At Speak Out we support 3 groups that meet either weekly or every 2 weeks. People who come to our groups enjoy meeting friends and talking to each other about their lives. Group members help each other to think about ways of making their lives better.

Groups also talk to people who run different services. They tell people what they think of how services are run or will invite people in to find out the answers to their questions. In the past year, our groups have talked to lots of different people including the Council, the Theatre Royal, the Police, the Community Safety Team and the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership.

Joining a self advocacy group

We often have places to join a self advocacy group. If you are interested you can call Sarah or Ingrid at Speak Out on 01273 421921. We will arrange to come and visit you. We will find out more about what you want and tell you more about our groups.

Every 2 months we run a meeting called the Big Meeting. The Big Meeting is for representatives of the self advocacy groups as well as representatives from local services including day services and respite services.

We ask people to bring any news from their services or groups so they can tell others. We also run themed workshops to find out whether people are getting the lives they want. Some of the workshops in the past have included ‘Our Ideal Home’; Changes to Day Services; Relationships; Complaints and Rights.

The Link Group is the 5th advocacy group at Speak Out. They act as ambassadors for the whole advocacy groups network. This means they take what people say to the Learning Disability Partnership Board so that people who run homes, day services and other services know what people who use their services think.

The Learning Disability Partnership Board is a meeting of:

• people with learning disabilities

• people who run learning disability services

• other interested organisations

The job of the Partnership Board is to make sure that learning disability services get better.

Speak Out supports the Link Group to attend. The Link Group is a group of people with learning disabilities who represent the views of people from the Big Meeting.

The Link group attends all Partnership Board meetings and the Big Meeting. Added to this they meet together to discuss what issues that have come up are important and need to be raised with others.

Joining the Link group

We sometimes have spaces for more people to join the Link Group. You need to have a learning disability and be good at listening to what other people with learning disabilities think.

We support people to get the confidence to go to large meetings and tell people who run services what people think. If you have things to say and are not afraid to talk about this at meetings then get in touch with Sarah at Speak Out on 01273 421921

Network News is a magazine that comes out 3 times a year. It is written by members of the self advocacy groups and people from other city-wide services. People choose subjects that they want to write about. Network News also has news from the Partnership Board to keep people informed about what is going on with services in the city.