HRH The Princess Royal joins Changes for the Future Forum at a round table event enabling discussions tackling issues that impact people with disabilities.
On 27 April Livability’s Changes for the Future forum were proud to host Livability’s Patron HRH The Princess Royal at a round table event which took place at Livability’s National Office in North Greenwich. Also present were the Livability Nash Student Advocacy Council.
HRH The Princess Royal was invited along to discuss topics of upmost importance to forum members, which included: the cost of living crisis, challenges with recruitment in the care sector and health promotion, and how these societal issues impact people with disabilities.
Livability’s Changes for the Future Forum is an important channel for hearing the voices and views of people supported by Livability about the things which matter most to them. Twenty-three members, or ‘champions’, representing 20 Livability services. This event punctuates a season of committed work from the forum members – who were thrilled to have this space to discuss key areas for improvement that they have been discussing since forming.
Tom, lead representative for the forum said:
On arrival HRH The Princess Royal spoke with forum members via a series of round table discussions. Cost of living discussions included tips and ways to budget carefully, especially for people with disabilities. Recruitment discussions included looking at what good care looks like and how important it is to involve the people we support in the recruitment process to attract the right talent. And finally the health group looked at barriers to accessing health care, awareness of the Learning Disability register, accessible information standards, healthy eating and health screening.
In her speech to members, The Princess Royal thanked forum members and Livability for their work in this arena and summarised by stating that it is never easy to bring so many different opinions together and the importance of being part of discussions with those providing care and those who receive it, are finding it valuable and beneficial on both sides.
Livability CEO, Sally Chivers said:
“Co-production is a complex word for something that is quite simple, allowing people with disabilities to pick their agendas, to choose what they want to talk about, to forge their own paths that they want in life.
And that’s what Livability aims to provide. We call it a ‘life sum’, a visual sum of everything that adds up to better wellbeing for an individual. We know that every life sum is different as there’s no one size fits all, and we aim for our support to reflect the same ethos. Today’s event reflects that ethos, what good care looks like and how we can work collaboratively together following on from the conversations we’ve heard today.”
Co-production is about working together with the people we support in meaningful and engaged ways on projects from design to delivery.
Co-production recognises that everyone has a contribution to make so, alongside this and with wider benefits for both themselves and those outside of our services, some of the people we support have been working together to look at information around societal issues that impact people with disabilities. Following the event the forum are working together to jointly writing and deciding on content for resources about these areas to directly support other people with disabilities.
At Livability it is essential that we involve the people we support in making decisions about the things that matter to them, that’s why this event was led and produced by the Changes for the Future Forum.
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