Detention of people with a learning disability and autistic people
There is growing anger about the experiences of people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health hospitals.
Ten years after abuse was first uncovered at Winterbourne View, over 2,000 people with a learning disability and autistic people are detained in mental health hospitals in England.
VoiceAbility is calling on government to use their new power to direct NHS England to improve community support and urgently reduce the number of people in hospital.
Read the Use your Power briefing to find out more.
Please contact stephen.hinchley@voiceability.org to support this call or for further information.
Independent advocacy for people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health hospitals
Statutory independent advocacy services are an important resource for people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health hospitals. Advocacy can help enable more person-centred care, challenge overly restrictive practices and use safeguarding processes to protect individuals where there are serious concerns.
However, the Care Quality Commission’s ‘Out of Sight - Who Cares’ report found the quality of support is too variable and sometimes advocacy is absent altogether.
To address this problem, the UK Department of Health and Social Care should establish a nationally commissioned, specialist advocacy service. This would provide more effective and consistent support for people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health in-patient services.
In this short policy paper, VoiceAbility sets out the case for why a nationally commissioned model is the best way to support people effectively. This policy position builds on a previous paper by Jonathan Senker, chief executive of VoiceAbility and Kate Mercer of Kate Mercer Training which set out the critical ingredients for delivering, managing, and commissioning effective advocacy in these contexts.