Independent Advocacy (Learning Disabilities)

Audrey Hunt

Audrey Hunt is a full-time worker providing issue-based advocacy support specifically for people with
the label ‘learning disability’. There is also an
emphasis on targeting individuals who identify as belonging to the Black and Minority Ethnic community,
who are often doubly disadvantaged in our society.

This project is ground breaking in that there are very few advocacy projects within the UK targeting people with learning disabilities within the BME community, and a more pro-active approach is being taken to identify this target group which differentiates this part of our work from the more referral based set up of our work.

The project provides support for people with complex and high individual support needs and non-typical communication. Additionally, this has to be done in a culturally sensitive way, utilising a range of communication techniques.

Funding for this Project has only been secured until the end of March 2006 at present via the Department of Health, this is administered by the British Institute of Learning Disabilities. This project has only been introduced since April 2005 and is already having an impact with subsequent increased demand. We will use this evidence to make a strong case for this work to continue.

Unfortunately we have not yet been able to secure further funding to continue this work after the initial funding ended. We continue to work on securing continuation funding to enable this valuable piece of work to progress - we will keep you updated if there are any further developments!