Blade Education’s Making Care Fair team have been working in partnership with Southend Mencap to extend the scope of the Making Care Fair Project and are proud to announce that we’ve been given funding by the National Lottery Community Fund to make this possible from January 2024.

Supporting the Supporters (StS) is a project that aims to champion the vital role that Community Advocates and Carers play in the lives of the most vulnerable people in our society: adults with learning disabilities (LD). Being an advocate for adults with LD and their carers is a very rewarding role Southeast Essex, however, it comes with many responsibilities. 

StS is working with Southend Mencap to bring all of our local Advocates together to support each other through networking and meetings, and through the project to support current Advocates to share their experiences and best practice models, and through the network be able to recruit new Advocates to support more adults with LD and their carers.

StS also aims to build a strong network of Advocates locally to support sharing of experience, and resources that allow greater understanding of the massive and radical changes to the increasingly complex Adult Social Care and Benefits Systems. 

Building from excellent relationships formed during the successful Making Care Fair Project, StS will hold monthly meetings across SE Essex, as well as remotely, to discuss the developing problems faced by the LD Community and the issues faced by Advocates and Carers to keep everyone well informed and on top of the best way to apply for the Care and Benefits that they are entitled to.

If any Advocates for the Learning Disability Community would like to be involved or find out more about this new Advocate group, please do get in touch with us or the team at Southend Mencap.

The StS Team would like to thank players of the National Lottery, without whom this project would not be possible.

The next meeting will be taking place at the Novel Coffee Shop, 98 London Road, Southend-on-Sea, GB SS1 1PG on Thursday 26th September 2024 at 1100 to find out more please get in touch contact@makingcarefair.co.uk