Policy - Strategic Advocacy

Our Policy work

Strategic Advocacy is speaking up and influencing policy at a national level. What we say and do at meetings is directly informed by our members from around the country. We gather the views and experiences of our members and communicate them as collective issues and concerns. 

We do this at meetings and at events or through Government consultations. 

For example, some of the issues raised include:

• a lack of reasonable adjustments when accessing services
• the need for accessible information about the things that affect us
• diagnostic overshadowing
• mental and physical health needs not being taken seriously
• poor quality physical healthcare

During the pandemic a lot of policy meetings were suspended or stopped completely so we had to find other ways to communicate with decision makers.

We also had to adapt to working online and this meant learning to use digital communication channels instead of meeting face-to-face. 

We spent a lot of time supporting people to get devices that they could use, get the right data packages and use digital platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams.

Some of our work at a national level is featured below.