NEWS

Learning Disability Week 2024 – Do you see me?

This week is Learning Disability Week! Each year, the third week of June is used to highlight issues that people with learning disabilities face and raise the profile of people with learning disabilities across society.

The theme for this year is ‘Do you see me?’ and is about people with learning disabilities being seen, heard and valued. To celebrate, Bild spoke with people with learning disabilities about issues that affect their daily lives, and are sharing those conversations through some short videos each focused on a different topic.

All of these topics were chosen by people with learning disabilities as being important to them.

We’re pleased to share these videos here. We will soon be sharing captioned versions of all these videos.

Love and Relationships

You can find out more about what can be done to help people with learning disabilities develop and maintain loving relationships through Supported Loving. This project is a national network that promotes best practice with the goal of getting people with learning disabilities and autistic people the support they need, to enjoy the same sexual and romantic freedoms as everyone else.

You can also find out more about the work of Spring Into Action, which Joanne from SeeAbility mentions in her interview by going here. Their Meet N Match service is a friendship and dating agency for people with a learning disability and autistic adults.

Employment

As part of Learning Disability Week 2024, Bild ran a special webinar aimed at people with learning disabilities and the people who support them about getting jobs. The recording of this webinar is free for anyone to view here.

If you enjoy this webinar and would like to see more, Bild has a full library of past webinars available for members to view. You can find out more about organisational and individual membership here.

Our main speaker for this webinar, Laura Davies, is Chief Executive of the British Association of Supported Employment (BASE). BASE is the national voice for providers of specialist employment support. They promote the principles and delivery of high quality Supported Employment services and work to improve the employment rates of disabled people.

Getting Good Healthcare

Joanne of SeeAbility speaks about the importance of eye care in this video. This is an area that SeeAbility know is often be overlooked for people with learning disabilities. They offer a wide range of Easy Read resources to make getting good eye care easier for people with learning disabilities. You can view these here.

Bild does a lot of work around Growing Older with Learning Disabilities that goes into some of the challenges around getting good healthcare.

It is important to keep in mind the long term impacts of people with learning disabilities not recieving the right healthcare. The Learning from Lives and Deaths of People with a Learning Disability and Autistic People (LeDeR) report is an annual study of avoidable deaths that shows how much work still needs to be done in this area. You can read the most recent report here.

Keeping Healthy

If you or someone you know would like to get involved in the Special Olympics, you can go to their website for more information. With more than 95 clubs around the UK, there’s plenty of opportunity to get involved with an inspirational community dedicated to fun and fitness.

Bild members can watch recordings of our recent webinars on Menopause and Men’s Mental Health for people with learning disabilities, each focusing on a different area of keeping healthy. These webinars offer personal suggestions as well as clinical advice on how to handle these important issues.

Going Out and Nightlife

Stay Up Late is a fantastic charity that fights for people with learning disabilities’ right to party. If you would like to learn more about their work reducing social isolation and limiting care practice, please go to their website.

Stay Up Late is also home to the Gig Buddies project. Gig Buddies pairs up people with and without learning disabilities to be friends and to go to events together. There are lots of chapters of Gig Buddies around the country, so if you are looking for a Gig Buddy or looking to become one you can find out what’s available in your area.

Bild would like to thank everyone who took part in the interviews for these videos, sharing their thoughts and experiences on some really key issues affecting people with learning disabilities.

When we showed these videos to the people who had taken part in them, we asked for their feedback and were really pleased with what they had to say.

When we asked what people liked about the project we were told:

“I liked it because I felt very important and that it gives people an insight on life with a learning disability.” – Kate (Bild)

“Lots of different answers.” – Jen (Worcestershire Special Olympics)

“It was short and sweet. It also had a lot of people with Learning Disabilities.” – Mano (Bild for the Future)

“The topics covered.” – Andrew Smith (Disability Sheffield and Bild for the Future)

When we asked why people wanted to share their views, we heard:

“So that other people see my views.” – Rohan (Stay Up Late)

“To get the word across to people that it’s ok to love someone but do it in a safe way.” – Sal (Bild for the Future)

“Because the more people we share with the better, it will promote good practice for people with learning disabilities.” – Kate (Bild)

“Its shows awareness of people’s struggles.” – John (Bild for the Future)

“I would like to help people with learning disabilities to lead as normal a life as possible.” – Mano (Bild for the Future)

We have been posting these videos on X (formerlly twitter) if you would like to share them more widely.

If you would like to see what other organisations have been doing for Learning Disability 2024, or would like to share what you have been doing, you can follow #LDWeek24 and #LearningDisabilityWeek2024 on all major social media platforms.