Merton Centre for Independent Living

Merton Centre for Independent Living (Merton CIL) are pleased to announce that Tom Lichy will be joining them as Chief Executive Officer from 12th August 2019.

This trainee role is a great opportunity to develop core information, advice and advocacy knowledge and experience while working with and supporting our committed team of caseworkers. You will be focusing on Personal Independence Payment applications, from form-filling to representation at the First-tier Tribunal and social care (Care Act 2014) assessments, reassessments and reviews.

Merton CIL has started a review of housing for Deaf and Disabled people in the borough and we want to hear people's views and experiences.

In May, the government has confirmed its decision to go ahead with the plastic straw ban despite the strong objections of Disabled people including members of Merton CIL. We used the consultation to tell the government that banning the general use of plastic straws would add to the barriers Disabled people have to deal with but they're going ahead with it anyway," says Michael Turner, Merton CIL Policy and Strategy Manager.
 

This CIL Matters newsletter is focused around 'togetherness'. We have articles on co-production, we speak about ways that you can get involved at Merton CIL and much more. We are also very excited to invite you all to this years My Voice Matters event in June. We hope you enjoy reading it!

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) is consulting on whether to introduce deposit return schemes to improve recycling. This broadly means that bottles may cost a little more to buy, but you can get money back if you return them. Our members raised concerns about whether Disabled People who need support to live independently might find that they are paying more for goods, and they are unable to get back to shops or reverse vending machines to get money back.

Merton CIL are looking for a new CEO, as their current CEO is moving overseas. This role is an exciting challenge for someone who is self-motivated and enjoys a varied and strategic role. It will be a demanding role combining day-to-day management of this user-led Deaf and Disabled People's Organisation, with accountability to the trustee board and responsibility for supervision and development of the senior management team.

A big thank you to all our members who came to the recent Craftivism and Chat group to talk about sex! Specifically, we gave feedback on Merton's planned Sexual Health Strategy. The London Borough of Merton and Merton Clinical Commissioning Group (NHS), working alongside NHS England, are responsible for commissioning sexual health services in Merton. They are currently developing a joint 5 year sexual health strategy. This strategy aims to set out how everyone in Merton has good access to sexual health services and is supported to be healthy.

Merton Centre for Independent Living is disappointed to announce that Merton Council has decided not to continue funding our unique home-visiting advice service for local Deaf and Disabled people. 

This world book day authors have been urged to feature Disabled characters in their stories. Deaf and Disabled people are often not as visible as they should be in literature, and this has to change.

Earlier this year we made an effort ahead of world book day to crowd-source a list of books by or about Deaf and Disabled People. Check out the list our members and supporters came up with, and feel free to suggest your own. You can send suggestions via email or tweet us @MertonCIL

The post will manage all aspects of the evaluation for the Pan-London Hate Crime Partnership and selected projects within the Partnership, working collaboratively with Inclusion London’s London Hate Crime Partnership Project Manager. It will ensure that our partners meet all delivery and monitoring requirements, and that project communications, publicity and evaluation work is carried out to ensure learning from the project is captured and shared with stakeholders. The post will also undertake Merton CIL’s self-evaluation.

Thank you to all our members who came to our recent Craftivism and Chat group and responded to Merton Council's consultation on the Local Plan. We have put together a consultation response with the support and input of our members, and shared this with Merton Council. Member's 25 key suggestions, across infrastructure, transport, environment, housing, economy and more have been passed on and we welcome further engagement and conversation on these matters.

Thank you to all our members and supporters who helped us feed back to Government how we feel about plans to ban plastic straws. In summary, we said we want to save the environment too, but, please don't ban plastic straws until there is a real alternative (there isn't one yet), because some Disabled People need them to drink!

We're thrilled to be able to send you thisshare our special 10th anniversary edition of CIL Matters. We hope you enjoy reading it and please do get in touch to share your own memories of Merton CIL! 

In September, the Merton CIL Craftivism and Chat group got together to respond to the Local Government Association (LGA) green paper on adult social care and wellbeing. The group's response was one of 500 responses sent to the LGA.

You can read our draft response to the consultation on plastic straws. We would love to hear from you if you have any further comments. Deadline 30th November 2018

Merton CIL has reviewed the current position of adult social care in the borough. We are bringing together a panel of speakers who will reflect on best practice locally and nationally, which can be built on to support Deaf and Disabled People to live independent lives. Following on from our AGM on 25th October, we will be hosting this panel event to discuss the future of social care. 

Our full report is now available: Choice, Control and Independent Living

An easyread summary is available here: Choice,_Control_and_Independent_Living._Easy_Read_Summary_Oct_2018.pdf

The Local Government Association (LGA) recently launched a nationwide consultation on how to pay for adult social care. The consultation, which has just closed, was seeking the views of people and organisations from across society on how best to pay for care and support for adults of all ages and their unpaid carers, and aimed to make the public a central part of the debate. The LGA intends to inform and influence the Government’s upcoming green paper and spending plans. It also intends to start a much-needed debate about how to shift the overall emphasis of our care and health system so that it focuses far more on preventative, community-based personalised care, which helps maximise people’s health, wellbeing and independence.

This is a great opportunity to join our dynamic user-led Deaf and Disabled people's organisation in Merton and to support our continued growth, strategic direction and governance on the trustee board.

Merton CIL are delighted to announce that we have been selected as Sainsbury’s Local Charity of The Year. We were selected by Sainsbury’s customers and colleagues as a charity that they wish to support as we make a big difference in the community.

Do you have what it takes to join a growing and dynamic user-led Deaf and Disabled People’s organisation in Merton? We have been described by our evaluators as an organisation that “contributes significantly and positively towards enabling its services users to grow in confidence, self-advocate and assert their rights toward a more independent life” and we are proud to be finalists in the Best Service Excellence category at The Merton’s Best Business Awards 2018.

In 2018, Merton Centre for Independent Living (Merton CIL), is celebrating its 10th year of supporting local Deaf and Disabled People in Merton. And, there is now cause for another celebration as Merton CIL is a finalist in the Best Service Excellence category at The Merton’s Best Business Awards 2018.

On July 5th, Merton Centre for Independent Living (Merton CIL), celebrated its 10th anniversary of supporting local Deaf and Disabled people with a party at The Everyday Church in Wimbledon.

Merton CILs engagement with the local community was evident from the crowd that turned up on the day to celebrate all that it has achieved, with nearly 100 people partying with us! The Mayor of Merton, Councillor Mary Curtin even came along to help us cut our birthday cake. There was an exclusive screening of Merton CILs new short film - #Here2Stay on the day. If you missed out you are able to watch here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecTQIfU4Doo&t=

Some of you were worried that banning plastic straws was going to have an impact on Disabled people who use them to drink independently. It was felt that maybe we could do our bit for the environment in other ways, and here at Merton CIL we've bought glasses instead of plastic cups for our water. But, we still provide bendy plastic straws for anyone who needs them!