Learning Disability Coalition

The Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities is now a member of the Learning Disability Coalition,a group of 15 organisations fighting to get better funding for services for people with learning disabilities in line with the aims of Government policy.

We have joined the coalition because too many people with a learning disability do not get the support they need to have a decent quality of life and do things other people take for granted.

The Learning Disability Coalition will call on the government to make sure there is enough money getting through the system to honour its promises to the 1.5 million people with a learning disability in the UK. Our target is to have 30,000 signatures to deliver to the Prime Minister at No 10.

The Coalition has continued its work in highlighting the need for good quality provision for people with learning disabilities and the consequent increase for public funding to meet these needs.

In order to inform dialogue with government, the Coalition, along with Mencap, commissioned a study by Eric Emerson and Chris Hatton from the Centre for Disability Research at Lancaster University into the future demand for care for people with learning disabilities.

The study found that:

nearly one million people have a learning disability in the UK, of whom some 800,000 are adults. About one quarter of the total - 224,000 – have some contact with social services
the number of adults with learning disabilities will continue to rise each year until 2025
numbers receiving care will increase by at least 3-5% annually on average over the next 5 years.

We need all of our members and supporters to support the coalition by signing our online petiton.

Sign the petition on the Learning Disability Coalition website

If your organisation would like to support the Coalition, please email Oliver Chantler.

For more information about the Coalition please visit the Learning Disability Coalition website.

gross spending by local authorities on adults with learning disabilities in 2007-08 amounted to £3.45 billion (£3.22 billion after charges made for services are deducted)
over the last 5 years, spending on services for adults with learning disabilities has increased in current prices by 7.2% and in real terms by 4.5%
it is predicted that an additional £1.5bn will be required over the next 10 years.

The Coalition recommends that central government should, at a minimum, provide 80% of these resources to local authorities. Identifying the need for an extra £200 million per annum is a first step towards tackling underinvestment in support and care for people with learning disabilities. We are calling on MPs to write to Yvette Cooper MP, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, to ask her to make good the £200 million annual shortfall in funding for services for people with learning disabilities.

Ideally, the forthcoming Green Paper on the future of social care will address some of the evidential shortcomings. The Coalition will continue to ensure:

that better information is available concerning the costs of unmet needs
the cost-benefits of prevention and early intervention
a better understanding of the numbers of people with high levels of need coming into services.

The Learning Disability Coalition would like organisations in the sector to sign up as supporters. Supporter organisations will be kept informed of the latest news about the campaign and what you can do to help. By becoming a supporter organisation of the Coalition you would also be helping the Coalition to present its case to the Government - the more organisations it can show are standing behind it, the more likely it is that the Government will listen to its case!