Originally posted: 22nd June 2018

UPDATE: In this blog, Kathryn Sturman talks about her diagnosis with sight loss, it’s challenges, and her organisation that promotes accessible music classes.

You can find out more about her organisation, that she runs with her friend, here: https://www.madewithmusic.co.uk/

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It’s easy to dwell on the challenges of life with a disability, but an old colleague recently reminded me of all the positive things that have changed because of it. I now know which of my friends are the best at audio describing; it’s all to do with shared reference points and knowing your audience in my opinion – being prepared to be silly helps a lot in my case! This has helped me to discover the inner workings of my friends’ minds, but it’s mainly in my working life where I’ve noticed that changes that I’ve made have impacted positively on other people and not just on me. 

 

I had an episode of sight-loss aged 18 at university that lasted for around a year. I can be fairly impulsive, so I changed my degree course, and I can also think things through, so I decided that I would really like to support young people in similar circumstances one day. When I lost some of my sight again suddenly and permanently at the age of 28, I was working part-time for the Visually Impaired Team at Leeds City Council and part-time for Youth Music. I was really lucky to have incredibly supportive colleagues at both workplaces who, through lots of advice and hand-holding (literal and metaphorical), enabled me to continue to work and to grow in confidence again. Redundancy and a new baby were thrown into the mix soon after and I needed to decide what to do next… I was a classically trained musician who had always worked in education, but who could no longer read music or travel alone and I had a tiny baby!

 

While on maternity leave, I met up with a friend who was also a musician and we decided to start a music class for our children and our friends’ children that we would lead together. I needed her there for support as my eyesight fluctuated a lot, but we found that we both benefitted from having another person there. With two people leading, it was a lot easier to keep our energy levels up, have a bit of time to read the mood of the room and think about what was coming next, plus we could plan the sessions together which led to loads of exciting ideas! Musically, it was brilliant having two musicians in a session; one of us could play while the other sang, we could sing in two-part harmony and we could also easily lead rounds.

 

Since then my eyesight has stabilised and our organisation has grown from one class for our friends to a charity promoting music education through accessible and inclusive live music activities. Working as a freelance musician can be isolating, draining and confidence-knocking sometimes and we realised that something that was originally put in place to support me would not only be beneficial to the wellbeing of the musicians that we work with but would also make the musical experience even better for anyone coming along. It has become a core part of our organisational ethos and freelance musicians working for us often comment on the positive support it brings.

 

It’s taken a lot of patience, perseverance and baby steps to get here – I spent a fair few weeks learning how to peg washing on a line and progressed slowly to other household tasks, independent travel and eventually back to work. As my own confidence has grown, I’ve had the opportunity to work with several more organisations in Leeds providing music and singing activities. I’m so grateful for all the support and advice I’ve received and for the friendships that I’ve formed with colleagues; it’s amazing to have someone to pick you up on your down days and to be honest about what is difficult because I can’t see and what is just difficult! I hope that I’ve also given my colleagues an insight into my experience of disability and encouraged them to think about the power of small changes that can ultimately end up benefitting everyone.

 

I’ve always believed in the strength of diversity and in learning from other people’s experiences, but I’ve realised since losing my sight that small positive interactions with others can change an individual’s perceptions of disability and influence their future decisions. This can, in time, change the ethos of whole organisations and enable a truly inclusive environment to develop where everyone’s strengths are valued. Even baby steps get you there eventually!

~ By Kathryn Sturman

You can access information on Kathryn’s organisation here: https://www.madewithmusic.co.uk/

Originally posted: 12th June 2018

Venue: Leeds Civic Hall

 

LDPO Members Present: Mostafa Kamal (Acting-Chair), Hannah McGurk, Steve Graby (Secretary), Tom Harris, Chris Shanks (Treasurer),  Sophie Yasmin, Anzir Boodoo, Peadar O’Dea (Chair), Maggie Griffiths & Gill Crawshaw.

 

LDPO successfully carried out our first public meeting, held on the 3rd of May 2018 at Leeds Civic Hall.

 

Convincing representatives from different organisations to sit together under the same roof for any amount of time to discuss ideas is difficult, given the fragmented nature of many DPO’s which is caused by the government’s ‘divide and conquer’ tactic, which ensures that DPO’s have to fight each other for resources in order to simply remain operational. So it was no small feat that LDPO managed to bring so many different parties together.

 

The meeting was chaired by our public relations officer Mostafa Kamal, who thankfully has experience in these sorts of things. The general vibe I got from the room was one of relief, relief perhaps that a new DPO was starting up, as someone said at the event ‘when so many others were being forced to close.’ Our proposal to focus our groups efforts on alleviating the social isolation of disabled people in Leeds seemed to go down well, however it also seemed that quite a few of those present wanted/expected political action from LDPO. More than one individual suggested we work with the Labour Party, to get campaigns started, this is a topic that the committee has discussed at length, and which I am probably guilty of talking about for too long at the meeting itself in response to the suggestions to join forces with Labour.

 

I am mindful that not everyone got to speak at the meeting, but there was a half hour or so for networking after the event in which LDPO members interacted with different people in the room, so hopefully this included some who did not get to speak publically.

 

There is a general feeling I believe that Leeds should be doing more to create inclusive spaces and policies for disabled people. There were a number of representatives from the council who attended the event, many of whom we had already met to discuss collaborative working with the LDPO and Leeds City Council, and we hope to work together to address some of these issues, and provide a platform for disabled people’s voices. 

 

LDPO has a lot to think about after this event, we followed it up with another committee meeting a few days later, and we feel we have some good ideas in the pipeline. We will need to try and meet the expectation that was echoed at the meeting, that we engage in some sort of political campaigns but also be realistic and mindful about what we can actually achieve.

 

For a first public meeting though, it seemed to go surprisingly smoothly for the most part. We have made more important contacts, and we have a general roadmap for projects we want to pursue, which will hopefully lead to exciting things in the future.

~ By Peader O’Dea

Update: at the time of publication on our new site, our committee positions are:

Chair: Mostafa Atta

Deputy Chairs: Leo Gunn, Peader O’Dea

Secretary: Rebecca Porter

Treasurer: Chris Shanks

Originally posted: 9th June 2018

No one can say that mobilization or at least the threat of mobilization does not have real, concrete, positive effects. To give some background context to this statement, the train company Trans Pennine Express (TPE) was considering putting a new train (the MK3) on the tracks, meaning to connect, people from Leeds to Scarborough. The one problem with this plan? The train was constructed with no wheelchair space on the train. When Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People (GMCDP) discovered this, they quickly created a petition to demand the retraction of the MK3 train at least in its current form. This was only one planned method of action, jointly GMCDP and LDPO planned a protest, to be coordinated for the same day.  However, it did not come to this, for within a few days over 2,000 people signed GMCDP’s widely circulated petition, and soon TPE backed down.

In a statement on their website, they said they would not be going ahead with the MK3 model after they had held consultation talks with the Department of Transport around the model. No doubt the DOT did play a role in convincing TPE in changing their minds but GMCDP’s petition and the planned coordinated protests by various DPO’s including LDPO cannot be discounted in swinging the choice not to go ahead with their inaccessible train model. This shows that quick, effective, action can change things for the best.

~ By Peader O’Dea

Originally posted: 30th of April 2018

In retrospect it may not be the best idea to use the word ‘chain’ in the title of this blog post, but I wanted something dramatic and catchy, and something that implied connectivity and LDPO branching out and building connections. Of course, Les Misérables teaches us that ‘their chains shall be broken, and all men shall have their reward’ but our chain here is more of positive links, as LDPO today met with Mr. Paul Leahy, a well-connected, enthusiastic and ardent disability advocate who identifies as both disabled and on the LGBT spectrum and works for Leeds City Council.

When I arrived at the meeting, I felt a little bit of apprehension, for I didn’t know what to expect from someone who was ‘on the inside’ so to speak, but I decided to put aside my fears and see what happened. Paul who works in the Human Resources (HR) department of Leeds City Council seemed genuinely interested in the ideas that LDPO is tentatively proposing [though obviously nothing is set in stone at this early stage] and spoke about the potential for some of our members to get involved in Leeds City Council, to tell its managers about the social model and other such ideas.

Unfortunately, I was feeling rather overwhelmed – for reasons totally unconnected to the meeting, so I was not able to memorize everything he said, thankfully the frighteningly talented Hannah McGurk not only asked most of the questions, that we really needed to find answers to, but also took notes, which I now provide here below to give you an indication of what the meeting was like.

 

Attendees: Paul Leahy, Hannah McGurk, Tom Harris, Peadar O’Dea, Anzir Boodoo

Details: Rose Bowl Café on Monday 30th April 09:00 – 10:30

 

What’s happening in Leeds City Council

• Paul works for Leeds City Council as one of the Human Resources Business Partners; they focus on Inclusion and Development under the Learning and Development branch.

• • They are working on re-launching staff networks within the council, and taking a proactive approach to making changes

• The council has counsellor ‘leads’ for each of the equality groups, with a head for the whole group

• • This will be changing following the elections on 3rd May, and will take about a month until the new people are in place

• Counsellor Alison Lowe is very active, and focuses on inclusion and diversity, particularly around BAME communities. She may be happy to collaborate with LDPO in the future. 

• The council are working towards becoming a Disability Confident Employer (level 3), which looks at their recruitment but also support for staff.

• • They are developing a ‘Supporting Staff at Work Policy’ that goes beyond the requirements of the Equality Act

• • They would perhaps be interested in constructive feedback from LDPO on this.

 

Access to employment

• Discussion of barriers to employment for disabled people; including limitations of full time work with no flexibility of hours

• • Paul mentioned that the Council and many public sectors now have policies that mean positions are advertised as both part and full-time roles.

• • More needs to be done on raising awareness amongst recruiters of these policies.

• • We need to go beyond this; traditional recruitment procedures may not be accessible to everyone (e.g. neurodiversity).

• Action: investigate collaborating on a workshop or seminar for disabled people to discuss access to work and employment opportunities.

 

Wider networks

• Some interesting networks we may like to get involved with:

• • Access Association (£60 per year, but concessions available)

• • Women’s and Equality Committee (House of Commons)

• • • They published an interim report on disability in Leeds

• • Employers Network for Equality and Inclusion (national)

 

Opportunities for collaboration

• Starting a wider conversation in the city of Leeds about access needs

• The council has an ‘inclusion calendar’ that has various inclusion events/dates; we could see about getting involved in more of these, so that we ensure we are an intersectional organisation.

• • Action: Paul to see if he can share this with LDPO

• Alex Watson is the head of Human Resources looking at transport within the city; working with the combined authority for transport in the region

• • In the future could perhaps get in touch and see if we could work together

• The council provide training and support to third sector organisations (when they contract work with them)

• • Linked in with local CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development)

• • Perhaps future opportunities for collaboration here

• • • Local people who could provide training on the social model?

• Training currently happens in pockets – i.e. adults, children, frontline staff. Aware this needs to be wider reaching

 

• Focus on Leeds 2023 – Year of Culture

• • Focus on disability and different intersections of identity

• • Using different art mediums

~ By Peader O’Dea and Hannah McGurk

Originally posted: 29th April 2018

t thought of the idea of Leeds Disabled People’s Organisation [LDPO] in late November, 2017, I was attending a screening of the documentary Defiant Lives which was being presented by one of my personal heroes Prof.  Colin Barnes, at the University of Leeds. The documentary showed the history of disabled people’s activism in the UK, US and Australia.

 

While watching the documentary, I couldn’t help but reflect upon the fact that things had gotten much worse for disabled people in the UK (and the US under Trump) since the documentary had been shot in 2010-11. Since then the Tories have more or less managed to make legislation that was introduced to protect disabled people redundant, with their all-out assault on the Welfare State and cuts to transport, while totally scrapping programmes like the Independent Living Fund (ILF).

 

For many of us things came to ahead in late 2016 when the UN condemned the Tory government for ‘grave and systematic’ human rights violations against disabled people. The UN repeated this condemnation in 2017, but to no avail, the media in the UK (apart from a few outlets) maintained a blanket silence on the issue.

 

In the back of my mind, I was vaguely aware that on the 3rd of December it would be International Day Of People With Disabilities, that day can often seem meaningless in the UK, since as I have said, it is already quite clear that the Tories policies are causing severe social isolation, loneliness, poverty, and despair for many disabled people in the UK.

 

I decided spurred on by the documentary that I have previously described, that I wanted to try and make some sort of statement on the 3rd of December, so that the day felt less hollow, and just maybe something would come from this action. So I did what many an angry activist does these days and took to Facebook, tagging as many people as I could think of, with the vague idea of setting up some sort of political group (or something) to try and combat all the problems that were happening, at least in the city of Leeds.

 

I then wrote out a two page, bullet-pointed programme for potential ideas for what such a group could feasibly do, and after getting a surprisingly large amount of interest in it [I was expecting none] I decided to convene a meeting for the 24th of January, 2018, where several wonderful and dedicated people, whose names and bio’s you’ll find on this website, showed up. We agreed to create a group initially called “Leeds Disabled People’s Group” but promptly changed it to “Leeds Disabled People’s Organisation” [at the second meeting in February].

 

After much debating, and constitution writing, and networking  we decided that LDPO would primarily focus on social outlets for disabled people, in order to try and break the isolation that is inflicted upon many who identify as disabled due to eight years of disgraceful Tory policies, and that is more or less the origin of our ragtag band.

– By LDPO founder and Deputy Chair, Peader O’Dea

Originally posted- 28th April 2018

A protest took place outside Leeds Town Hall against cuts to disabled young people’s transport. Instead, a ‘travel allowance’ is proposed. The fear is that the cuts mean Leeds’ largely inaccessible systems will not be able to accommodate disabled young people, in the way Leeds council ran transport does.

Several of us from Leeds Disabled People’s Organisation attended the protest. DEAL (Disability Empowerment Action Links) who formed in response to the SEND crisis, made up the majority.

As a person with a learning difficulty, and a person in education, I personally was horrified at the idea that these young people were denied an education on the basis that they had no acceptable means of getting there come September. We hope that Leeds Council will reconsider it’s decision. 

~ By LDPO Secretary Rebecca Porter (Becca)

Originally posted: 25th April 2018

Several our LDPO members (Tom, Becca, Hannah and Peadar) went along to the second meeting of the Disability Labour Association on Wednesday 25th April. Although the group is in its infancy, there was an exciting discussion about the formation of the group and what its priorities will be going forward, a topic that was aided by the bountiful selection of biscuits provided.

 

Although Tom had to apologise for bringing up Brexit and nearly sending the room into chaos, it was agreed that DLA will be focusing on presenting and projecting a strong voice for disability issues in the Leeds Labour Party as well as Leeds more generally as a city. Whilst LDPO is not aligned to a political party, there is the potential for collaboration and sharing of ideas between these two organisations in the future. These could include issues around public accessibility and combating the social isolation faced by many disabled people, both of which were raised during the meeting and are also of great importance for LDPO.

 

It is exciting to see a major political party taking disability issues seriously within Leeds and the Disability Labour Association is an avenue to ensure that the voice of disabled people remains on the agenda.  One important aspect of this is making sure that speakers at DLA meetings on disability issues are themselves disabled, something which we think is fundamentally important to the success of both groups.

 

Encouragingly, there was great interest in LDPO among those in attendance and I am optimistic that word will spread quickly if we are able to maintain a presence at this and similar events in future.  It was made clear that much of our focus will be determined by the issues that are raised at our public meeting next Thursday 3rd of May. Understandably this means that people affiliated with the Labour Party will not be able to attend the meeting due to the local elections taking place on the same night. However, we look forward to feeding back to DLA on our progress at the next meeting at the end of the month. That is assuming of course that the supply of biscuits continues unabated.

~ By LDPO member Tom Harris

This blog was originally posted on April 23rd 2018

Lucy (Forum Central) started off with an introduction and explained that in the last meeting in January 2018, they discussed a project looking at the gaps faced by disabled people in the LGBT community, as well as the issue of employment for disabled people. Although some of these projects have ended, Forum Central will be continuing to work on these areas.

 

The first speaker was Gilda Smith-Leigh, a senior Economic Development officer with Leeds City Council, and her talk was supplemented by the consultation draft of the ‘Leeds Inclusive Growth Strategy 2017-2023’ which details the vision, drivers for change and twelve Big Ideas for Leeds. It was interesting to hear about the ways in which we are one of the fastest growing cities in the UK, but that this growth is in the private sector with a shrinking public sector. Leeds is focusing on retraining people for jobs that will eventually disappear and looking at getting people into work. Unfortunately, ‘disability’ doesn’t have its own place in this strategy, but we were assured that Forum Central and other stakeholders were involved in the consultation process.

 

The second speaker was Simon Cox, from the Department of Work and Pensions in his role as Disabled Person’s Community Partner. His talk was refreshing and painted a very positive image of the DWP, which often ignites feelings of anxiety in many disabled people. He talked about how their culture is changing, the role of the community partners, and how to get involved. Although positive and great to hear a change in attitudes towards disabled people, some elements may provide interesting opportunities for LDPO.

 

One of the interesting points to further explore was how the ‘coaches’ in DWP have been trained to support disabled people, and to what extent this was developed in collaboration with disabled people themselves. It is pertinent to add here that Simon Cox himself was a disabled man. This may be a space in which LDPO could work with the Community Partners and share member’s feedback as to how to better support disabled people looking for work. Next was the claim that they are ‘improving quality of life and wellbeing’, which would be fascinating to find out more about how they are doing this, and also people’s experiences of receiving this support. There are concerns around getting people to do voluntary work instead of finding paid employment, but these debates are more complex, and this is not the space to get into it, as this is not what the meeting was focused on. Finally, Simon mentioned that West Yorkshire has a new district manager who is focused on ‘experiences and not numbers’. This is an exciting opportunity to LDPO to work with disabled people in Leeds and have these conversations with DWP to promote better support and working practices. Stay tuned!

 

Hannah (Forum Central) then provided a quick update on Health and Social Care, mentioning that they are the voice of the third sector in Leeds and often sit on committees for these strategic projects. She encouraged members to join the Health and Third Sector Leaders Network, and get involved as much or as little, to make the voice of the third sector more powerful. There was an update on the neighbourhood teams (previously 13, now 18 of them); these are multidisciplinary teams around Leeds, ensuring that health and care can work together to provide more person centred approaches

~ By Hannah McGurk

Update: to find out more about Forum Central’s work, visit their website: https://www.forumcentral.org.uk

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Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton