Health and Wellbeing Alliance projects in 2022 - 2023
We’re pleased to share the three projects we’re working on this year to support the mission of the Health and Wellbeing Alliance.
The VCSE Health and Wellbeing Alliance (HW Alliance) works to enable policy, commissioning and provider organisations to design services and support based on the needs of people and communities who face disadvantage and exclusion, including digital exclusion.
The HW Alliance is funded by the Department of Health and Social Care, NHS England and the UK Health Security Agency. Each year, HW Alliance members undertake a number of planned work projects where they work in partnership with policy leads to address issues of importance to the communities they work with or represent.
This year, voluntary and community sector organisations from the HW Alliance have partnered up with policy leads from across the Department of Health and Social Care, NHS England and the UK Health Security Agency to improve access to, experience of and outcomes within mental health, maternal health, social prescribing, primary care, elective care, social care, end of life care and more.
During 2022/23, members of the HW Alliance have partnered up with policy leads to deliver 54 projects which aim to reduce health inequalities.
VoiceAbility is a member of the Complex Needs Consortium (with Embracing Complexity, National Autistic Society and Sense). As a group, we are delivering 3 projects as part of our work in the HW Alliance.
The 3 projects are:
- Supporting engagement, particularly for people with lived experience, with the government’s ‘Building the Right Support’ programme to reduce the number of people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health in-patient services
- Maximising safeguards and support for people with complex needs who are deprived of their liberty as part of reforms to the Mental Capacity Act and Mental Health Act
- Working to ensure the revised Accessible Information Standard will meet the needs of people with complex needs and their families when accessing health and care
Charlotte Gill, Director of Policy, Public Affairs and Communications at VoiceAbility, said:
“We are particularly pleased to lead the Complex Needs Consortium’s work on reforms to the Mental Health Act and the work towards implementation of the Liberty Protection Safeguards under the Mental Capacity Act.”
It is important that people’s voices are heard when they are deprived of their liberty. People must always be supported to be fully involved in decisions about their care and treatment, whatever their circumstance.
As part of our HW Alliance work on reforms to the Mental Health Act, VoiceAbility recently published a report on how opt-out advocacy can improve outcomes for people admitted to hospital for a mental illness.
Commenting on the importance of the HW Alliance, Sarah Norton, Deputy Director of Community Health Care at the Department of Health and Social Care said:
“The VCSE Health and Wellbeing Alliance is an invaluable resource for policy teams, allowing us to work collaboratively with voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations, bringing the expertise of the sector, and the voices of the people they represent, into national policy development and delivery.
“The Alliance membership was refreshed last year and ensures representation across the broadest range of lived experiences. This year, the Alliance is working on 54 separate projects, across a variety of priority areas, promoting equality and reducing health inequalities across health and social care.”
The full list of 54 projects can be accessed below.