenges do you face in delivering training? There are so many people out there who might not have heard of us or know about what we do. It is important to get the message out. 4. What do you find the most rewarding thing about your job? It is rewarding when it s clear that we have made a positive difference with the work we have done. So please give us feedback, so we can make sure that we keep making a difference! 5. What do you enjoy most about working for Speaking Up? Speaking Up is a great place to work, because it has lots of great positive people and it does lots of great positive things. To contact John call / John.Woodhouse@speakingup.org 7

8 Buy a Big Box for a school near you The Big Box is a tried and tested self-advocacy tool kit that helps young people with learning difficulties gain the confidence to speak up for themselves. You can help teachers to achieve the outcomes of Every Child Matters by buying them a Big Box It gives young people the confidence to voice their opinions both to other young people and to adults. We feel it makes them ready for the world of adulthood, ready to leave school and make sure in the world that is coming after school they have got the power to go out and say This is what I want, listen to me. Julia Weston, Headteacher, Samuel Pepys Special School For more information about how you can help a school that matters to you by buying a Big Box, please call Clare Wilson on CONTACT SPEAKING UP: call us: us: info@speakingup.org visit the website: Head Office is open from 9.00am till 5.00pm Independent Mental Capacity Advocacy Hotline: New Publications! Speaking Up's team of writers have been working on new accessible publications! The next one in the pipeline is called Keeping Myself Clean and is designed to give other people with learning difficulties information and pictures to help them remember what they need to do to keep themselves clean and fresh. One member of the focus group, said: "What I like about working on the booklets is that I can learn things that I didn't know before. Like things about washing your hands properly (doing the backs for example)" To order your copy of Keeping Myself Clean, or to order any of our publications, please call The Write Idea on , quoting NEWSLETTER, or you can andy@writeidea.co.uk Donate Speaking Up needs your support to continue helping people with learning difficulties and mental health problems to speak up for themselves and achieve greater confidence and happier lives through our projects and services. If you would like to make a donation to Speaking Up, please call Gemma or Tom on , or visit our website: