News: Brighton and Hove City Council leader Jason Kitcat

In recent months the council, supported by independent experts, has been re-thinking how it supports people with learning disabilities. Two major reviews have been run, one focused on our services for children and the other on those for adults.

These are hugely complex and sensitive areas. There is certainly no ‘one size fits all’ solution for the diversity of needs we see amongst citizens. For children there is also the importance of connecting support with schooling.

Both reviews have come back with a powerful focus on putting the needs of our service users first, which is what you would expect. But what the reviews found is that while we have some excellent staff providing brilliant services, they aren’t always as joined up as they could be, nor are they always keeping up with people’s changing needs.

For example many parents told us of their frustration with the number of times they had to tell ‘their story’ to professionals, and the number of different places they had to go to access support. So we are setting a goal to bring together much more of these services into combined hubs alongside our special schools. This will deliver better, more integrated care for young people with learning disabilities.

For adults we are seeking to put greater emphasis on ‘personalisation’, which means letting them choose what they want to spend their budget on, rather than being placed in services we already offer. We must avoid paternalism and, wherever possible, meet the aspirations we heard in the review of travelling and working in the city like everyone else.

These ambitions will take some time to achieve fully, but my hope is that partners across the city will agree them as our goals at a special meeting on 3 February.
Read more about the reviews and the special meeting at http://bit.ly/1BqcWyM