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LEVEL FOUR: Individualised,person-centred support
Changes at the other three levels will provide a much-improved climate for people with a learning disability to gain employment.
This level is about the extra individual support people need to choose, get and keep a job. It was clear from all our focus groups that each person needed an individualised and flexible service - not just to get the job but also to keep the job and to progress their career.
People with learning disabilities often require extra support not just with doing the job but also with getting to and from work, with personal care, and with other aspects of their life: so different agencies need to work together to make it happen, alongside the employer and work colleagues. North Lanarkshire, for example, help with ensuring that transport to work is reliable and accessible, but try and ensure that transport for work social events is provided by work peers. Our focus group of employees in North Lanarkshire gave glowing reports of the success of this.
The example below of how Harry was supported by Enable in Glasgow shows the individualised work needed to help someone succeed in being at work.
Following his discharge from Lennox Castle hospital, Harry Black was referred to Enable Scotland, a Glasgow-based organisation, for employment advice by his professional supporters. Harry was keen to try work. Enable supported him carefully. First they built up a vocational profile to gauge Harry's preferred activities and environment. To do this they spent time with Harry and talked with people who knew him. Once this was done they informed employers based near his home about Harry. They trained Harry in interview techniques and, once employment was offered, Enable went into the workplace to do all the tasks of the job, understand the workplace culture and identify workplace mentors who could provide 'natural support' to Harry. Enable then supported Harry at his work to start with, fading away after a while but still being available to Harry and his employer on an ongoing basis. Harry worked as a trolley porter for a well-known supermarket, got pleasure from his work and made friends. He enjoyed work so much that after his 65th birthday, Harry went through the same steps again and this time got a job as a school crossing patroller. Over a year later he is still happy and content and working away at his crossing. |
Similarly, Tayside Employment Disability Unit 'work on the principle that there is no one best way to assist a disabled person to secure employment'. Of prime importance to it is its ability 'to provide a one-to-one service, enabling people with disabilities to access a wide variety of support, according to their personal needs'. North Lanarkshire supported employment scheme also provide this type of individualised service. Both Tayside EDU and North Lanarkshire have won national awards for their work.
A core role of a supported employment facilitator needs to be supporting a team to work around the person, using the contribution of the person, her family, other people in the workplace and other agencies already involved in supporting the person. Care and support workers who help people with a learning disability on a daily basis in and around their home should also have a more active role in helping people choose and get a job - after all, they should know the person very well. At present the machinery can be a bit bureaucratic: if they refer someone to a supported employment agency they may be told there is a waiting list of months or years. Similarly, families and friends have a vital contribution to make, especially with young people where brothers, sisters and schoolmates as well as parents can help with finding evening and Saturday jobs.
But mainstream services such as Jobcentre Plus should also be central to ensuring that each adult with a learning disability has the person-centred support they need to get and keep work. The strengths of Jobcentre Plus are contacts with employers and access to a range of government schemes.
All staff at Jobcentre Plus should be aware of the needs of people with a learning disability and be able to offer a good first-line service.
However, people with a learning disability often need extra assistance with finding, learning and keeping a job - and more contact may be needed with the employer to adapt or 'carve' the job to suit the person. It is not realistic to expect every member of staff at Jobcentre Plus to have this expertise.
We therefore propose that, to enable the mainstream Jobcentre Plus to facilitate individually sustainable jobs, each Jobcentre Plus be linked more firmly with existing supported employment agencies who follow up the first-line service with in-depth and ongoing support for individual jobseekers with learning disabilities. This demands that Personal Advisors at Jobcentre Plus both become more sensitive to learning disability and more engaged with their local supported employment services. In turn, supported employment facilitators across Scotland need to be talking to Personal Advisers and to be consistently trained to design individual and flexible supports in conjunction with employers, co-workers, jobseekers, Personal Advisers and other people involved such as families and supported living staff.
The key issue is that there needs to be a consistently good service across Scotland, so that employment facilitators have a consistent role and level of skill, and are linked effectively in teams with mainstream Jobcentre Plus.
There are two further new opportunities in Scotland for developing the person-centred approach to supported employment.
First, Local Area Co-ordinators have a 'whole person' role in supporting the individual, and to make the best of their new role in Scotland, employment facilitators need to engage with LACs closely, providing advice and contacts.
Secondly, some people with a learning disability may want to use Direct Payments to hire a person or an agency to help them find a job. Employment facilitators need to work both imaginatively and with some consistency across Scotland around using Direct Payments to help people gain and sustain employment.
So, to facilitate individualised, person-centred support for each person with learning disabilities a shift is needed in how mainstream services are open to them and how supported employment agencies are networked with Jobcentre Plus and the 'natural' and paid supports surrounding the person. This requires both national and local leadership and co-ordination.
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