As many do at the end of a year, I also shared some reading and listening recommendations from 2021. 🕵️♀️ This series of Investigate Europe articles on private money in old people care is definitely worth the time of anyone interested in social services. 🔥 Inclusion Dialogue podcast is always very interesting to get new…
Bringing you an overview of news, reports, policies covered in Include newsletter this year. Subscribe here not to miss anything next time around. * And a bit of other stuff, too. Oh, and this was 2020 by the way. Hello. I hope you find this a useful reminder of some things that happened this year. When it’s…
Soufiane El Amrani and Milan Šveřepa wrote an article about employment, published in Dutch here. Below is an English version: „As a person with intellectual disabilities I think it is important for all people with intellectual disabilities to have a job like everyone else,“ says Soufiane El Amrani, self-advocacy and easy-to-read officer at Inclusion Europe. „Having a job…
Last 2 days have been about learning how supporting living works in Greece, and how to improve it and make it available to many more people. It was a conference in Athens, held by Estia to mark 10 years of providing supported living services. They kindly invited me to talk about support for independent living and inclusion to…
Polskie Forum Osób z Niepełnosprawnościami organised a conference called “We have the right to live independently. We cannot wait any longer”, and I was invited to speak during a panel about the Polish deinstitutionalisation strategy and “whether we have to wait until 2030?” I offered suggestions for deinstitutionalisation: Prevent institutionalisation of those living in the…
Today I spoke during a EESC hearing about challenges of the transition from institutional to community-based support for persons with disabilities and the role of families as their carers. I talked about priorities in deinstitutionalisation, one of which must be making the changes work for people with complex support needs too. They are often left…
Forum for human rights, Validity launch of report on institutionalisation of old people, September 2021. My remarks: Massive institutionalisation of older people demonstrates the failure of policy when it comes to securing support and care. It stems from lack of understanding how support and care should and can be provided. And it is based…
Written for Inclusion Europe 13 September 2021. When the news is filled with clawing away of people’s rights, and chipping away on the rule of law, what does a democratic-minded person do to keep hopeful and level-headed? We look up to the institutions charged with protecting them, of course. But what does one do when…
I was honoured to have been interviewed for a book on deinstitutionalisation, community-based services and inclusion of people with disabilities. About the book “Social services for people with disabilities have undergone substantial changes over time, in particular in the past two decades. Whilst lack of affordable and appropriate housing is a barrier to community living…
I don’t know about you but I don’t find project reporting particularly enjoyable. It doesn’t help when it is all about a year which itself was incredibly hard. But there is one element to it which is quite gratifying: seeing all of the year’s work collected and summarised together. It gives you a perspective on…
