Housing Choices

Our work on housing choices includes hosting a post with JMS Trust that helps people set up their new home.

Find out more about JMS trust  here 

We are working on questions about

• Supported Living and being safe
• Social Housing and Supported Housing

This includes trying to understand the numbers of unexpected deaths and incidents reported to CQC by providers and shared in the BBC file on 4 programme in February 2019.

There is also a blog by Kevin from L’Arche on what they changed after Joe Ulleri died in hospital. You can read that here

Thank you to all the members so far who have shared information, ideas or examples from their work

If you want to share anything or tell us what you do after things go wrong in a service or what you want to see services do please get in touch

#right2home campaign

#right2home is a campaign to keep the Whorlton Hall scandal on the political agenda, and press the government to act on its promises.

It is led by self advocates and family campaigners.

We know that more than 2,000 adults and children are still in secure mental health units.

Since the coronavirus lockdown started, people in secure units may not have seen advocates or family carers. We are worried about their welfare.

The campaign is building up to 5 days of action on from 18th to 22nd May, – they want people to join in

Building on earlier campaigns, #right2home is co-run by people with learning disabilities and campaigners.

You can read more about the campaign here

Learning Disability England is supporting the campaign

You can follow the campaign on twitter and facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/right2homeUK/

Tweets by right2homeUK

Influencing funding decisions and understanding how it affects peoples lives

Universal Credit

Universal Credit affects learning disabled people more than other groups of people. We’ve been worried that people with learning disabilities haven’t been included when talking about those effects.

We’ve been talking to members about how universal credit has affected them.

We’ve started working with others to make sure people voices are heard and support is accessible and inclusive.

You can read our full report here.

Sleep in payments

We have started this work as part of the #Solvesleepins Alliance

#SolveSleepIns September 2019 Update

HMRC Sleep-in Guidance

HMRC have made this 10 minute webinar offering guidance on the rate of pay given to staff who work sleep-in shifts. The webinar

• Explains the Court of Appeal decision in the Royal Mencap Society v Tomlinson-Blake case
• Presents case studies to help you understand how sleep-in shifts should be classed and paid for in accordance with the law.

Please click here to view video

Sleep-Ins: September Update

The Supreme Court is allowing the trade union, Unison, to appeal the Court of Appeals decision about sleep-ins.

This means that the Supreme Court will now look at the case.

The Supreme Court is the highest Court of Appeal in the UK. They make decisions about how the law works in cases where the law is currently unclear.

The decision they make must be used by all other courts.

To have a case heard at the Supreme Court it must be heard at the other levels of Court first. Only cases that are very important to the public go are heard.

The sleep-ins case is about whether support staff should be paid the National Minimum Wage during overnight shifts when they aren’t always working.

It is seen as very important to the public because a decision that staff should be paid the National Minimum Wage for the whole sleep-in shift would have a huge effect on the social care sector. It might mean the sector has to pay around £400 million in back pay to staff. This might bankrupt some organisations. It also is an important message on how support staff are valued for the work they do so many people want a solution that keeps good reliable staff doing their jobs.

For more information about the case and previous decisions, click here.

The 12^th and 13^th February 2020 have been set as the dates for the appeal. It is expected the Court will make a decision by July 2020.

Sleep-Ins effecting Members

Some members have been telling us about changes their providers have tried to make to wages for sleep-ins.

One family told us about their provider trying to reduce staffs sleep-in pay despite the local authority committing to not reducing rates. They have challenged the provider on this as they think its unreasonable and unfair for staff to take a pay cut.

If you have been effected by issues around sleep ins and would like to share your experiences, you can contact Rachael on rachael.hall@ldengland.org.uk

Individual Service Funds in England: Making Choice and Control Happen

About this event

Want more choice and control over your support without the complications of Direct Payments? An Individual Service Fund may be the answer!

Watch to hear about how people are starting to use Individual Service Funds in England to have more choice and control over their support. 

ISFs are a type of personal budget that can offer nearly the same amount of choice and control as a Direct Payment but without some of the complications. 

They were introduced in England through the Care Act 2014, as a promoted option for local authorities to be able to commission this form of self-directed support. 

Since then, several pilots have taken place around England to trial ISFs and to ‘test and learn’ more about how they work and the benefits for people using them. 

In this webinar you will hear from Chris Watson, Founder of Self Directed Futures, Jacqui Hendra, a social care assessor who works with ISF’s in Devon and Gary Kent who runs a support provider organisation called New Key. 

The webinar covers: 

• What ISFs are 

• What are their benefits and why they are different to Direct Payments 

• What your rights are and what is happening with them around England 

• Gary and Jacqui’s work together supporting people with ISFs in Devon 

• Trudy’s real life ISF story 

• Question and answer session with all speakers

For more information about the webinar and resources about ISF, click here

This webinar will be of particular interest to families, support providers and those working for local authorities. 

This was a members only webinar. It was open to individual members and people who are part of organisations who are members. You can join as a member for as little as £12 a year, find out more here