I’m ending 2019 by looking back at some of the issues I’ve written about this year.
Generally, I’ve covered the good stuff we need more of and the bad stuff we definitely need less of.
Thanks to everyone I’ve worked with (quoted and not) about human rights, disability, learning disability, social care, equality, diversity and campaigning.
So here’s what we need more of and less of in 2020 and beyond, based on what I’ve written about:
This post is based on a Twitter thread and reflects some of the issues that feature in my book, Made Possible, which is being published on 28 May 2020.
Paul Williams, former champion runner, is now a fledgling public speaker thanks to a new project connecting people who use support services with their local communities (pic: NDTi)
Paul Williams has a learning disability and was once an athlete. Years in institutional care meant he didn’t mention his talent. With the Time to Connect project, which I wrote about in the Guardian today, he dug out his medals, has done a local talk and is now writing his life story.
Williams, his care organisation and volunteer are part of the Time to Connect community inclusion project. This encourages stronger links between people using care services and their neighbourhoods, and ensures they become more active citizens. Time To Connect is a partnership between social inclusion charity NDTi(National Development Team for Inclusion) and Timebanking UK, the national charity that helps people to share time and skills.
So far, Time to Connect has involved 265 people: 92 care staff, 102 older people, 39 learning disabled people, 10 people with mental health support needs and 22 time bank members. An interim reportdescribes positive outcomes for all participants: “The evaluation found numerous examples of increased confidence and motivation among care staff as well as changes to attitudes and behaviour. This is in turn leading to increased opportunities for people to connect with their communities.”
Time to Connect adds value to care work because support staff get a greater glimpse into people’s lives and characters, rather than focusing simply on their physical needs. Clive Brown, Paul’s support worker, says: “It makes the job more rewarding and it improves my relationship with the people I’m working with. It just makes me smile a little more.”
If you need social care support, why can’t services respond better to your individual aspirations – instead of fitting you into what’s already on offer?
This aim – shifting traditional social work practice to “community led” methods – is at the heart of a new programme I’ve just reported on.
Leeds is one of nine local authorities changing adult social care by developing community-led social work (in a nutshell – more local solutions). The councils are being supported in this drive by social inclusion charity National Development Team for Inclusion’s community-led support (CLS) programme. NDTi has just published an evaluation from the first year of delivery in the participating areas
Gail*, for example, has a learning difficulty, mobility problems and is prone to angry outbursts. Leeds council adult social care staff have supported her intermittently over a few years, helping with self-care and chaotic living conditions.
Recently, it considered commissioning weekly visits from a support worker to help Gail manage her home. But instead, under a new approach launched in Leeds last year, Gail met social work staff at community “talking points” – venues such as libraries and churches instead of at home or at the council. The neutral environment sparked different conversations about support. Gail said she wanted to volunteer and staff felt able to be more creative with her care.
A social worker supported Gail to explore opportunities at her community centre, where she began volunteering. Her self-esteem has grown, her personal appearance has improved and she has begun anger management classes.
Feedback from people like Gail involved in the new support method includes comments about staff such as “they listened to me” and “we did talk about the important things”.
The concept of community social work is not new, but demand for social care, pressure on staff and funding cuts mean less time and freedom to develop innovative solutions. The 2014 Care Act encourages community-focused support, but this has been hard to achieve. A difficulty in developing “strengths-based” solutions is well documented, for example, in recent guidance from Think Local Act Personal.
At Leeds, adult social services director Cath Roff says the council had two choices: “Either we go down the road of ever-tightening interpretation of eligibility criteria to manage resources, or try a new approach. Social work services are increasingly becoming the ‘border patrol’, policing in order to manage reducing budgets. None of us came into social care to do that.”
Martin, who has a mild learning disability and cerebral palsy, recently interviewed two engineers from the PWL production company and the experience boosted his confidence. “That was my first interview. I was nervous but I nailed it,” he says. “We recorded it first and then we edited it. I enjoyed coming up with questions.”
He also won the station’s producer of the year award for 2016-17. What would he do if was not at the station? “I wouldn’t know everyone here – they are like my family. I would be at home doing nothing or going out and spending money, but I want to save and become more independent.”
Online station Direction Radio is part of social care provider Surrey Choices’ day service programme. It helps people with physical or learning disabilities to develop skills in broadcast and production.
Some 19 DJs produce and present the shows reflecting all musical genres – from rock to pop, R&B and classical. Station manager Chris Fenn (who does not have a disability) explains that DJs have “a blank canvas” to create their slots, which last between one and three hours, and decide on everything from the jingle to the playlist. “I say to all the guys, ‘You do what you want to do with it’,” says Fenn. “It’s all their choice and that’s why it’s so diverse.”
You can read my report on Martin and his fellow DJs on the Guardian website (all photos from Surrey Choices).
Anxiety and mobility issues mean that 76-year-old Anna Bolton* is usually housebound. But regular calls to a free, confidential helpline for older people have helped her “feel normal”.
Bolton’s mental health deteriorated after she was widowed two years ago. Although she has had some support from local mental health counsellors in her native north-east England, help from Blackpool-based The Silver Line was “invaluable” and more immediate than waiting months for a counselling referral.
The Silver Line, created in 2013 by Esther Rantzen (who also created Childline), is a free, 24-hour, 365-day-a-year helpline offering information and friendship, and signposts people to local organisations for support or social activities.
“There’s still stigma about mental health,” says Bolton. “It’s often easier to speak to a stranger, and nice to know you can call day or night.”
Bolton, who has no family nearby, contacted the helpline after it was mentioned by a receptionist at her GP surgery. She is among the 10,000 people who call the helpline – often referred to as the Childline for older people – every week.
For my full report on the charity and the rise in mental health issues among older people, see the Guardian social care pages.
What does someone who is supported by social care look like?
Transforming stereotypical perceptions of social care is the aim of a new photography exhibition showing in London this month – some of the featured images are shown below.
SELF Season 2 is a collaboration between photographer Dean Belcher and social care provider Certitude.
Everyone featured in the exhibition is either connected with Certitude or with activities offered by Age UK Hounslow, west London. The project’s ambition is to use imagery “to depict the commonalities between people within social care rather than reinforcing the often-imposed barriers and roles that people are given”.
The new show follows the success of an exhibition (SELF: Portraits in Social Care) held in Brixton earlier this year.
* SELF: Portraits in Social Care is running until Thursday 28th September at Montague Hall, 30 Montague Rd, Hounslow TW3 1LD, Monday to Friday 3pm – 5pm. For further details, contact jmeyer@certitude.org.uk
The issue of how Surrey’s general wealth hides specific pockets of deprivation is outlined in a new report into the social and community impact of Watts Gallery Artists’ Village (WGAV), in Compton, about a 10 minute drive from Westborough.
The Journey, water-based oil on canvas, by Dena from HMP Send.
There are, as the report states, six prisons situated within 25 miles of the gallery, including two for young offenders and two for women. More than 420 prisoners and young offenders took part in workshops over the least year and WGAV has had an artist in residence at HMP Send for over 10 years.
Close Up, oil on canvas by Samantha from HMP Send, part of Watts Gallery’s community outreach work.
The report has been commissioned by Watts Gallery Trust and written by Helen Bowcock, a philanthropist and donor to WGAV and, as such, a “critical friend”. Bowcock argues that, despite the impression of affluence, Watts Gallery – Artists’ Village “is located in an area that receives significantly less public funding per capita than other areas of the UK”. The argument is that local arts provision in Surrey depends more on the charity and community sectors and voluntary income than it does elsewhere in the country (the concept that philanthropy, volunteering and so-called “big society” – RIP – only works in wealthy areas is something I wrote about in this piece a few years ago).
As public sector funding cuts continue and community-based projects are further decimated, Watt’s words are as relevant today as they were during his Victorian lifetime: “I paint ideas, not things. My intention is less to paint works that are pleasing to the eye than to suggest great thoughts which will speak to the imagination and the heart and will arouse all that is noblest and best in man.”
Brighton, mixed media on paper, by Jenny from HMP Send.
More information on the gallery’s community engagement and outreach programme is here.
Roy Warman’s wife, Phyllis, died in January 2015. Buoyed by well-wishers in the first few weeks of bereavement, the visits and telephone calls gradually dwindled, and he felt increasingly alone. Many of his friends have passed away, he does not have any family nearby and the couple never had children. He explains: “The longer it goes without speaking to someone, the harder it gets.” He describes loneliness as “one of the hardest things that you will encounter in life”, likening feeling low to “living in a void”.
Roy Warman credits Age UK with helping to turn his life around Photograph: Amanda Searle/Guardian
Today he is part of the charity Age UK’s telephone befriending service that matches older people with like-minded volunteers for friendship or phone calls. Roy has weekly phone calls with a volunteer he describes as “like the daughter I never had” and he also has regular visits from another volunteer as part of Age UK’s face-to-face befriending scheme.
The kind of weekly phone call or visit that Roy gets are among the solutions to help ease the loneliness epidemic affecting 1.2 million older people in England; I’ve written about this for the Guardian today.
Age UK says that 1.2 million older people are chronically lonely and that this has an adverse impact on mental health, and the challenge will increase as our population ages. In the next 20 years, England’s over-85 population is set to rise from nearly 1.3 million people to just under 2.8 million.
The UK’s Flamingo Chicks also delivers inclusive dance workshops overseas, this is a session at the Multikids Academy school in Accra, Ghana (photograph: Flamingo Chicks)
“It is the one place she can be herself” is how one parent described the inclusive dance school I wrote about for the Guardian last year.
I’ve been following the progress of the Bristol-based Flamingo Chicks, which has just published its latest impact report and is now preparing for its spring show tomorrow, Saturday (you can read more about the background to the organisation in this original piece).
An inclusive dance session run by Flamingo Chicks (photograph: Flamingo Chicks)The three-year-old community interest company, which has English National Ballet artistic director Tamara Rojo as a patron, brings disabled and non-disabled children together to do ballet.
Over 2000 children and young people aged 2 to 25 attended the classes and workshops in 2016-17 through workshops across the UK and regular classes in Bradford, York, Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds and London. The campaigning slogan is “ballet not barriers” and while the majority of young participants have a range of physical disabilities, learning disabilities and autism, 22% are not disabled.
The need for more more inclusive arts groups is reflected in a recent survey by charity Scope and parenting website Mumsnet. It showed that four in 10 parents of disabled children say their child rarely or never has the opportunity to play with non-disabled children. Josie and her helper Joe at an inclusive dance session (photograph: Flamingo Chicks)
Josie Wilkins, who has a learning disability, attended mainstream dance classes with the help of her older sister, but as she got older the “gap” between her and the other pupils became wider and she had to leave. The family found Flamingo Chicks, where Josie, 10, who is also visually impaired, is a regular. She recently had major surgery but returned to class as soon as she was out of hospital, wearing, Ingrid adds “a pink tutu, and dancing in her wheelchair using just one arm!”
Recognising that preconceptions about ballet may put off boys, Flamingo Chicks launched boys only groups and introduced more male teachers and volunteers (in the last year, 38% of participants were boys). The company’s recent Dad & Me campaign also focused on the challenges fathers face when caring for a disabled child. Of 250 fathers who participated in a survey as part of the campaign, only 10% had told their boss they had a disabled child, mostly due to fear that it affect their career.
Alfie Pearson, who attends the inclusive dance sessions, with his dad and sister (photograph: Flamingo Kids)
The organisation has also delivered training and workshops overseas (I’ve blogged about this before), so its model can be emulated elsewhere. The overseas work includes collaborations with the special school in Ghana (pictured at the top of this post), a country once described as “the worst place in the world to be disabled”.
Find out more about Flamingo Chicks and its #balletnotbarriers campaign on the website, Facebook or Twitter
Tech entrepreneur Alexandre Mars is known in his native France as the French Bill Gates. Having made his fortune creating and selling tech startups, Mars, 41, founded Epic Foundation two years ago. In an interview for The Guardian, Mars explains how his orgnaisation aims to encourage tech-savvy investors to donate to children’s and young people’s charities it has selected.
Mars believes a debate is needed “to explore opportunities and strategies for increasing giving”. At at time when trust in charities is at an all-time low following criticism of some traditional fundraising practices, new ways of engaging donors through technology is surely needed. Such challenges are expected to feature in next year’s House of Lords select committee report on charities, with its focus on digital innovation and financial sustainability.
How does he define the role of philanthropists versus the state? “We need policymakers, we need strong leaders … [but] they don’t have enough money, so where is it [the money]? It’s with the corporate world most of the time, so how can we [business] just step up?”
