Fairer Scotland for disabled people: progress report - easy read

A Fairer Scotland for Disabled People: What work has been done? - Easy Read

What work has been done?

‘A Fairer Scotland for Disabled People’ is a plan to make life better for disabled people in Scotland.

The Scottish Government is working to make Scotland a fair and equal place for everyone.

This report says what work in the plan was done by the Scottish Government from 2016 to 2021.

The report also says that Coronavirus has changed everyone’s lives.

Some people have been affected more than others.

Disabled people have been affected very badly.

The plan has 5 aims in red writing. Each aim is what we said we would do in 2016.

Underneath each aim is the work that has happened after 2016.

Disabled people and organisations worked with us to decide the aims in 2016.

Aim 1

Disabled people have the right support to live their lives.

More disabled people are using self-directed support.

Self-directed support means people can make decisions about what kind of support they want.

We started a new group to work with the Scottish Government to make social care better.

The group is called the People-led Policy Panel.

It is a group of people who have had social care support, including unpaid carers.

The First Minister asked for a report about adult social care.

The report was published in February 2021.

The Review has recommendations.

A recommendation is what it thinks should happen.

The Review wants to make sure social care has the same importance as the National Health Service.

The next Parliament and Government will decide how to make the recommendations happen.

The Independent Living Fund (ILF) gives money, information and services to support disabled people.

The ILF Transition Fund opened in 2017.

It helps young disabled people when their life changes in a big way.

It can give them money for things that help them spend time with other people and gain confidence and independence.

In 2019 the rules changed so that any young person up to age 25 can apply for money from the Fund.

More young people now get money from the Fund.

We have a plan to support people with learning disabilities to be included in everyday life.

The plan is called ‘The keys to life’.

In 2019 we made a report about how the work in the plan will be done up to 2021.

We have a new plan for autism.

Autistic people, their families, carers and staff worked with us on the plan.

The plan was made in March 2018.

It will make it easier to find out when someone has autism and support them better.

Aim 2

Disabled people have the right benefits.

They have support to work and stay in work.

Not as many disabled people have a job as non-disabled people.

We have a plan to help more disabled people get a job.

It is called the Employment Action Plan.

It was made in December 2018.

Fair Start Scotland supports people to get back into work.

It has helped thousands of people.

We work with Fair Start Scotland to make sure people get support that is right for them.

There will be reviews of the service in 2021 to check that it is working well.

The Young Person’s Guarantee supports every young person aged between 16 and 24 to have the chance to:

• study
• get an apprenticeship, job or work experience
• be a volunteer.

We have other projects that support disabled people into work:

• the NHS disabled internship scheme
• We Can Work internship scheme.

An internship is paid work experience.

Social Security Scotland started in 2018 to deal with some benefits in Scotland.

It works in a way that gives people dignity and respect.

Social Security Scotland are making a plan so that everyone can communicate with them in a way that is right for them.

They have information in accessible formats.

There are new benefits called:

• Child Disability Payment – it will start in 2021.
• Adult Disability Payment – it will start in 2022.
• Child Winter Heating Assistance – it started in 2020.

It helps families with the cost of heating their homes in winter.

From 2017 to 2021 the Family Fund gave money to families with disabled or very ill children and young people that do not have much money.

It helps them buy things like computers, washing machines and fridges.

Carers get more money in benefits through the Carer’s Allowance Supplement and a one-off payment of £230 because of coronavirus.

Carers have new rights and laws.

Aim 3

Places are accessible to everyone.

A Culture Strategy for Scotland was published in February 2020.

It is a plan to make sure that culture is accessible to disabled people.

Culture includes things like cinema, theatre, music and groups.

People need accessible homes.

1,124 accessible homes have been built for disabled people.

We give money to Housing Options Scotland.

In 2019-2020 they helped 690 people.

They find the right houses for disabled people and people with health issues.

We are making transport more accessible.

This means making it easier for disabled people to get on trains, taxis and planes.

We made a plan to show how work on accessible travel will happen.

A report in January 2021 showed how well the work was going.

It also showed what work was done to support disabled people during the coronavirus pandemic.

There was an easy read version of the report.

Aim 4

Disabled people get fair treatment and have access to their rights.

We have worked with Disabled People’s Organisations and Police Scotland to tell more people about hate crime and how to report it.

There were hate crime campaigns in 2017, 2018 and 2020.

The Supporting Offenders with Learning Disabilities (SOLD) Network works to make things better for people with communication support needs in the Justice system.

The criminal justice system is the police, courts and prison.

SOLD have new information for staff who work in the criminal justice system to help them support people with communication support needs better.

There was a group called the National Taskforce for Human Rights Leadership.

It started in 2019 and wrote a report in March 2021.

The report is about making sure everyone's human rights are protected in Scotland.

The report says the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities should be part of Scottish law.

A Convention is an agreement that means countries will protect human rights in the same way for everyone.

Aim 5

Disabled people can take part in life in Scotland, and do not experience discrimination.

If disabled people want to be elected as a Member of the Scottish Parliament, or local government there is a fund to make sure they are not disadvantaged by their disability.

In 2017 the money supported 39 disabled people to stand for election to local councils.

15 candidates were elected.

To help people know about coronavirus we have:

• made accessible versions of health information including British Sign Language and Easy Read.
• started support phone lines.
• given training and equipment to disabled people who did not have internet access.

This helped people know about new health information.

It helped people who are lonely and on their own.

And finally …

In the past 5 years there has been a lot of good work to support the rights of disabled people.

It will take more time to make sure everyone is treated equally.

This work is a good start.