New guide for professionals to help people with learning disabilities to exercise their freedom launched

A new guide has been launched to help professionals enable the people with learning disabilities they work with to exercise their freedom to the fullest extent possible.

The guide, Freedom, written by Dr Simon Duffy, develops ideas from his earlier book Keys to Citizenship. It is published by the social care think-tank Centre for Welfare Reform and offers practical advice on how to offer support while enabling people with learning disabilities to exercise freedom of choice as much as possible.

As Simon Cramp, fellow of the Centre for Welfare Reform, said in his preface to the guide: “Most people take freedom as a given. But for someone with a learning disability that is not always the case. That means that there are often more controls and fewer choices. People miss out on some of the most important things in life.”

Alicia Wood, CEO of the Housing and Support Alliance, added: “This guide offers service providers the tool to make freedom real for the people they serve. It’s time we all take freedom seriously.”

This guide is also an out-put of the Open Future Learning online course for support workers.

The guide is available to download and read online here. 

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