Placards in hand, protesters gathered at Chichester’s County Hall to voice their anger at the cutting of £250,000 of support for people with disabilities. As of September 30, West Sussex County Council will end its contract with disability advocacy charity Impact Initiatives, which each year helps more than 450 vulnerable people with learning disabilities, autism, physical disabilities, sensory disabilities and acquired brain injury.
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00:00 Shut the f***ing house!
00:12 We are here today because it just seems that every service for disabled people is getting cut and getting taken away.
00:21 Hi Josh! Sorry, another musical member.
00:25 And these people really don't have anywhere else to go. We are being told that there are services in place and there are other things but this simply isn't true.
00:36 If we lose this service, many of these people, that's a lifeline for them.
00:41 And also this infrastructure has been set up for 20 years, isn't it?
00:45 Yeah.
00:46 So, you know, this group runs, is successful, it does really well.
00:51 If you take that away and start everything from the beginning again, you're going to lose so much.
00:56 Yeah, so there's six advocacy groups. There's four for learning disabilities and two for autism.
01:02 They're claiming that they will support us to continue but they won't.
01:05 We need 12 hours a week of support to run. They're offering like two hours a month for three months.
01:11 So basically they're ending.
01:13 And with issue-based advocacy, that helps disabled people with various conditions of any issue they might be having.
01:19 So it might be like housing, food bank referrals, like needing to get care and support workers for themselves,
01:26 or to help them look after their children, like helping to understand the process, like if their children are going into foster care, you know, that sort of thing.
01:33 Navigating services.
01:35 Yeah, navigating all the pathways which are really hard to understand, like even though they exist if you're disabled.
01:40 All of that's going. The council acknowledge that this service helps them to fulfil their statutory obligations under the Care Act.
01:49 And this is just not being replaced. It's gone.
01:51 They keep saying they're going to be doing this, that and the other.
01:54 And they keep saying to MPs that they've got detailed finishing plans in place to, you know, replace it.
02:00 But they literally haven't. They've done nothing. They're not telling the truth.
02:04 So we're here, we're hoping we can change their minds.
02:07 Very much so. Very much so. And honestly, we've heard this kind of thing before.
02:14 (laughing)