June 2010

I am writing this at a time of great uncertainty. Whatever your politics, the change of government mixed with the ongoing concerns about national finances leads to serious worries about all charity funding and Resources for Autism is not immune from this. I have always been a strong believer in having a wide range of funders as, over the years, I have seen good organisations collapse due to an over dependence on one funder or one kind of funder.

We gain our funding from Trusts and Foundations which are independent organisations whose only role in life is to fund charities. Most of them give small to medium grants for specific purposes (toys for example), some are generous or big enough to fund a member of staff for a year or so but that is rare and almost all of them will only fund an organisation once and then want at least a year off before they will consider funding again.

Our next main source of funding are local government contracts. These are wonderful but have serious restrictions tied to them. For example, if Brent fund a holiday play scheme, reasonably enough, only children who live in Brent can use it. They are also always time limited, usually for a year and very inflexible in what money can be spent on. This means that even if we are able to find extra funding for an element of the service we cannot stretch the provision beyond the original set date, rather it means that any money we can 'save' gets taken back by the funding authority.

Next there are generous individual donors - people who just like what we do and give us anything from 50p to £5,000 or even more. There is no way I can express my gratitude to them. This kind of money that we can spend where and when we need to is absolutely essential. Like our services, it bridges the gaps.

The other unrestricted funding we access is linked to events - like our current sky dive. People chose to have fun, run, jump, act, paint, entertain or whatever and the money raised comes to us. I hope that the pleasure gained from doing whatever it is somehow goes to reward the effort and the difference this kind of fundraising makes.

So, why am I concentrating on such a boring subject as money when the sun is beginning to shine more regularly and we are all shedding our winter blues?

Aiming High For Disabled Children (AHDC) was an initiative brought in by the last government and supported by MP's from all sides of the House. It focused on Short Breaks for two particular groups of children. Those with life limiting conditions and those with autism and challenging behaviours. It offered an opportunity for charities like ours to provide a range of imaginative and fun short breaks (play schemes, one to one support, youth clubs and so on) in areas where these have been few and far between.

We have been very successful at providing these short breaks and AHDC money entirely funds our services in Birmingham and many of our current holiday play schemes The future of this funding is now in the balance. No one knows if it will continue after March 2011. We will continue to seek alternative funding but this is a huge amount of money to find. Should I have not gone for it in the first place because it meant we were too dependent on one source? The answer to this is a resounding NO! We have met families and children who have had nothing at all in the way of out of school support in the past. We have shown them that it is possible to have fun with others however profound your autism and however much social groups may be a challenge for you. We have given some families the first real leisure time break they have had from their caring responsibilities for years and we have developed and expanded staff team of highly trained and highly professional workers who will never lose the skills they have gained thanks to AHDC.

I will do everything I can to ensure our AHDC services continue in Southwark, Haringey, Brent, Birmingham, Richmond and everywhere else. I can make no promises, as I said at the beginning, these are uncertain times. However, it is not just up to me. It is up to every parent to let their MP know how important these services are. They are not bad people but they cannot know everything about everything and it is up to us to keep them informed about why practical services run by the voluntary sector really matter and deserve to be funded even in difficult times.

Have a fun summer and please do keep in touch.

Winter 2009

I am writing this in the last week of November with thoughts of Christmas holiday play schemes and winter parties at the forefront of my mind.

It has been a wonderful few months with so much happening it is hard to know where to begin. So I have decided to start with poetry….

I was privileged to spend an evening with our new Birmingham youth club recently when they hosted a visit from Charlie Jordon one of the Cities best known poets. I was unsure how our young people would react and it was amazing to see a group of teenagers sitting spellbound listening to a poem that named each of them and talked of their achievements. They then went on to write their own poems with a little help from key workers and the end of the evening saw a poetry performance by the entire group – something I would not have anticipated.

Really ‘hearing’ our children, young people and adults is something that I think is the most important thing we can do. Hearing the poems our youngsters had written made me think about how hard it is to be heard properly when you may communicate differently. One of the things I am most proud of is how hard my team work to ensure everyone does get heard and by being heard is then provided with a service that is appropriate, where they feel safe and that they enjoy.

Our Birmingham services are now in full swing with Reach Out providing much needed home based support for 14 – 19 year olds and their families, although we urgently need more volunteers in the City if we are to meet the huge need we have found. The play team are offering something for everyone aged 8 – 19 and are running their first family fun day soon. Our siblings group is developing and will be off on their first outing over the Christmas holidays. Siblings of those on the spectrum are another group whose voices need to be heard!

Despite the economic woes around us, fundraising efforts have continued and thankfully been more successful than I feared. In Birmingham, David, one of our play team organised a wonderful Curry Night at the Celebrity Restaurant in the City centre and as well as a great night with lovely food, they raised £500 for us. Barclays West London Commercial Branch dedicated their winter event to us, with an auction and raffle raising the fabulous sum of £7,590 towards funding our Saturday play scheme in Brent. City Bridge Foundation has agreed to fund our YNOT? youth club in North London for the next three years and Children in Need are funding half of our play, after school and holiday provision in Barnet. It appears that amidst all the clamour regarding financial downturns and recessions the voices raised in support of charities like ours can still get heard, even if we have to shout a little louder and more persistently than in the past

We have also heard the demands from young adults aged 19 -25 for something geared towards their needs and our music and art therapists are working together to offer a social skills/arts based group especially for them. Watch this space for more details.

Voices from the East have not been ignored either and we are currently working with colleagues and friends in Newham to see if we can offer a specialist after school service for some young people from East London who would like the same opportunities as their more westerly counterparts to have fun.

Resources for Autism is growing but I am acutely aware that however big we get I do not want to lose touch with all of you who have been kind enough to talk to me either by email, phone or in person. It is only by listening to you that I can be certain that I am taking RfA in the right direction and that I am really meeting the needs of you, your children and those you love and care for. So please do keep talking to me, I can’t promise to do everything but I can promise you will be heard and your views, needs, hopes and expectations will be taken seriously and responded to as best as I can.

Thank you for listening………..