Voice UK also provide workshops on Disability Hate Crime. The project’s main aim is to support and encourage people to get Equal Access to Justice in the Criminal Justice System by delivering informal workshops to groups of people with Learning Disabilities and their carers in order to raise awareness and ultimately improve wellbeing. 

The workshops are peer-lead and delivered by our project workers who themselves have Learning Disabilities; they are supported at each session by our project support workers. 

 

Our main workshops cover the following areas but we can tailor our work to your requirements and have delivered sessions in many different environments and on many different subjects. We work closely with our Training Coordinator and contribute to some of the professional training carried out by the organisation. All of our sessions are free of charge to service users, include interactive activities and participants are able to keep all of the materials used.

This session covers keeping safe at home and potential dangers in the house, what to do if someone comes to your door, keeping safe when out and about, using public transport, what to do if you are in danger and how to contact the police. We introduce our ‘magic word’ for keeping safe and the session includes interactive and accessible activities for the group to re-affirm learning in a fun way.

This workshop covers what the difference is between bullying and abuse, how to recognise them both, the different types of bullying and abuse, what to do if you have been or feel you are a victim, how to contact the police and what the police may need to know. 

As this workshop does deal with sensitive issues we can liaise with the group leaders or protection officers beforehand with regards to confidentiality and disclosure as although we will not be directly asking any participants to share any of their own experiences, occasionally participants have first-hand knowledge of the issues we talk about and this can be upsetting. This session is designed as a partner to the ‘Keeping Safe’ workshop.

Disability Hate Crime is often under reported; this workshop aims to inform people with Learning Disabilities about what disability hate crime is, how to recognise if you are a victim and how to report it. We approach this very much as an ‘awareness raising’ session and do not expose participants to excess technical information. As with the Bullying and Abuse Workshop we are aware that there may be disclosures during the workshop and we are happy to discuss this issue with the group leaders or protection officers before the workshop. We have also developed a Criminal Justice Sector (CJS) overview which covers what happens from offence to sentence.

Our Project Workers are available to speak with groups and contribute to other training sessions/conferences in order to raise awareness of Learning Disabilities. They often perform role plays on topics such as accessing ‘Special Measures’ within the courts and Disability Hate Crime and the impact it can have on the individual. These are very effective at linking the actions of an organisation or individual to the emotional and physical impact it has on the Victim. They can be hard hitting and are designed to provoke thought and discussion.

The role-plays are in average around 15 / 20 minutes long and can be tailored to your event or audience. 

In addition to the above we are extremely flexible and open to exploring new avenues of work; we can usually tailor our sessions and content to any and all of your requirements so just give us a call. 

For further information on any of the above please contact the Voice UK Equal Access to Justice Project Coordinator Daniel Haslam on 01332 291042 or email:  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it