The A-Team meet the Super Stars of Lewisham Speaking Up!

Yesterday Matthew and I had the privilege of meeting up with the 'Super Stars of' Lewisham Speaking Up! The meeting was held via Zoom. The purpose was to gain the views of self-advocates as to what lessons have been learnt since covid-19 took over our lives. We will be publishing their thoughts in the forthcoming book 'Peter and friends on the coronavirus for people with learning disabilities or autism'.

There were over 20 self-advocates at the meeting and everyone was able to share their thoughts. We got some absolute fantastic feedback and I believe that some of these self-advocates should be in the next government!

Here are some headlines from Lewisham Speaking Up!

'People should have worn masks from the beginning'

'Lockdown should have happened earlier, this will save lives'

'There should information about how we are going to get out of this'

'During lockdown people need lots of activities, something to occupy them'

'We need phone numbers, like the Samaritans'

'We should all be given exception cards, to tell people we have a learning disability'

'We need lots of easy read information like employment and transport'

'We need clear and straight forward information. There has been no clarity, its an absolute mess'

'I don't understand what a 'social bubble is'

'The use of videos explaining everything would be good'

We think that these ideas are common sense but why do this group feel let down? We have much more information from Lewisham Speaking Up and we will translate this into a list of what we expect to happen next time. We would like to thank the self-advocates for their time and great ideas. We would also like to thank Marsh for setting this meeting up!

Stay safe!