The Co-production team was shortlisted at this year’s Great British Care Awards (London region) in the Co-production Award category. The awards evening was attended by Campaign 4 Change member and Unity Co-chair, Mary Woodall, Campaign 4 Change member, Stephen Adamson, and Co-production Manager, Elmi Terjavjainen.
Achieve together has been a stalwart champion and facilitator of co-production for many years. We have a dedicated Co-production Team, including experts in co-production, employment, inclusive communication and autism. The team also includes self-advocates and experts by experience with learning disabilities and autism. Through the co-production and self-advocacy groups, Unity and Campaign 4 Change, we have put the voices of people we support at the forefront of everything they do.
Campaigning work
Campaign 4 Change self-advocacy group raises awareness and challenges issues important to people with learning disabilities and autism nationally. Members have campaigned and released videos on YouTube on several issues. These include hate crime, better pay for social care workers, the use of outmoded language in social care, and the notion that disabled people may experience a permanent state of lockdown due to accessibility issues. Mary Woodall, from London, who is a key member of Campaign 4 Change, is on the Learning Disability England Representative Body, promoting the rights of people with learning disabilities from that platform.
Unity group members focus on working with internal teams in the organisation to ensure that people we support have a say in how Achieve together runs. They also demonstrate the importance of Co-production. Unity members agree policy, strategy and projects, present at conferences and offer their insights as experts by experience.
Projects that Unity has created include podcasts focusing on sections of The Wheel of Engagement (Achieve together’s framework for supporting people to have good lives). Other work includes planning/presenting conference content, and the creation of their own animated mascot, Captain Co-Production, who demonstrates what co-production is and why we do it.
Unity and Campaign 4 Change membership continues to grow as a paid role, and their input is an essential ingredient to running a modern, caring and progressive social care organisation. Examples of their brilliant work can be found on YouTube and other social media sites:
