Programme

Registration and refreshments

Opening remarks from the chair

Valuing People Now – Improving support for people with learning disabilities

• Assessing the future of service improvements for adults with learning disabilities in the context of Valuing People Now
• The Valuing People Now Employment Strategy – assessing the implications of the current economic climate on employment opportunities for people with learning disabilities
• Exploring opportunities for joining up health and social services such as employment services and access to housing
• Developing more personalised services, increasing choice and encouraging independent living

Taking an efficient and universal approach to service provision and market development

• Integrating learning disabilities with the mainstream services agenda
• Getting commissioning right: What needs to come first – demand or supply?
• Driving continuous improvement in the current economic climate and keeping costs down
• Determining the impact of likely future budget cuts on service provision
• Managing increasing expectation while making better use of resources

Making It Personal

Question and answer session

Phil Hope, Minister of State for Care Services, & Minister for the East Midlands Department of Health

Morning refreshments

Communicating choice, developing control and managing risk

• Defining what choice looks like – striking a balance between traditional and new modes of service provision
• Understanding what customers want and how they want to buy
• Helping service users to make informed choices
• Fulfilling customer rights and freedom of choice whilst offsetting the risks of self-directed support

Increasing use of personal budgets as a route to a better life and supporting people into employment

• Lessons from experience: The real life challenges of using a personal budget for people with learning difficulties.
  
• A case study: The good, the bad and the indifferent
• How Speaking Up's 'lifeunlimited' projects are hoping to make personal budgets work as a route to a better life.
  
• Learning from our early work and implications for future practice: a) bottom up solutions b) the state to work more closely with advocacy and other third sector organisations

Question and answer session

Lunch

Afternoon Chair:

Mainstreaming health services for adults with learning disabilities

• Develop a whole system approach to commissioning inclusive healthcare services
• Addressing the recommendation from the formal investigation 'Healthcare for All'
• Making Valuing People Now - Better Health happen at a local level
• Implementing the Direct Enhanced Scheme for People with Learning Disabilities
  

Developing forward thinking commissioning relationships with third sector providers

• Assessing opportunities for pooling health and local government budgets
• Setting up an effective joint commissioning board and assigning clear roles and responsibilities across your partnerships
• How successful is this approach in encouraging access to mainstream services for people with learning disabilities?
  

Effective joint commissioning of services for people with learning disabilities

• Assessing opportunities for pooling health and local government budgets
• Setting up an effective joint commissioning board and assigning clear roles and responsibilities across your partnerships
• How successful is this approach in encouraging access to mainstream services for people with learning disabilities?

Question and answer session

Afternoon refreshments

Establishing personalised, sustainable and cost effective supported living arrangements

• Analysing how personalised budgets have affected the services people with learning disabilities choose
• Defining appropriate housing options for adults with learning disabilities
• Working with individual budgets, independent providers and landlords to develop sustainable housing options while keeping costs to a minimum

Measuring the impact of self-directed support in achieving independent living for adults with learning disabilities

• Analysing how personalised budgets have affected the services people with learning disabilities choose
• Assessing the effectiveness of self-directed care in improving community participation, choice and control
• Monitoring the long term impact of self-directed support

Question and answer session

Chair’s closing remarks and close of conference