Mary is a student, an artist, and she works for Brandon as a Quality Checker. Having been supported by Brandon for the last year, Mary became part of the first group of Brandon Quality Checkers six months ago. Mary is keen to help make sure other people receive the same level of support that she does. And if she can help to improve support generally, that’s even better.

At one flexible support service in Wiltshire, they are keen to enable everyone they support to take part in the sorts of activities that most people take for granted. In December 2018, they took a group of people ice-skating to the largest outdoor rink in the south-west.

Tony began working in the care sector 37 years ago and for the last 25 years he has been supporting people with learning disabilities, autism or both. As support has evolved, he has found he has more time working with people and providing direct support. This enables him to better support individuals to make their own choices, to give them time to do that. The difference time makes is obvious. He explains that one of the gentlemen he supports, Clarence, has gone from saying single words to short sentences.

Some of the people living at one of Brandon’s registered care homes near Bristol came from long-stay institutionalised care, where they were prescribed medication which may – or, crucially, may not – benefit them. STOMP is a health campaign to stop the overmedication of people with learning disabilities and/or autism, and improve their quality of life. Hugh and Sophie are team leaders at the care home – here they describe the life-changing effects STOMP can have…

After working as a civil servant for 25 years, I knew I needed a change. My job had become the most stressful it had ever been. My daughter is a support worker, and one day, she asked me to keep her company at a recruitment evening. I had no intention of applying for a job, I simply went for moral support. I’d always envied my daughter’s job role and how much satisfaction she got from her work. She knew it was something I’d talked about wanting to do, but I never had the courage to do anything about it.

I first met James in 2014. He was 24 years old. Described as having a severe learning disability, autism, and behaviours that seriously challenged, he had spent many years in a long-stay hospital. Any attempt to move him to residential care had failed catastrophically.