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National Valuing People Now Work
This page gives some updates about our current work.
- Employment
- Housing
- Families
- Health
- Workforce
- Advocacy
- Hate Crime
- Black and Minority Ethnic Communities
- Other Work Strands
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Valuing Employment Now: real jobs for people with learning disabilities
Valuing Employment Now is an ambitious cross-government strategy to radically increase the number of people with moderate and severe learning disabilities in employment by 2025. We want as many as possible of these jobs to be at least 16 hours per week. We aspire to close the gap between the employment rate of people with learning disabilities and that of disabled people generally.
The strategy was launched in June 2009, with a delivery plan and a literature review of the evidence base for supported employment. This was followed by regional launches later in 2009.
A cross-government delivery team has been established, with further recruitment under way. It reports to the Minister for Care Services and the Minister for Disabled People.
The delivery team is based in the Office of the National Director for Learning Disabilities, in the Department of Health.
The team is developing a range of resources to support local and regional delivery of the strategy, which will be available online in Spring 2010.
Learning from the range of demonstration sites will be shared over the coming months, through this website, the regional Valuing People teams, and at events and conferences.
- There are now Getting A Life sites in every English Region, transforming local systems and services so that young people with learning disabilities leave school or college and go into paid employment. More information is available on the Getting A Life website.
- Fourteen Project Search sites were announced in October 2009. More information is available on the Office for Disability Issues website.
- Jobs First Sites will be announced in February 2010, aligned with Right to Control. Jobs First will support people with learning disabilities to use their individual budgets to help them get into paid employment. More information will be available soon.
- The Employability Hub for people with complex needs, in Kent, is progressing well.
On 20 January 2010 the National Director for Learning Disabilities, Anne Williams, and Co-National Director, Scott Watkin, wrote to Directors of Adult and Children's Social Services and Chief Executives of Local Authorities, with an update on the Valuing Employment Now resources and a reminder of the business case for investment in supported employment.
More information is available in the Valuing Employment Now section.
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Housing
The National Director, Anne Williams has been working closely with the Department for Communities and Local Government and other colleagues in the Department of Health to develop a programme of work around Housing. A temporary Housing Advisor is in post and there are plans for a Housing Toolkit to be launched later this year.
The role of National Valuing People Housing Lead was advertised and closed on 28 August.
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Families Work
This part is under construction. Please bear with us while we try and update this website.
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Health
This part is under construction. Please bear with us while we try and update this website.
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Workforce Issues
The Valuing People Workforce Lead has been working with Skills for Care to develop a new qualification.
A new Human Rights Toolkit has been developed for Partnership Boards. This shows how to take a human rights approach to the design and delivery of services for people with learning disabilties.
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Advocacy
A big part of the work around advocacy is being taken forward by Inclusion North. They have created two co-worker posts (one for a person with a learning disability) to manage this work. The co-workers will work with the National Forum, regional Valuing People leads and others to help strengthen advocacy across the country.
A new advocacy steering group has been set up to oversee all the Valuing People Now advocacy work. Members of the group include Inclusion North, the National Forum, National Valuing Families Forum, NAGLDE and Office of the National Director. The steering group will be chaired jointly by Scott Watkin and the National Valuing People Advocacy Lead (once in post).
The role of National Valuing People Advocacy Lead has been advertised and closed on 28 August.
To find out more about Inclusion North, visit their website at www.inclusionnorth.org
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Hate Crime
Valuing People Now sets out the Governments objective that people with learning disabilities are able to live in safe environments and feel confident that their right to live in safety is upheld by the criminal justice system.
It is unacceptable that people with learning disabilities are victims of hate crime and we are determined to take action to tackle this.
On 14th September, the Home office launched the cross-Government Hate Crime Action Plan - which includes disability hate crime and addresses the specific issues for people with learning disabilities. The action plan and easy read can be found at: www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/hate-crime-action-plan/
This action plan includes some specific commitments around people with learning disabilities, including:
- A review of best practice across the country - for example where people with learning disabilities are being supported to report crimes or where they have a 'keep safe' scheme in place locally.
- Specific guidance for local Learning Disability Partnership Boards around preventing hate crimes of incidents, supporting victims and working with other agencies.
- A new Crown Prosecution Service policy on prosecuting crimes where people with learning disabilities or mental health problems are victims or witnesses. This can be downloaded at www.cps.gov.uk
Other commitments include: work in schools to prevent and record bullying; training for police in working with vunerable groups and better local recording of incidents and crimes.
The Department of Health is part of the cross-government working group (led by the home office) to take forward the Hate Crime Action Plan. The Office of the National Director for Learning Disabilities is involved in this work to make sure that all the commitments benefit people with learning disabilities. DH also has links with the new Commission on Disability Hate Crime that the Equality and Human Rights Commission have set up.
The Office of the National Director are exploring ways to engage with our existing forums around Hate Crime. The National Forum for People with Learning Difficulties, for example, is looking at Hate Crime as part of its 'Community Lives' work. We are planning a workshop in the spring to bring together our key stakeholders to explore how to take this work forward together, including how we will then engage with self advocacy groups. We will continue to
work with stakeholders like Mencap, the National Forum, the National Valuing Families Forum, the National Advisory Group on Learning Disability and Ethnicity, EHRC and our DH colleagues on this commitment.
Building on the work above, we will develop best practice guidance for Partnership Boards, drawing on the best practice identified across the country. We will also use the new Valuing People Now website (due Summer 2010) for the dissemination of best practice ideas and resources.
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Reaching out to Black and Minority Ethnic Communities
The Office of the National Director has been working closely with the National Advisory Group on Learning Disability and Ethnicity (NAGLDE) to explore how they can be more involved in making Valuing People Now work for people from black and minority ethnic and newly arrived communities.
There are plans to strengthen the role of NAGLDE and build up the regional ethnicity networks. New work will be commissioned around ethnicity and a National Valuing People Ethnicity Lead will be appointed.
To go to the website of NAGLDE click here
Other Work Strands...
Parents with a Learning Disability
In 2007, the Department of Health and the Department for Children, Schools and Families (was DfES) published Good Practice Guidance for Supporting Parents with a Learning Disability.
New guidance for people who commission support for parents with a learning disability is being finalised and will be published later this year.
The original guidance is now going to be reprinted and both sets of guidance will be sent out across the country.
To see the guidance from 2007 click here
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