National Forum of People with Learning Disabilities

26th and 27thOctober, Burleigh Court, Loughborough

Attending:
Kerry Martin (co chair) supported by Hannah Leach
Jonathan Hurley (co chair) supported by Aidan Pollitt
Carrie Ann Beavan (vice chair) supported by KayPerry (first part of the meeting) and Vicky Tantony
Jason Muldowney(North East) supported by Dave Norman and Alison Strong
Jenny Carter (North West) supported by Dene Donalds
Alison Owen (Yorkshire and Humber) supported by Hayley Wilcock
Ian Davies (East Midlands) supported by
Marie O’Sullivan
Neil Davies (West Midlands) supported by Sarah Offley
Carol Lee MBE (Eastern) supported by Alex Morris
Tina Walker (South East) supported by Holly Smith
Tammy Peapell (South West) supported by Kate Spenceley
Robert Daniels (London) supported by Kay Perry
Jo Jordan (West Midlands co-ordinator)
Lucy Virgo, Angela Ellis, Melissa Peacock(Inclusion North)

Guests:
Jill Davies (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities) and Richard Lawrence (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities)

Jason Hyde and Ian Hubbard (Eastern regional forum)

Who couldn’t come?
Christian Raphael (rep for people with complex needs) it was Christian’s 30th Birthday! /
Welcome to the meeting
Alison welcomed everyone to the meeting.
She explained that the co and vice chairs were having a meeting with Inclusion North to work together on some issues and would be late into the meeting.
People introduced themselves and said where they were from. /
Minutes from the last meeting
Alison took everyone through the minutes from the previous meeting.
There were a few corrections that we will make on the minutes.
Neil pointed out that the film of the panel session hasn’t been shared. We haven’t been able to do this as yet as we haven’t had consent from the Department of Health – we are working on this. /
Regional reports
Neil from the West Midlands presented his regional report, the link is here

Neil talked about Birmingham People First losing their funding. The group talked about the impact of funding cuts and how some areas are campaigning against them (with petitions etc)
Tammy from the South West presented her regional report, the link is here

Robert agreed with the big issues Tammy has raised from her region. Jason (from the Eastern region) talked about safe places funding in Norfolk – the council are safe place champions. Jason (NE rep) said shops display safe place logos in their window to show they are a safe place scheme. /
Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities Hate Crime project and work
Jill and Richard shared the work that they have been doing around ‘Addressing Disability Hate Crime’.
You can find out more about it here:

The project is looking at what disability hate crime schemes work best across the country. The group have already met with the Crown Prosecution Service to share stories about how disability hate crime affects people with learning disabilities.
Alison attended the meeting for the forum and shared her story.
Jill and Richard had three asks for forum members:
  1. On line Survey - For those members who run hate crime schemes or know of local hate crime schemes to complete the on line survey. The Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities has launched the survey to map the current hate crime schemes and projects across the country. They could include disability awareness training in schools, safe place schemes, support for a person to get a circles of support etc. You can find the survey here please do pass on to anyone you know who runs such a scheme or project
  2. Paid co-researcher work - The Foundation are planning to visit some of the hate crime schemes who completed the survey. They would be really happy for members of the forum to come along as co researchers (they will be paid) if the Foundation visit a scheme near their local area
  3. Co-running sharing events in Autumn 2017 - Next Autumn 2017 the Foundation plan to run events to promote the project findings in all nine English regions and would like to co-run them with members of the forum. Jill will be in contact with you over the next few months to find out if this is possible.
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The co and vice chairs came into the meeting and went through the rules
Kerry, Hannah, Carrie Ann, Kay, Jonathan, Aiden, Angela and Lucy had all been in a separate meeting up to now.
So, when they came back everyone introduced themselves.
Kerry and Jonathan said a little bit about why they and others had been out of the meeting. They explained that there was a bit of a hiccup that the group were trying to sort out. Everyone involved is trying really hard to sort this out and they will have another meeting on 22nd December about this.
Kerry and Carrie Ann went through the meeting rules. This is because there have been some new rules added.
To do: Can people let Lucy know their comments or questions about the rules if they have any? These will need to be sent back by Wednesday 9th November. /
About our region
Tina gave a presentation about the South East region. You can see the South East region report and Tina’s presentation below

Tina told the group:
  • Some members of the region have to travel for 3 and a half hours to get to meetings
  • The big issues for people in the South East were housing, benefit cuts and employment, and transport
  • There is lots of good work being doing by self-advocacy groups in the region to improve things
  • They are sharing good practice and running disability awareness training for the police, schools, support workers and local councils
  • The South East are doing lots of work on Transforming Care and are planning to set up a transforming care forum with commissioners (people who buy services), providers, families and people with learning disabilities
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Regional reports
Robert from the London region shared his report, you can see it by clicking the link here

Ian from the East Midlands region shared his report, you can see it by clicking the link here
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The future of the National Forum
Angela and Kerry shared a presentation about the future of the forum.
They said that the Department of Health had told Inclusion North that it was very unlikely that there would be any more money for the forum after March 2017.
Forum members were asked to think about 3 questions:
What should we do about the decision?
Attached with the minutes
What are our big questions?
What should we try to keep hold of?
You can see the flipcharts of these discussions here

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Wednesday 27th October

Welcome back
Kerry and Jonathan welcomed everyone back to the meeting.
They asked forum members to share their thoughts from day 1. You can find them here:
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The future of the National Forum
Jonathan, Aidan and Dene got everyone to think about action planning.
Forum members were asked to split into 3 groups and focus on actions from 1 of the 3 questions they looked at yesterday.
The flipcharts are attached to the minutes that show the actions, and some further creative ideas for the forum /
Regional Reports
The final 4 regions Yorkshire and Humber, North West, Eastern and North East shared their regional reports.
You can find them here:
Yorkshire and Humber

North West

Eastern

North East
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Learning Disability England response to forum questions
Kerry shared the easy read response from Learning Disability England to the questions the forum had asked at their last meeting.

Kerry told the group about the last Learning Disability England steering group. She asked if forum members have any further questions, after they’d looked through Learning Disability England’s response, to share those with herself or Carrie Ann to take back. /

Agreeing actions from the meeting
All forum members agreed that they wanted to campaign against the Department of Health’s decision.
They agreed to start a social media campaign #novoice which would be launched on Friday 28th October at 1pm.
The other actions agreed by the forum can be found here /
Burning Issues/AOB
Tinais stepping down from her role as South East region rep to spend more time with her daughter. Everyone thanked Tina for doing a wonderful job and said she will be much missed.
Carrie Ann congratulated Vicky (her supporter) on getting married the day before – none of the forum members could believe that Vicky had come to the forum when she should have been on honeymoon!
Here are the burning issues from the washing line that people wrote during the forum meeting.
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PLEASE NOTE: The next National Forum of People with Learning Disabilities meeting is on the 20th and 21st February.

The meeting will be held at Burleigh Court in Loughborough.

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