Category Archives: Uncategorized

Health, media & communication, Music & arts, Third sector, Uncategorized

The artists redrawing our perceptions of disability

Bengali Welcome, by David Constantine

Photographer David Constantine – he’s the creator of the arresting and uplifting image above, Bengali Welcome, above – has a theory as to why his subjects relax once they’re in front of his lens; his wheelchair breaks the ice.

Constantine’s work is being shown as part of the inaugural Bloomsbury Art Fair that opens today at the Goodenough College, Mecklenburgh Square, London. As well as works by popular artists Banksy and Damien Hirst, there are pieces for sale by new and emerging artists. The three-day charitiable event raises money for spinal injury-related charities.

Constantine, for example, began taking pictures as a teenager and sold his bike to buy his first camera. While on a working holiday in Australia in 1982 he broke his neck in a diving accident and became quadriplegic. Paralysed from the shoulders down, he gave up photography for a year. But while he wasn’t able to pick up his camera, he continued to “see” images. As he writes on his website: “During that year I realised that I was still ‘seeing’ pictures, choosing images in my head even to the point of deciding on film types and composition I would use for a particular shot. The only thing I lacked was the physical ability to use a camera. I realised that this was a ridiculous reason for giving up and all it need take was some adaptations to my camera and wheelchair to enable me to take pictures.”

Exactly a year to the day of his injury he began the process of taking pictures again. He travels with his work for Motivation, the international disability charity he co-founded, and his main subjects are people in their own environments. As he says, “the disadvantages I foresaw with my photography after becoming a wheelchair user have turned into advantages.” He has developed different skills and enhanced others: “I am so conspicuous that it has made me bolder, I am happy to go and ask someone for their picture. If I can’t communicate verbally I make it very obvious that I would like to take their picture, people make it quite clear whether they are happy for me to photograph them or not.”

Love, by Sophie Morgan

Among the participating artists is Sophie Morgan, who was runner up to Britain’s Missing Top Models. Morgan had a car accident in 2003 that left her paralysed and in a wheelchair for life. Her beautiful piece, Love, is above.

Morgan’s website declares that she is (in this order) an “Artist, Portraitist, Writer, Arts Psychoth

Cuts, Health, Housing, Learning disability, Mental health, Older people, Social exclusion, Third sector, Uncategorized, Wellbeing

Dilnot: reaction round up

Today the Dilnot commission on social care published its conclusions in its Fairer Care Funding report. Among its findings are that care costs should be capped and the means-tested threshold increased under major changes to the funding of adult social care in England.

The report is a chance to finally fix a shattered system, there will be widespready reaction and analysis later today and beyond to what Dilnot himself calls a once-in-a-lifetime chance to overhaul social care but for now, here’s a selection of today’s responses which I’ll try and update throughout the day.

Sue Brown, Head of Public Policy at the national deafblind charity Sense: “Sense welcomes the Dilnot report, and in particular the key finding that additional public funding for adult social care is urgently required. But we are concerned that the media focus is only on older people which obscures some critical aspects. We believe the report clearly shows that not only can the Government afford to support disabled people of all ages, but crucially as a society we can’t afford not to. It is now up to the Government to fund adult social care so that it gives disabled people of all ages quality of life. For deafblind people social care means communication and mobility support, not just personal care.”

Julia Unwin, the Chief Executive of JRF and the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust (a non-for-profit provider of housing and care services): “Today marks the most concrete and credible step for years. I believe that the proposed reforms have the potential to bring about a radical step-change in how we value social care, how we think about disability, and how we all – as individuals and as a society – plan and prepare for longer lives.
It is positive to hear commitments from all the main parties to set aside party differences and consider the Dilnot report with the consideration it clearly warrants.
The JRF now urges the Coalition Government to abide by its promises to deliver a White Paper in the next six to nine months. It would be a tragedy for this, one of the most pressing and defining issues of our age, to be kicked, yet again, into the long grass.”

Jeremy Hughes, Chief Executive, Alzheimer’s Society: “Today’s welcome report could bring to an end the scandal of the colossal Dementia Tax where every year tens of thousands of families are left to pay all their care costs whilst other diseases are paid for by the NHS. The government mustn’t miss this opportunity to right a wrong that is destroying lives. In a new system we must end the postcode lottery that gives different support depending on local authority. The Dilnot Commission has given the coalition government the opportunity to show that it is a caring government. Pending implementation they must also show they care, protecting social care spending in the way they are doing for health.”

TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber: “The TUC welcomes the increase in funding for the care of the elderly over the next few years, and the news that social care will be free for those who become disabled before the age of 40.
“The introduction of a national eligibility assessment should avoid a ‘postcode lottery’ and make it possible for those receiving social care to move around the country without losing their care provision.
“The TUC believes that social care should be provided free for those who need it, and funded from general taxation. The Dilnot Commission’s proposals could, however, be transformed into this NHS model by continually reducing the level of the cap on care costs. The government must not set too high a cap – a level above £50,000 per person would mean that families could still face losing their homes to pay for the vital care they need.”

Gordon Morris, managing director of Age UK Enterprises: “The Dilnot commission report delivers a clear call to action to the financial services industry to work with government to develop the innovative products needed to fund long-term care. Existing products, such as equity release and annuities, could present a solution, but far more has to be done to build flexibility into these products to increase access and ensure these products evolve to meet changing financial needs.”

Stephen Burke, founder of social enterprise United for All Ages: “Under the commission’s regressive proposals, the winners would be richer families whose inheritance will be relatively protected, while most families will face a more confusing and potentially costly care system. The proposed cap on care costs will still result in some older people being forced to sell their homes to pay for care and related costs.
“The proposals aim to reform the current inadequate system for funding care. But they would lead to a more complex, fragmented and confusing care system … This could be seen as a care ‘poll tax’ for the so-called squeezed middle.”

An interesting reaction from by social worker “Sarah Smith“: “It is local authorities that take the hit from policies devised by central government, and we can only hope that all parties are brave enough to act together for the country’s interests rather than consider of their own chances at the ballot box. We deserve much better than that.”

Labour leader Ed Miliband: “The last thing Britain needs is for Andrew Dilnot’s proposals to be put into the long grass. We three party leaders are of similar age and the same ­generation. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity which our generation must address.”

Which? executive director Richard Lloyd: “Consumers tell us that long-term care is their top health care priority* so we welcome these recommendations and urge the Government to act sooner rather than later. If private insurance is to play a part in funding long-term care, then we need to learn lessons from the past, where products have either failed to meet people’s needs or have been mis-sold. This will be a new market with a clean slate so it’s important that strong consumer protection is in place from the start.”

Michelle Mitchell, charity director at Age UK, tells the Guardian that the report set out “a clear blueprint” for sustainable reform. Production of a white paper by next spring was ambitious but achievable, Mitchell said. But she warned: “Delay beyond Easter would be indefensible.”

Mark Goldring, chief executive of learning disability charity Mencap, said: “Now is the time for monumental change and it is vital that the government does not bury social care reform.”

John Adams, Voluntary Organisations Disability Group (VODG) general secretary: “Today is about more simply demanding more money – vital though additional funding is – it is about urgent reform of a broken system. The Dilnot commission has taken great pains to build cross-party consensus; ministers now need to match the warm rhetoric with which they greeted today’s report with swift action. The government must find the courage to put its money where its mouth is, succeed where previous administrations have failed and exploit what Dilnot himself describes as a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to create a fair and sustainable system of social care.”

Senior Fellow at The King’s Fund, Richard Humphries: “The budget deficit should not be used as a reason for inaction. This is a long-term issue and questions of affordability go beyond the current economic situation. The additional public expenditure needed to fund these proposals is less than 0.25 per cent of gross domestic product – this should not be too high a price to pay for providing a care system fit for the 21st century….Where they have failed in the past, politicians from all parties must now seize the best opportunity in a generation to ensure that people can access the care and support they deserve in later life.”

Su Sayer, learning disability charity United Response’s chief executive: “The report’s recommendations are the first step towards creating a better system which ensures that people in need of care receive it, funded in a way that is not only fair, but seen to be fair….Whether viewing this economically or morally, we cannot afford to ignore these recommendations, which is why we urge all political parties to work together towards a better social care system for all.”

Guy Parckar, acting director of policy, campaigns and communications at Leonard Cheshire Disability: “The system as it stands is creaking at the seams, with more and more people missing out on the care that they need. This report must be seen as a clear call for action. All of the political parties must come together with one agenda and that is to agree a fairer settlement for social care. We cannot go on with disabled and older people missing out on care because of a system that simply cannot cope with the demands placed upon it…Too often disabled people with significant social care needs can be charged into poverty by our social care system. People are unable to work, unable to save, unable to buy a home as any income or assets will simply be taken to cover the costs of care. This is a critically important recommendation that could make an immense difference, and it is absolutely imperative that the Government acts on it.”

Domini Gunn, Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) Director of Public Health and Vulnerable Communities: “In reforming the funding of social care, we urge the government to follow Dilnot’s recommendation to review the scope for improving the integration of adult social care with wider care and support system. This must include housing, and housing support, providers and could help drive a more preventative approach, incentivised through funding arrangements.”

Sir Stuart Etherington, Chief Executive of NCVO: “This review makes major strides towards identifying how we can achieve an affordable, sustainable and fair funding system for all adults in the UK. The challenge now falls to all parties to resist turning the review into a political football and to prioritise responding swiftly and decisively. It is the most vulnerable who will suffer if we cannot seize this golden opportunity to improve the funding of adult social care.”

Big society, Housing, Social exclusion, Third sector, Uncategorized, Volunteering

The big society bypass


Above, Ian Harvey, from heroin and rough sleeping to charity volunteer, gardening enthusiast and Chelsea Flower Show winner.

The big society concept might be a touch nebulous – as its creator Philip Blond effectively admitted this week – but one transparent element is the fact that volunteers are its backbone.

The drive is a potentially all-inclusive one as the big society dream is of a volunteering renaissance that unites the young (nothing else paid on offer), the more mature (nothing else to do in well-heeled retirement) and the professional (nothing as good as a bit of CSR in the city to justify that fat salary and boost the CV).

But any official messages about big society bypass a huge swath of society; the homeless.

The vulnerable are excluded from the big society agenda and a potential volunteering resource remains untapped, as new research published this week by homelessness charity St Mungo’s argues. The organisation suggests that volunteering can help the homeless move from social exclusion to being active in their community.

Its figures show that only 14% of around 200 St Mungo’s clients and staff surveyed (84 of the 200 were clients) think homeless people are included in society. The report from St Mungo’s, Enough Room: is society big enough for homeless people?, has been released to coincide with the charity’s action week to raise awareness about the social exclusion of the homeless. According to the latest figures, 3,975 people were seen rough sleeping in 2010/11 on the streets of London – a rise of eight per cent from the previous year.

The charity says there’s a real wish among those it supports to give something back. Of the homeless clients surveyed, 70% wanted to volunteer to “give something back to their local community” or to “help other people.”

Investing time in supporting vulnerable people to volunteer can bring long-term benefits – stability, greater self-esteem and social integration and the chance to develop new skills.

I recently came across the Crown Centre in the deprived area of Stonehouse, Plymouth, for example. The centre supports vulnerable people through projects such as the Plymouth Foodbank, ensuring those in crisis do not go hungry. Every week, the centre relies on its 47 regular volunteers to run coffee and lunch clubs supporting 120 service users. Half the volunteers have health or dependency issues and are “supported volunteers”, needing more guidance and supervision than their peers donating time for free.

Back in London, St Mungo’s client turned volunteer Ian Harvey (scroll up to the video above), is the kind of volunteer we could have more of. Ian, a former rough sleeper and ex-heroin addict, has been supported by St Mungo’s to work with the charity’s community gardening scheme, Putting Down Roots. Ian has tuned his life around with specialist support and from involvement in the volunteering scheme; not so long ago he was self-harming and sleeping on the streets, now he’s the proud owner of a silver award from the Chelsea Flower Show and is looking forward to winning gold next time.

Roger is another St Mungo volunteer, a former drug-user who slept rough, he volunteers for the charity’s employment team and encourages clients to improve their basic computer literacy skills. He explains: “I realised that the key to me moving on with my life was training and qualifying. It also became very clear that I would get nowhere without knowing my way around a computer …Since November last year, I have been volunteering for St Mungos’ employment team and have been helping more clients get online with weekly drop in sessions and support with basic computing courses.”

Lorette, a volunteer peer advisor with St Mungo’s resettlement service, explains the strength of the ex-homeless supporting those who still need support: “I think the client feels they can relate to you more if you have been through what they have. You can swap stories and experiences, which I think enables them to open up to you more…Volunteering is great for your self esteem and confidence, especially if you have been out of work for a long time, there’s new skills to learn, great people to meet and a great feeling of self worth that you really are helping people and doing something really worthwhile.”

Yet so far the big society drive has largely failed to include or capture the attention of the vulnerable. As the St Mungo’s research demonstrates, the neediest in society neither feel part of the campaign nor understand what it stands for (although frankly they’re not alone in that latter complaint). A big society, but one that’s currently too small for the vulnerable.

Big society, Social exclusion, Third sector, Uncategorized, Young people, Youth crime

Terrors on two wheels become social cyclists: the teens transforming their community

From antisocial behaviour to force for social good; Buzz Bikes, Wales.
It’s as much a symbol of antisocial behaviour as hoodies drinking alcopops at bus stops; on the corner of most streets in the middle of most neighbourhoods in the UK, you’ll usually find a gang of beanie-hatted teens, posturing on their bikes before racing up the pavement and causing the locals no end of distress.

But in the small community of Blaina, in Blaenau, Gwent, a deprived area where alcohol and drug addiction is common and where young people have little else to do but get into trouble, a group of teenagers on bikes have proved the exception to this stereotype. They boys have turned their cycling from an activity that caused local havoc into a force for social good.

The seven young people had faced problems at school, some had had run-ins with the police and all of them hung around the town centre on their bikes. The boys, recognising their problems stemmed partly from boredom and a lack of local facilities, heard about the Prince’s Trust and applied for money from the organisation’s community cash awards scheme. With match funding from the Welsh Assembly Government, Buzz Bikes was born in October 2008.

The outdoor cycling club offers a diversion with bicycle maintenance training, health and safety training and organised cycle rides. The group has designed its own logo, now emblazoned on hoodies and T-shirts, and the youngsters runs a small shop in town hiring and repairing bicycles; if the local police knock on their doors now, it is to hire a Buzz Bike (the boys have loaned bikes to local officers).

Around 50 young people now belong to Buzz Bikes while the core founding members have learned skills including negotiating, budgeting and working in a team. None of the original members has been in trouble since starting the scheme.

The founding members now want to give something back to the charity that’s supported them so in October this year, they plan to do the Prince’s Trust Adventure Challenge to the Himalayas. All team members have to raise £3,700 each for The Prince’s Trust in order to take part in the challenge – hiking, biking and white-water rafting 286 kilometres in seven days. The money raised will go back to The Prince’s Trust to help more young people.

The Buzz Bikes team

I heard about the project earlier this year when it won the Prince’s Trust Community Impact Award, sponsored by Balfour Beatty, to recognise the positive contribution of young people to the community. I was reminded about it while watching a recent BBC story about the Bike Works project in America to teach children who might otherwise be on the streets how to build and maintain bikes. The project has been a runaway success but, with public services scarce, it is a victim of that success – increasingly finding itself providing emergency care by offering children food, or a place to sleep, rather than concentrating on its central aim.

As Bike Works’ director, Kitty Heite told the BBC: “So many kids are falling through the gaps, and it’s the responsibility of society to help them..We aren’t social services, and we could do so much more with Bike Works, with the fun thing, if we weren’t having to do that. Making the voluntary sector responsible for the glue in people’s lives is a little scary.”

Heite’s words stress an emerging theme in the current cuts climate; that an over-reliance on community-based enterprises might backfire and distract organisations from their founding princples. I’m not suggesting that the Buzz Bikes teenagers are expected to (or could) provide a social safety net if local public services decline, but I do hope that their core aims – what the American Bike Works director calls “the fun thing”, the diversion caused by an interesting activity – will long continue.

* To support Buzz Bikes/the Prince’s Trust, visit the group’s Just Giving page.

Housing, media & communication, Older people, Uncategorized

Silver Surfers’ Day

It’s Silver Surfers’ Day and even if you don’t like the name of the annual event (for something so future-focused, it sounds dated), who can argue with its aim of promoting digital technology among older people?

Take 79-year-old David Le Clair, for example, who’s learning new computer skills which he hopes will help him to write a book about his life. David is a resident of James Hill House, an extra-care scheme run by housing association Octavia Housing in west London, and has just joined his social landlord’s free IT training project for older people.

David Le Clair in the digital techology room of his extra-care housing scheme

According to Digital Unite, the provider of digital skills in the community behind today’s annual event, around nine million people, many of whom are aged over 50, “continue to be excluded from large parts of daily life because they have no access to a computer and are not online”. Silver Surfers’ Day is the culmination of a week of events to encourage computer skills in the community, aiming to introduce older people to technology at a local level through libraries, community centres, schools and sheltered housing schemes, with taster sessions, for example. This year’s Silver Surfers’ Day coincides with Digital Day, part of Adult Learners Week.

At James Hill House, the digital course David is on is being taught using extra large screens and keyboards and shows older people how to use the internet, webcams and how to create Word documents. Funding from the government’s former Get Digital programme means residents now have their own camcorder, colour printer, TV and Wii games console too. The digital room is always open but residents can also use a laptop if they want to use the technology in their own flats.

The aim, says Octavia Housing, is to enable older people not only to use these technologies to connect with their family and friends, but to pursue their own projects of interest. For David, a former policeman, it is a chance to use the internet to reconnect with his past including his time in Nigeria where he lived for over 50 years. He’s hoping this will help him write his life story.

Vlado Veljanoski, James Hill House scheme manager, says the benefits go beyond simply sending emails or looking up things online: “Our residents now help to put together quiz nights and have developed interests in creating their own websites; two of them would like to showcase their paintings on the internet, others have interests in flowers and plants.”

Veljanoski and the James Hill House residents know that getting online brings more than simply social benefits but new research published yesterday suggests that the practical advantages are not exploited by older people. Research by the Payments Council, the body that sets the UK’s payments strategy, showed that, despite increasing numbers of over-55s getting online, not many take advantage of online or telephone banking. In a survey of 4,500 adults across the UK earlier this month, says the Payments Council, only 32% of over 55s use either telephone or internet banking, and only 24% of over 65s, compared with 60% of 16-24 year olds, 71% of 25-34 year olds, 69% of 35-44 year olds and 57% of 45-54 year olds.

While technology allows isolated or vulnerable people to access online social networks – to complement face to face interaction, not replace it – digitial inclusion is equally important for an ageing popultion from a more practical perspective, encouraging new, time-saving ways to manage daily chores, accessing public services or locating information online. Given that public sector and gassroots organisations are key to spreading the digital message in communities, how long before the digital drive is adversely affected by the spending cuts impacting on other local services and campaigns?

Whether silver surfers are just dipping a toe into the digital waters like David in west London, or are on the same tech-savvy wavelength as their younger counterparts (sorry – the title of today’s campaign makes obvious puns irresistable), the reasons to get online are brilliantly put by an older IT-fan from a previous blogpost, “When you get to your 90s you feel you want to keep up with things.. it makes you feel you’re up with the world.”

Education, Learning disability, media & communication, Uncategorized, Young people

Art for autism’s sake

1 Comment

Tim, 17, had not uttered a word for five years when he arrived at Beechwood College. Two years into his time at the specialist residential college in Cardiff, Wales, the teenager with Asperger’s syndrome started speaking. Two years after that, at 21, he passed his GCSE Art and Design with a grade B, had a work placement at Tesco under his belt and has since left the college and got a job.

Beechwood, a further education college for students aged 16 and over with an autistic spectrum disorder (ASD), uses art and creativity programmes as the backbone of its personalised education programme. Students study music, 2D art, 3D art, digital media and horticulture and learn to articulate themseleves through these activities.

Batik Tiger created by a student at Beechwood College
Beechwood College student draws pebbles after visiting the beach in a project led by University of Glamorgan lecturers working at the college

Earlier this month, to mark World Autism Awareness Day, the college launched a national art competition to showcase the creativity of young people with autism and related conditions. The competition project, Create! Art for Autism, is open to those aged 11 to 25 who are formally diagnosed with an ASD, with the aim of showing that art can not only encourage learning and instill lifelong skills but, as Tim’s case shows, also boost quality of life and future prospects. Shortlisted entries to the Beechwood-led scheme will be exhibited in a national art tour, starting at The Old Library in Cardiff and moving to London galleries from the summer.

I know my sister has developed a newfound independence and confidence thanks to activities from painting to pottery, bakery, art and horticulture during her time with the Camphill movement. The Beechwood competition gets my vote not only because it encourages young people with special needs to find their own voice through creativity and practical action, but because it aims to bring the artistic talents of the learning disabled to a wider, more mainstream audience.

Darren Jackson, principal of Beechwood College, explains: “It’s my belief that creativity is essential to those with an autistic spectrum disorder on more than just a therapeutic or enjoyment level. We have seen how engaging in such programmes can transform young people who previously struggled to make themselves heard.”

Jackson says stop motion animation is a particularly effective way of encouraging confidence and self esteem: “The use of this creative multimedia tool has enabled many of our students to gain greater confidence and self esteem which, indirectly has resulted in them demonstrating a greater willingness to share their thoughts and ideas within their peer group. Many students who in the past have displayed high levels of anxiety are now willing to record voiceovers for their animated characters and use them as a vehicle for communication.”

Competition entries in categories including 2D, 3D and digital media art, can be submitted until June 10. The judging panel includes Brendan Stuart Burns, artist lecturer at The University of Glamorgan, Lucinda Bredin, editor at Bonhams Magazine, Hugh Morgan, chief executive of Autism Cymru and Beechwood’s Jackson. Finalists will be announced on June 24 and the awards ceremony will take place in Cardiff on July 24.

media & communication, Music & arts, Third sector, Uncategorized

Being visionary about sight loss

A new exhibition aims to challenge prejudice about sight loss and explore notions of sensory perception by showcasing works by visually impaired artists inspired by the sense of smell.

The two-day pop-up exhibition, Scents and Sensibility, is organised by sight loss charity RNIB and opens at central London’s Vaad Gallery on Monday. The theme is fragrance expressed through exhibits including painting, sculpture and photography. Read about it in my Society Guardian piece today.

Artist Rachel Gadsden will be exhibiting her work at the Scents and Sensibility show in London from Monday

Big society, Education, Employment, Third sector, Uncategorized, Young people

60 reasons to be cheerful

Need a reason to smile amid the cuts? How about 60? A bold new exhibition which opened last week presents the 60 bright young things making a difference by volunteering in schools across London.

City Year corps member Rodney Williams

City Year corps member Eleanor Cooper

The exhibition, Full of Purpose, was lauched last week and presents portrait shots, as shown above, of members of City Year London, a project that involves 18-25-year-olds mentoring and supporting primary school pupils.

Based on a successful American model of civic duty that began in 1988, you can read more about it in this post written for The Social Issue by corps member guest blogger Alex Scott. Founded in 1988, more than 12,000 corps members have helped millions of children in 20 US cities and in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The shots by documentary photographer Katie Higson are exhibited at City Year London’s offices in north London until Thursday. As well as the images, the exhibiton includes information about the young people’s work and their motivations for giving a year to serve in schools and communities.

As volunteer Alex says: “I joined City Year because I wanted to spend a year doing something more challenging…as my long term goals lie in entering a career in counselling or therapy, a mentoring role was something that excited me. City Year has proved to be both challenging and incredibly fulfilling. Often it is hard to measure the effect you are having on a day-to-day basis, but every time I am able to see progression in one of the children it makes the long hours worthwhile.”

For more information, contact City Year London.