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Workforce update for 

Services that support people with a learning disability and/or autistic people

Welcome to this month's newsletter for adult social care services that support

people with a learning disability and/or autistic people. We're sharing the latest

news, resources, events and funding opportunities from Skills for Care and

partners.

Skills for Care news

Mental Health Act reform: Update on our work to hear your views

Skills for Care were asked by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to talk to social care providers, commissioners, User Led Organisations (ULOs) and Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs) about the proposed changes to the Mental Health Act 1983 (as set out in the draft Mental Health Bill). 

We heard from people in lots of roles and organisations via a survey and several online meetings. Overall, most people didn’t feel the Mental Health Act impacted their work directly and they didn’t know much about the reforms. 

The things that were crucial in arranging good community support for people were:

• commissioning and designing the right support for the person
• finding the right place to live and the right staff to do the support
• having good support and co-working with the person and their social worker and family
• having a good community or intensive support team.

We submitted our findings in a report to DHSC in March.

Recruiting the right people campaign

During May, our ‘recruiting the right people’ campaign offered insights, guidance, tools and resources to help employers with their recruitment activity. 

The campaign aims to help employers build more diverse workforces, understand how to use values-based recruitment approaches and create welcoming environments that make staff want to stay.

Learn more about the campaign

Unfair to Care report

Community Integrated Care has produced a report which looks at benchmarking

data for care workers and how greater investment in social care will improve

economic growth and help to strengthen the NHS.

Read the report 

New toolkit to consider the needs of carers

The Carers Trust and Carers UK have co-developed a new toolkit for those providing or commissioning services to consider the needs of carers and the support they need.

Access the resources 

Developing Shared Lives for people with a learning disability guidance

Partners in Care and Health have published new guidance to support councils wanting to enable more people with a learning disability to benefit from the Shared Lives model of care and support.

Find out more

Report on improving housing choices for people with a learning disability

Partners in Care and Health have published a report providing evidence of good practice and insights in relation to people with a learning disability having access to and living in ‘mainstream’ housing. The report covers some of the different housing arrangements for a person with a learning disability as distinct from supported accommodation.

Read the report

Learning Disability England COVID-19 pandemic project

Learning Disability England are supporting a project called ‘How we survive and thrive – The people with learning disabilities pandemic inquiry’. The project aims to make recommendations for change, based on how life changed for people with learning disabilities because of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The recommendations will be shared with the Government and policy makers.

Find out more about the project and how to get involved

Annual health checks

Evidence shows that annual health checks make a difference. While annual health checks for people with a learning disability are no longer a government target for GPs, they will still be paid for doing them.

Workers in care services should support people to think about this and decide whether to ask for a check.

Learn more

Mental health medications research and resources

A new research project has collated information to enable people to be more involved in decisions regarding their mental health medication. As part of the project, a toolkit has been developed to help people with learning disabilities to make choices about their mental health medications.

Access the toolkit

Direct payments learning resources

Think Local Act Personal have launched a free learning resource to enable social care teams to help build confidence in offering direct payments and to help support people’s choices and control.

Find the resources

Travel and transport for autistic adults research

The National Autistic Society (NAS) are pleased to share the results of a year-long research project about travel and transport. The research aimed to understand the barriers autistic adults face when using transport and what needs to change. 

They focused on three key questions: 

• What makes travel difficult or uncomfortable?
• What impact does that have on autistic people?
• What changes could make transport more autism-friendly?

Read the report

Research into supervision practice

Do you work in adult social care in the UK with individuals with learning disabilities? Are you a direct support worker or a frontline manager? If this is you, then Nadia Khan, a PhD Researcher and Graduate Teaching Assistant at the University of Kent, would like to hear from you about your supervision practices.

Get involved in the research

Autism Act call for evidence

The House of Lords Committee on the Autism Act 2009 has launched a call for evidence. They want to understand how well the Autism Act, the Government’s Autism Strategy and the statutory guidance are working.

The Committee want to hear from autistic persons (including if you have a diagnosis or if you consider yourself autistic). They also want to hear from people with an autistic person in their family, who support an autistic person, or who work with autistic people in their job or on research.

Find out more in easy read or answer the call for evidence online. Alternatively, you can record your responses and email your voice recording to HLAutismAct2009@parliament.uk

The deadline is 11:45 on Monday 2 June.

Leaving long-stay hospitals research

‘What happens next?’ is a new research study by the University of Birmingham and Changing Our Lives. It aims to see how the lives of people with learning disabilities and/or autistic people change over time after they come out of long-stay/secure hospitals, and the sort of support that help people lead more ordinary lives.

If you’re a social care service provider in England who will be supporting someone to come out of hospital before the end of 2025 and are keen to find out about taking part, please contact Meena on h.plappert@bham.ac.uk.

AUTSCAPE: Evolving Autistic Space Conference 2025

AUTSCAPE is a retreat from mainstream society and an escape to autistic space, where being and acting autistic is normal. It is also an educational conference, a social gathering, and a great opportunity for networking and for developing advocacy.

The conference will take place in Swanwick, Derbyshire on Monday 4 – Thursday 7 August 2025.

Find out more and book your place

Love and relationships webinar

Bild for the Future will be running a free webinar for Learning Disability Week about love and relationships. It will share the work of Supported Loving and how people can get the information and support they need to have the relationships they want. We will also hear from some people with learning disabilities about their experiences with love and relationships.

This webinar will be held on Wednesday 18 June at 12:30.

Register to attend

Bild postural care webinar

Postural care is a non-invasive approach designed to support professionals and carers of people with complex needs. Bild are running a free webinar to raise awareness of postural care which helps people to engage more effectively in activities, improve communication, wellbeing and quality of life.

The webinar takes place on Wednesday 4 June at 12:30.

Register your place

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