Our Associates team all have lived experience of different disabilities. They all advocate for the rights of people with disabilities. They call on companies, decision makers in government and society in general to help make inclusion a reality.

They have four key areas they campaign about:

Accessibility

• More disabled parking spaces in local communities.
• A ban on pavement parking.
• More accessible public transport and penalties for companies that aren’t doing the right thing.
• More action on making buildings like hospitals accessible.

Attitudes and awareness

• More awareness campaigns on adjustments that can be made for people with learning disabilities, people who are autistic and people who have a visual impairment.
• Employers to recruit more people with disabilities.
• Reform of the benefits system, removing repeat assessments of people with a lifelong disability, like a visual impairment.
• Police and government tackling disability hate crime and social media companies over online disability abuse.

Social care

• Social care being built around respecting people’s human rights and right to have a good life. Hospital units should never become a person’s home.
• More funding into social care now. In the long term, providing funding on a national level rather than more means testing or council tax rises.
• Ensuring the social care workforce is as valued as NHS staff, with a national strategy and funding to reflect this as a skilled job.

Eye care

• Completion of an NHS plan to introduce specialist sight tests for 120,000 children in special schools in 2020. This is based on SeeAbility’s work and we are pleased to see this is  under way. Read more about the Special Schools Eye Care Service.
• NHS, health bodies and eye care professionals acting to improve eye care for people who have learning disabilities or are autistic.