Stronger Together Empowering Parents STEP Trafford

Such an emotive clip

Please do not ever minimise a child’s voice in any situation. Parents ARE the experts in their own children and young people - respect that & work with them to keep the best interests of the child / young person at the centre always. #SEND #Autism #ParentCarer

And too often schools are labelling unmet needs in a classroom as “behaviour issues” 😞 its a system that benefits nobody at the end of the day 🫤

So. At the point that my children fell into crisis, public services were unable to offer timely support. We were fortunate at that time we could write a cheque to self fund some emergency care. We could manage that for about 3-6 months. That was all. 7 years later, we were still self funding care. CAMHS had discharged us against our wishes after 4 months, they didn’t have the appropriate specialist on staff, they offered something else which made everything worse. There was no paediatric care pathway on NHS for our child’s since identified genetic condition. 1 co-morbid condition we could transfer to adult services at 18. There was nothing until then, we’d have to wait 9 years. We were a single income household as one of us had to become full time parent carer. The sole earner went thru redundancy 6 times in 9 years, driving us further into debt. Our home fell into disrepair as we couldn’t afford to maintain it. Our savings lasted 9 months, 9 years later, we’ve borrowed money and yes, @Keir_Starmer, we have lived with that gnawing feeling in our stomach for years on end that we are financially on a knife edge. We’re the undeserving middle class you have in your mind’s eye. Us and tens of thousands of families, who’ve been punched down, woken up to structural injustice and have had enough. We advocate for every family who are struggling, every family pushed to the brink, every family unable to get back up. Please, let’s stop the Hunger Games of need. Let’s not perpetuate harmful narratives around undeserving poor, undeserving middle class. Tired tropes which continue division and discrimination. Instead, let’s aspire to build a better Britain for every child and every family. Let’s ensure equity, dignity, co-operation and participation are upheld. Let’s do better. Together. 🙏🏻 @BethRigby @SkyNews @NotFineinSchool

Disability benefits cuts would be devastating, and lead to even higher levels of poverty. Life already costs more for disabled people. The government should use next week's budget to strengthen the benefits system, not cut away at it. inews.co.uk/news/pip-asses…

Our columnist, @catrionamoore13 of @IPSEAcharity spoke to @Channel4News last night about how children with #SEND are being failed every day by not being given the support they're entitled to: youtube.com/watch?v=BA-Oqy…

📢 Tune in to @Channel4News at 7pm this evening  Our Policy Manager, Catriona Moore, will be discussing today’s report from @NAOorguk, which highlights the ongoing failures in support for children and young people with SEND.

Powerful words. Like @CarrieGrant1 we’ve walked that exact path twice. 64k families sharing the same heartache via @NotFineinSchool. The pressure is untenable. Kids and families are being broken, left with the long shadow of trauma and recovery. These are hard conversations to have. It starts by raising the standard of the conversation about parents, children and families. It starts by upholding dignity for all those needing support. It starts not by asking leading questions to confirm institutional bias about parents’ perceptions, but by understanding how parents are perceived by institutions (and power holders). Let’s break down the barriers to come together and find the solutions. Together. Join us. teamsquarepeg.org

If only people had listened and acted five years ago when parents of disabled children took a judicial review against the Chancellor and Secretary of State for Education. Parents/carers and disabled young people are not to blame for this mess. #SEND

We certainly have been 'sounding the alarm' – the impact of inadequate support for children & young people w/ SEND is profound. Ministers must commit to ensuring the SEND system works by upholding the law so families no longer have to fight for what the law says they should have.

Too many families have told me they have lost confidence in the current SEND system. We need bold leadership to join up education, health, and care services for better planning and early intervention, so fewer children reach crisis point. childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/statement/chil…

Autism is invisible to most people

In Celebration of National Allied Health Professional Day today, we are promoting the roles of Specialist Allied Health Professional working in cancer care in Greater Manchester.

Essential autumn reading for disabled young people, parents, families and allies - long awaited and much needed proposals to modernise and streamline the law on disabled children’s social care. Lots of important questions to get your teeth into

Not much has changed since this documentary was filmed 11 years ago! In fact more foodbanks exist now. The system is still failing those in need: buff.ly/3Y2DjON

A big thank you to Melanie Grabowski for writing this blog post for us about her family's experiences & her masters research. notfineinschool.co.uk/home/f/finding…

This is a really helpful graphic from @contactfamilies summarising the excessively complex law on social care assessment for disabled children and families

Health, education and social care getting their heads together to deal with children’s needs. You mean like in an education, health and care needs assessment?

Four out of five school staff say their setting does not have enough money to meet the needs of pupils with special educational needs and disabilities according to new research from @tes. tes.com/magazine/news/…