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toothbrushes, knives and forks, alarm clocks and chocolate coins

longman

No its not a list of my favourite things.

NAS has sent Government Minister Norman Lamb 400 toothbrushes, 400 knives and forks, 50 alarm clocks and 770 chocolate coins.

I hope Norman Lamb isn't as non-plussed as I am.

According to NAS campaigns - Push for Action - these everyday objects (chocolate coins?) represent the basic support adults with autism are still waiting to receive. They highlight how the current system is failing to answer the most basic needs of people with autism, whether that's help with making a meal or getting access to work.

Well the alarm clocks fit in with the Chancellor of the Exchequer's quip about people on benefits having a lie in.

I'm sorry NAS I'm a bit lost. I just have to hope that the Minister Norman Lamb has a better idea what you are on about.

You probably think I'm being an ungrateful cynic, but I got the email about this this morning, and neither the email, nor the 'Find out more' link explains it. If I'm stuck, and maybe others using this forum can enlighten me, are you sure you are getting the right message across.

Should they have been delivered to him on a wednesday by someone wearing a onesie?

  • The email was sent out by the head of campaigns headed "Our reminder to Norman about people living in....."

    As I have pointed out yesterday on another posting "Does autism get pushed to one side by learning disabilities?" - the trouble with the statistics is we don't have the worst.

    Learning Disability has only 6.4% in work. They've used similar campaigns.

    NAS needs to ensure that the message from autism is original and hard hitting, and not just the same punches from a group with less marked percentages.

    Also there are very different things going on here. The barriers for autism for those able to get work in favourable conditions, lies with the resolvability of the issues.

    Much of the problem with autism is overcoming people's prejudices about work colleagues who behave slightly differently, don't conform, don't fit in, don't learn the pecking order etc.

    This extends to the way they are treated by health professionals, in accessing public services, and getting local authority support.

    Many people with autism could work, and could live better lives, if other people better understood and enabled a fairly small adjustment in how they are treated.

    That sort of subtlety isn't addressed by competing with other disabilities on plain statistics.

  • That's really unfortunate as it was a lot of work by Jess and the team to make this exercise happen. I've already flagged it to them.

    Thank you for letting us know. 

     

  • Thanks for clarifying Anil A - Mod.  That makes a lot more sense.

    Possibly campaigns need to have another look at the email they've sent out which doesn't explain the message in the different colours of objects.

    It just tells everyone they sent out 400 undesrcribed toothbrushes, and so on. There's nothing said about there being differences representing percentages.

  • Having not seen the email, I can't comment on how well they described the exercise. That said, having been part of the team that worked on this I can shed some light on what it was about - although I'm not the best person to answer questions about the campaign overall. 

    One of our staff, Jess, worked incredibly hard on putting together the boxes we sent to Norman Lamb, creating these clips to explain what Push for Action statistic each box represented. Each box contained a leaflet explaining more about Push for Action. 

    vine.co/.../906587395045072896

    If we take the chocolate coins example, we used a mix of gold and silver coins to represent this statistic. "77% of adults with autism said they need help to manage money. But only 4% get this support from social services"

    We used a mix of red and black alarm clocks to demonstrate "53% of adults with autism said they want help to find work but only 10% get this support". The toothbruses were a mix of white and red, with red toothbrushes representing the 7% who get help to wash and dress themselves from social services.

    The videos were intended for our social networks as a way of encouraging people to get involved with the campaign. Alas, the onesies aren't coming out until 2nd April for WAAD.