Autism Together Annual Review 2021/2022

2021 2022 ANNUAL

REVIEW

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W H AT ’ S N E W

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Our River Park group won Autism Leaders List Awards Children and Family fun day

We fundraised for a defibrillator www.autismtogether.co.uk

CONTENTS

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W H AT WE DO

LETTER FROM THE CEO & TRUSTEES

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Garden Centre cafe reopened

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DEVELOPING SKILLS

We won funding through the Wirral Globe voucher scheme

Pygmy goats arrived

Sensory garden completed

ACHIEVEMENTS & HIGHLIGHTS

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COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

SUPPORTING AUTISTIC PEOPLE

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SUPPORTING S TA F F & FA M I L I E S

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MEETING O U R VA L U E S

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Alex donated his latest artwork

FINANCES www.autismtogether.co.uk

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What we do

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For over 50 years, Autism Together has been providing support to autistic people, offering a wide range of residential services, supported living, day services and community support from our base in Wirral, UK. Research has shown that specialist education and structured support can really make a difference to the life of an autistic person.

Every person on the autism spectrum is unique, so we work with each individual to help them overcome any difficulties autism may present them with, enabling them to lead a more fulfilling life.

As a specialist autism provider, our organisation recognises that each person has a right to live their life as they choose.

We create a shared understanding of each person’s strengths and needs, ensuring their preferred way of communicating these is respected and implemented by all our staff.

Our support approaches and strategies are focused on developing lifelong learning, helping to develop people's skills by considering their communication needs, thinking patterns, social understanding and sensory differences.

Our mission

To help autistic people develop their full potential and achieve their aspirations by delivering high quality, person-centred support.

Our philosophy remains firmly rooted in a belief that...

We begin with what people can do, not with what they can’t, by listening to each individual and acknowledging that they are the experts in their autism.

Our support begins with the person, along with a shared understanding of what is important to them and what their strengths and needs are.

Our support approaches are individualised so that staff can meet each person’s communication needs. Staff are trained to be consistent in the way they use communication strategies with individuals.

Our values.

Positive communication www.autismtogether.co.uk

To be person-centred

To be respectful

Promote learning

We are always glad to help the people we support make lovely gifts for their parents' birthdays and other anniversaries.

Rachael (pictured) created some lovely paper flowers in a vase for her dad’s birthday.

CREATIVE ARTS

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A MES S AG E F ROM OU R C EO

Sue Stubbs

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motivate people to drink more water each day, healthy recipes with easy read instructions so people we support can join in, and videos showing simple exercises that can Welcome to our Annual Report for 2021/22. be done at home or in the office.

During the past year we continued to face numerous Maintaining mental health is probably the most Covid-19 challenges. Yet again we responded to important consideration and we offer various routes that lockdowns, coped with high infection rates and staff can follow to get any additional support they might staff absences. need. However, often the simplest things are the most We closed and re-opened a large proportion of our effective, so we encourage everyone to look out for, and day services, redeployed staff, reacted to the myriad of be kind to each other – be that a colleague or a person Government and local authority requests and guidance, we support. managed outbreaks in our homes and services, and While we have had to reprioritise some of our activities reassured the people we support and their families. during the year, we have continued to make progress Despite these challenges we have much to celebrate. against our Five-Year Strategic Plan, some highlights of Our staff team continues to make a massive difference which are detailed on the next page. to the lives of the people we support through their It was with huge regret that we had to make the decision commitment, hard work and compassion, ensuring to temporarily close our respite/short stay service based that the people they are supporting are engaged, in The Maples. Along with other social care providers, we entertained and continue to achieve their goals. are facing an unprecedented shortage of staff resulting This annual report is full of examples in a high level of vacancies. We I am so proud of my of how, despite operating through have plans in place to address this a global pandemic, we are fulfilling and are constantly monitoring the colleagues and the people our mission to help autistic people situation. they support – for their develop their potential and achieve We have continued to maintain commitment, hard work and our strong financial position, their aspirations by delivering highquality, person-centred support. again increasing our free reserves many achievements.

These demonstrate the fantastic to give us a much-needed achievements of the people we support across all our financial cushion for the future, while providing services, supported by our incredible staff team. reassurance to our staff, the people we However, we cannot underestimate the toll support and their families about the longthe past two years has taken on the health term sustainability of Autism Together. and well-being of both the people we I am so proud of my colleagues and support and our staff. Throughout, we the people they support – for their have provided a range of resources aimed commitment, hard work and many at both colleagues and the people we achievements. In the third year of this support. These focus on ways to better global pandemic, I am hopeful that life look after our minds and bodies and is getting back to normal and that we all range from downloadable charts to help have much to look forward to. www.autismtogether.co.uk

Progress against our Strategic Objectives

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Provide personcentred and high-quality services for people across the autism spectrum Yet again we have focused on keeping the people we support safe, well, entertained and engaged during another challenging year. The way

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Develop our autism services

we have managed this has been a resounding success with no people we support getting seriously ill or being involved in any significant incidents.

We have responded to continued lockdowns, coped with high infection rates amongst our staff resulting in high absences.

We closed and re-opened day services, redeployed staff, reacted to changing requests and guidance, managed outbreaks in our homes and services, reassured the people we support and their families.

In addition, we have achieved the following against our operational plan objectives:

the overall day service structure.

These include phasing out of the Super Tuesday regime (where people who lived in Residential Covid and now staffing difficulties and Supported Living services did have been a significant barrier to not attend), a reduction in people plans to develop our services. moving from one day service to Our CVS or day services has another during the day and removal gone through significant changes of half-day attendance across the during the pandemic, with multiple board. closures and re-openings of It was disappointing that we were services. As services have renot able to pursue the potential of opened, we have implemented some opening a new day service provision of the changes we want to make to in Hoylake, however it provided an

f Continued to develop the Quality Framework and have now appointed a Quality Assurance (QA) Manager to oversee this work programme. f The people we support have been encouraged to have meaningful involvement in the service they live in or attend. The people we support forums, which closed earlier in the pandemic, have now returned and the new QA Manager will have responsibility to implement more initiatives in this area. f The Risk Management Framework has been approved, the new risk register is active and internal auditors have been appointed to provide independent assurance.

opportunity to explore alternative models of day service support and, now that we are near capacity, the Head of Service and Service Managers are further developing these plans.

The Supported Living model has been reviewed in detail, considering the management structure, and the cost effectiveness of each location.

We have changed the management structure to offer better financial sustainability and manager oversight. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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A very well organised trust considering how large it has become over the years. Staff and management are excellent.

I am so grateful for the expertise and kindness shown to my loved one.

A PA R E N T

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www.autismtogether.co.uk

LETTERS FROM THE CEO AND TRUSTEES

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Develop and invest in our staff

The key achievement this year has been the move to pay our frontline staff at least the Real Living Wage. We also continued to ensure that staff were rewarded through enhanced overtime rates, and sick pay, and a retention bonus. In addition, we achieved the

following against our Operational Plan:

staff with their well-being. f Made progress in ensuring essential training is kept up to date. f Continued the development of staff communication and engagement initiatives, under the continued challenging circumstances, by utilising arange of virtual communication tools.

f Although not conducting a significant staff satisfaction survey we did check how we were doing in supporting staff, through Covid well-being supervisions. We will be conducting a full staff survey in Autumn 2022. f Continued to develop and promote a wide range of resources to support

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Be financially sustainable

Invest in our assets and infrastructure

This year we have made progress in a number of areas: f Our Property Strategy is now live and we have made good progress delivering against the action plan, especially through engagement with Riverside and developing a plan for the Raby site. f Appointing a Health & Safety Advisor has provided new focus and supported the Health & Safety Committee that now meets quarterly. f The IT strategy has been developed and approved. f Our head office has been re-configured and is now delivering Day Services again.

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Raise autism awareness, acceptance and promote autism good practice We have continued to increase our reach and raised our profile across our social media channels and through local media and wider news networks.

f Features including Enable Magazine, Charity Today, BBC Radio Merseyside, Granada (ITV) News, Women’s Radio, Liverpool Live Radio and more. f Worked with Dobbies Garden Centres to help train their staff to run autism-friendly Christmas Grottos. The resulting press releases from Dobbies spread Autism Together’s name right

Despite the continued uncertainties we have achieved the following: f Exceeded our budgeted surplus to add to free reserves. f Improved our cash position and reduced our borrowings. f The finance department restructuring is now delivering tangible financial benefits. f Exceeded our fundraising target.

across the UK. f A tie-in with Grand Central Rail about the joy of train travel for many autistic people brought a range of articles in media we would not normally reach.

SOCIAL MEDIA FOLLOWERS

14,000 2,000 3,500

3,300 1,000

www.autismtogether.co.uk

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CHAIR OF TRUSTEES

Cath Ames

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As detailed in our CEO’s message, 21/22 has been another year of uncertainty and challenge, still requiring much tenacity, patience and hard work.

Sue sets out how hard this time has been, and I would like to thank and commend both her and our staff for all they have done for the people we support.

In spite of the constraints, we enter this new year in a healthy and strong financial position. Our debt position has been transformed over the last 5 years due to careful and wise decision making and astute management.

We have modernised our risk management and implemented a new risk management framework, seeking to clarify this across every aspect of our organisation.

Our property strategy continues to develop. This muchneeded plan will make the most of our diverse portfolio, safeguard the enormous legacy of the past and keep our people safe and well-housed in the future.

We are now paying our front-line staff at least the Real Living Wage and it remains a Board priority that staff know how much they are valued. Without them we would not be here.

Nearly three years into our strategic plan, it has been frustrating not to move things along as we envisaged. But as you will see from this Annual Report, so much has been done and continues to be done every day.

The Autism Together vision: “A better life for autistic people”, is what drives and motivates the organisation and the Board. We know there is more to do, there always will be, and we are poised and ready for the next chapter.

It has been an honour to be Chair of this organisation and to play a small part in safeguarding it for the future. www.autismtogether.co.uk

MESSAGE FROM THE INCOMING CHAIR

IAIN CADMAN

Iain has been a trustee since 2016 and is currently Chair of the Finance sub-committee.

Iain said: “It is a privilege to become the new Chair of Trustees and I will work hard to build on the successes of the last 53 years.

“Autism Together is in a very strong position and I look forward to working more closely with Sue Stubbs and the Senior Leadership Team to ensure we remain at the forefront of quality provision for the people we support.”

Developing skills 11 11

C YC L I N G AT B I R K E N H E A D PA R K www.autismtogether.co.uk

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R E V I E W

In the past year, over 30 of the people we also gone back to Grange Road West for trampolining support in Community Health & Wellbeing and have a group that attends the Soccer Dome (CH&W) have enjoyed the success of in Wallasey for football specific sessions. The completing various different ASDAN Tranmere Rovers community football session awards. has also restarted with a great success for the ASDAN is a British education people we support. charity and awarding organisation which offers people the chance to With more and more of the people we develop knowledge and skills for support returning to our day services over learning, work and life - and receive the past year, it’s been a joy to see faces old G R A N G E ROA D W E S T a meaningful award at the end of the and new at Gallagher House. So many of the FO R T R A M P O L I N I N G journey. people we support have told us how happy they The CH&W team has slowly introduced are to be back seeing their friends again and their two new ASDAN awards for people to support staff. strive for – Realising Aspirations and Supporting Recently we opened a Creative Arts service in Bromborough, Aspirations. Alongside this, staff have given out more than 20 within our Oak House head office. This has opened up Autism Together Personal Challenge Awards to the people we the service to many of the people we support who live support. in our Residential and Supported Living houses. We are The Swimming Trial group are working towards Rock Hopper currently upgrading the outside space there to make it more awards again, and we are looking to reintroduce BAGA awards comfortable for people to sit and enjoy the woodlands which with the restarted Trampolining groups too. adjoin the site.

In the community we have returned to various activities Lots of new starters have joined us and they have settled in such as cycling at Birkenhead Park and Wrexham. We have really well. Through accessing our Creative Arts & Technology

MEET OUR NEW HEALTH & SAFETY COMMITTEE...

Neil, Dan, Mandy & Martin www.autismtogether.co.uk

These people we support meet with staff every two months in our head office to discuss health and safety issues. Each of them has completed safety training in fire awareness, barbecues, fireworks and electricals. The group are supported to complete weekly safety checks in their Supported Living properties and have recently started work towards gaining ASDAN awards.

wing of CVS, the people we support can express themselves through painting, learn new IT skills using packages like Krita and Microsoft Office, or spend an afternoon making models and animating them in our Media department. Like Karl (pictured below) using the Krita software to create digital art.

We have recently created a new podcast, which is recorded in Gallagher House, presented by the people we support. Each week, the presenters chat and interview each other about their hobbies and interests. It strongly features discussions on the Premier League football season with our regular presenters keen to discuss their love of Liverpool and Everton football clubs. As you can imagine there are some strong opinions about that!

Rob (Liverpool fan) and Adam (Everton fan) have lots of goodhumoured rivalry about which is the better team.

Another recent project saw the people we support using craft skills to create pairs of animals for our own Noah’s Ark. Meanwhile, friends Karl and Dan created a ‘feel good’ alphabet with positive and inspiring words for each letter.

Some people understandably struggled with the disruptions of Covid, lockdowns and the impact this has had on their usual routines and timetables. We have put together Positive Behaviour Support plans and visual aids to help the people we support deal with the changes that have come about. The people we support have coped really well with all the changes, thanks to lots of positive reinforcement and praise from our support teams.

Like within CH&W, many individuals across our day services are being supported to achieve ASDAN awards. These nationallyrecognised qualifications can be accomplished for a variety of life skills. Rob and Chloe were recently awarded ASDAN certificates for work ‘Towards Independence’. Chloe also celebrated the arrival of our new arrivals at Raby Gardens last year by creating an amazing alpaca artwork (pictured right)!

Well done to everyone who has achieved so much this year.

K A R L A N D DA N H AV E C R E AT E D A ‘ F E E L GOOD’ ALPHABET C H LO E C E L E B R AT E S T H E B A BY A L PA P C A 13

D I G I TA L A RT C R E AT E D BY K R I TA www.autismtogether.co.uk

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Achievements & Highlights 14 14

R I V E R PA R K T E A M CO M P L E T E T H E I R H E A LT H A N D S A F E T Y AWA R DS www.autismtogether.co.uk

This year our role at Port Sunlight River Park changed, as we welcomed a new managing agent, The Conservation Volunteers, to oversee the day-to-day running of the site.

Autism Together maintains a strong presence there by continuing to run the Heritage Centre café and kiosk, while offering workplace opportunities on site for the autistic adults we support. Eight of the people we support from our team there completed five different eLearning modules, alongside a group from our Garden Centre team. These two teams have also been working hard towards John Muir awards for improvements to the areas they work in and for doing volunteering work.

The River Park team went on to make waves by winning a national award. The Dimensions Leaders List Awards are given each year for exceptional achievement by autistic people or those with learning difficulties. Last year our team reopened the kiosk service, which had closed during the pandemic, to provide hot drinks and snacks to members of the public using the park. They completed training in health and safety and food hygiene before running the successful provision, with help from support staff. The whole enterprise was a huge success and the team were worthy winners of this prestigious award, which was presented to them, via an online awards ceremony, by BBC Radio 2’s Ken Bruce.

15 WA L K I N G O U R A L PAC A S M A K I N G F R I E N DS

One of the most popular activities, for the people we support, is taking our alpacas for a walk. Over the past year our alpacas have become famous as the arrival of some baby alpacas, or crias, became a feelgood local news story, with two TV crews visiting to film the animals and interview staff.

Since then, the people we support have enjoyed bonding with our alpaca family and, with the animals halter-trained, the people we support now love walking these beautiful animals around our main field and woods.

There are many benefits to spending time with and walking alpacas. These animals can help alleviate stress and anxiety, while their gentle nature helps those we support by building confidence, self-esteem and enhancing wellbeing. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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Over the past year, our Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) leader, Stuart Lyons, has been hard at work updating and implementing our new PBS organisational strategy and structure. This has been developed in response to operational restrictions relating to the pandemic and staffing shortages, which sometimes created difficulties for PBS coaches to follow-up on referrals.

Plans were made, looking towards the ‘new normal’ postpandemic, to ensure our internal PBS strategy continues to be effective in meeting the needs of the people we support PA RT O F T H E N E W and their staff teams.

T R A I N I N G FO R ATM , T H E AU T I S M TO G E T H E R The PBS department has expanded this year, with Sarah M O D E L FO R P B S Williams joining the team in a new role as PBS Practitioner, to support the growing demand for the department’s Residential and Supported Living services have seen assistance. unprecedented recruitment and retention struggles across In other news, the PBS team has been working with our the board this past year. But, teams continued to cover training team to finalise ATM – The Autism Together extra shifts to make sure we could deliver vital support to Model. This is a new, bespoke, in-house the people in our care. training course for Autism Together staff.

They pulled double shifts, stayed late and came We have begun rolling it out to the work in early. We are all incredibly grateful to each A strong force, with sessions run each week. Every person who hung on after their shift should staff team who are course is fully booked and receiving have ended, or rearranged a family event to dedicated to my excellent feedback from the staff cover the extra shift needed. attending.

We have worked hard and continue to work daughter’s care and hard on recruitment. Unfortunately, our know her well.

With so many staff having now Respite service remains closed at present, attended the ATM course, the but we are continuing to work on how we can A PA R E N T department has noticed a change in achieve a safe opening in future. trends of internal PBS referrals. There We are committed to once again providing this vital has been an increase in referrals, but service to families we know are struggling without it. these are sent more proactively, before behaviours reach a However, the future for our services looks bright. We have crisis point, enabling earlier intervention, which is a fantastic welcomed three new Registered Managers into Residential, impact of ATM. along with a number of new House Managers and Senior We have now completed external assessments and quality Support Workers. We look forward to their contributions as assurance processes for the ATM course, with BILD (British they join an already brilliant, inventive and inspiring team.

Institute of Learning Disabilities). BILD reported that we For the coming year, we will continue to support people to met all the required standards and have referred ATM to the achieve the outcomes that are important to them. We are Government’s UKASS panel, which is the final step in full continuing to build on our resilience and solid foundations accreditation, six months earlier than planned! and look forward to what the future brings. www.autismtogether.co.uk

A Pandemic Poem

BY MICHELLE SEDDON, HEAD OF RESIDENTIAL SERVICES

Facemasks were a-plenty and banana bread was king, We started to rely on each other for more than just one thing!

While people worried about a germ that could not been seen or smelled, We worried about pizza and what a closing McDonald's held…

The food from kind donations – Nando's, a local pub, Does anyone want this chicken? It's in a herby rub!

While we waited in anxious anticipation for news from number 10, Our staff teams rolled up their sleeves,

donned a mask and got stuck in.

Adapting to new routines in the void that had begun, Arts and crafts, long walks and movie nights just for fun.

The local community passed by our Raby grounds “We’re on a walk!” they'd say, “Don’t mind me!”, “Just passing through!”, “Lovely day!”

The public locked down in houses,

Our heroic care workers out in droves, To cover an extra shift, shop for essentials, Or support a Facetime call.

They became people’s everything, And far surpassed the challenge,

Supporting and understanding Became their super power.

With letters printed out, in case a police-stop came their way, They travelled on into work, day after day.

Supporting others’ loved ones, while they worried for their own, This was more than just a job, It was a calling and a way to carry on.

Office staff covered all angles, dropping off supplies,

Co-ordinating where they could, Calling to offer support, and making sure all was good.

Our SLT donned PPE, kind eyes above a mask, They helped us cover shifts and show that AT is here to last.

We faced it all together, we all worked as one, And in the face of chaos, we created our own calm.

To my wonderful management group, your dedication has been unmatched, Your humour, your resilience – you’ve truly been a class act!

I know at night you worried, but in the day you got things done, With determination to make it through And be there for everyone.

The tears and the tantrums, the joy and the relief, This pandemic has brought it all It's time to take some time to breathe.

We made the tough decisions, we risk assessed, we shared, We didn't have all the answers but we had a team who cared…

A team who’d back us 100% and make sure we were heard.

We protected those most vulnerable We worked together safely, In the face of dodgy PPE, political scandal, And guidance changing daily!

Through the chaos and confusion, and many things I'll forget There was one overriding feeling,

Things will get better yet...

To all you lovely helpful people,

I thank you from the bottom of my pumps, The pandemic brought us chaos…

But you lot came up trumps!

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Staff [are] taking an interest in their likes and interests such as walking in the woods, bird spotting and music choices. Contributing to their overall development – thank you!

Q U OT E F RO M A PA R E N T

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Supporting autistic people www.autismtogether.co.uk

SWIMMING S E S S I O N S AT O U R R A BY P O O L

Many of our services have seen changes this past year, in terms of both staffing and locations. Our Performing Arts team said goodbye to Price's Sports & Social Club which, after almost 10 years, was handed back to Riverside Housing.

As a department they are now looking to the future and getting back to a post-pandemic normality. This includes the introduction of new spaces and groups, while reintroducing some community-based groups, such as our Community Dance group.

Along with seeing some familiar faces return to our groups and activities, we have also welcomed a number of new people we support to CVS, and this has been a real success with all the new individuals settling in really quickly and fully integrating into the sessions.

This is testament to the outstanding hard work and professionalism of our teams, who have excelled throughout a difficult and turbulent 12 months.

Performing Arts also saw recent changes to the people we support and staff teams based in the old St Matthew’s church, including welcoming a new Activity Leader, Chris Mitchell.

Unfortunately, the team had to put some of our popular sessions on hold, including the Beathovens' weekly jamming session. While some members of the group have moved on or chosen to leave day services, we also saw the very sad passing of band member Vince. He was instrumental in the success of the band through his unbelievable talent as a drummer. Vince will be sadly missed by us all.

Like with all CVS groups, Performing Arts has had to adopt a more flexible approach and try to offer a wider variety of sessions. We have managed to give the people we support a change in timetable, in order to offer more variety in their working week. This has been a huge success and ensured that they continue to receive a personcentred and autism-specific S A N TA PA I D service.

US A VISIT So, after a turbulent 12

W I L L I A M E N J OY I N G TRAMPOLINING CLASSES

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Meet William William is a new admission to Community Health & Wellbeing, arriving last year during the pandemic. Within a year he has gone from strength to strength. He came initially for 3 days a week, then progressed to the full 5 days and his staff team could not be happier with him. William has also been able to access the community and gain enough confidence to go on an all-day group. He has visited the River Park where he loved going for a long walk with staff and has been attending trampolining. Our staff’s hard work has gone a long way to helping him achieve these goals. Great work all round! www.autismtogether.co.uk

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months, a new venue to replace Price's is in the pipeline, and we are close to reintroducing more community groups. We have seen new people we support access our services with great success, while good staff have moved on and others taken their place.

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The CVS group in Giles Shirley Hall has continued to grow both in size and in the sheer number of activities we have been able to offer. Staff realised that, due to a still somewhat-restricted timetable for most of the people we support, it was important to think outside the box and introduce some ‘non-performing arts’ type sessions. These have included groups for local walks and enjoying indoor bowling.

Alongside this, one of our activity leaders identified the need for the creation of a new band of people we support.

All involved were very keen to form a musical group, playing the instruments themselves and covering their favourite songs, plus some originals of their own. From here 'The Donkey Heads' were formed!

However, like many rock and roll bands, their careers were initially put on hold due to the pandemic, as a number of the members moved from day services or had changes to their timetables, while new members joined the group throughout the year. The band have been enjoying practising and performing together this past 12 months.

We wish the The Donkey Heads all the best and look forward to hearing more from them soon. www.autismtogether.co.uk

Over at Raby, our CVS teams have got community groups back up and running, with social activities and events taking place ranging from day trips to Chester Zoo, walks and hikes to the likes of Moel Famau, visiting our narrowboat, swimming sessions, and cycling in Wrexham.

At Raby Kitchen Gardens, we organise social activities and events for people to enjoy, whilst befriending others and enjoying refreshments together in an environment people feel comfortable in and enjoy. Throughout the year we celebrated big events with themed fun at Christmas, Halloween and for the Queen’s Jubilee, where everyone came together to enjoy food and dancing at a big outdoor party.

Our Residential and Supported Living services helped the people in their care through the challenges of the past year, by tackling them head on. Of course, our staff teams have adapted and adapted again, making sure the people we support knew what was happening and why. Staff have been amazing in reinventing routines and reintroducing activities, delicately supporting individuals to access muchloved community settings, shops, eateries and groups once again.

One important thing has been to support people to reach the outcomes they most wanted to achieve. That meant getting back to the pub, back to holiday planning, back to seeing much-missed friends and family. Seeing people out and about, enjoying their local communities once again, has been a real highlight of recent months.

Other individuals were supported to take part in snooker and darts tournaments, join local football teams and simple pleasures like enjoying picnics in the sunshine.

Also during the past year or so, there has been a 'blooming boom' with the people we support. It has been great to see

so many individuals gaining an interest in gardening which has provided meaningful activity and fresh air, lots of homegrown produce, and created tidy and attractive outdoor spaces for people to relax in at home during the nice weather.

Supported Living has seen three more successful moves during the past year. We are always happy

to accommodate the changing needs of people we support as soon as new places become available.

Rachel (pictured left) finally got her wish to move and is really happy and settled with her new housemate. Meanwhile, Imogen has moved into a single storey property to meet her mobility needs, while Hannah is making new friends at Woodchurch Swimming Club.

baked treats out in the open, with us Storage areas have been built here trying to make them as healthy as to organise all materials which would Everyone has been as productive as possible.

Friday is usually our day for otherwise be thrown away. These possible this past 12 months in The creating a delicious, warming pot of materials can be re-used to keep Woodland. We have continued masoup. costs and waste to a minimum. New king items to order, including bespoke At Christmas, our grotto was a huge compost bays have been put in to strawberry planters and products for success, bigger and better than last utilise our waste.

Brimstage Brewery.

Some of the parents of people we year! Everyone received a present And you cannot miss the new new support have been purchasing log from Father Christmas and his elves, Raby Gardens signage which has been animals from us too. while we used a rather cool snow installed at the entrance, which has Many of our items were sold machine to really bring the whole really improved the look of the place by the Fundraising Team at Winter Wonderland experience as you come in and made it feel very Woodside Market events, all to life. welcoming. helping raise money to plough Throughout the year we P EO P L E W E S U P P O RT have been working back into creating even more H AV E B E E N M A K I N G products in future. hard on creating LO G A N I M A L S All information posts around a bird hide and the Woodland area have been workshop. This is a work in progress replaced. New handmade posts with and should be completed in the a colour-coded band now mark the coming year. We have named pathways and bird feeders. this area The Crooked Over the past year we've enjoyed Oak, after the snaking cooking up a range of culinary oak tree there. We have delights. We are upgrading the firepit installed a great new sign W E C R E AT E to make it more accessible for staff here too.

DELICIOUS T R E AT S I N O U R and people we support. The pizza The ‘Eco Village’ is our P I Z Z A OV E N oven has allowed us to enjoy various new addition to the Woodland.

Raby Woodland

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Exciting police visit The people we support were thrilled to get a friendly visit from Merseyside Police's Armed Response Unit, who met up with our budding police officers, AJ and Harry. The police team were fantastic and allowed everyone to sit in the car, switch on the sirens and see all of their equipment. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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Supporting staff and families www.autismtogether.co.uk

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R E V I E W

As we continue to come out of the pandemic period, we have started to see a more settled picture with regards to staffing, after another challenging year.

The legislation requiring compulsory vaccination of all staff working in the care services caused significant disruption, with a number of staff leaving rather than being vaccinated.

This became a requirement in our Residential service in November 2021 and was due to take effect in Supported Living and CVS services in March 2022, until a last minute U-turn on this strategy was made by the government.

We also undertook a review of terms and conditions for most of our direct care staff. This has brought us into line with other care providers and allowed us to advertise at a higher hourly rate of pay, which has made Autism Together more competitive when it comes to recruitment.

Despite the many staffing difficulties seen nationally across the care sector, we are, thanks to the dedication and hard work of the HR team, starting to see an improvement in our staffing situation.

Our Staffing team has also worked tirelessly throughout the year, in order to ensure our services continue to have safe staff levels, despite lower staff numbers overall and often high Covid absence rates.

We have focused on the welfare of our staff throughout and have introduced a number of opportunities for staff to seek support, both internally and externally. We have been able to financially support our staff though their Covid-related absences, through grants available from the local authorities.

Very importantly, one of the ways we have been able to thank our staff has been through significant one-off bonus payments for the incredible support and care they have shown through such unprecedented times.

Our Children & Family Service took over the running of our adult socialising and friendship group in the past year.

Staff are particularly proud of how the membership of the Connected group has grown over the year when it was able to restart after the last lockdown period.

This group enables autistic adults aged 18+ to come www.autismtogether.co.uk

together with like-minded individuals to share common interests, make friends, socialise and have fun.

The group is split into 2 age groups 18-30s and 30+. The membership of the younger group is especially high.

The groups decide themselves what activities they would like to do and have accessed community venues and activities including bowling, Laser Quest, cinema, crazy golf, escape rooms, walks, pub nights, meals out, and more.

The younger group has also formed its own Discord chat group to enable them to stay in touch online regularly between meet ups.

In August 2021 we held our first Family Fun Day at our Raby Gardens site. This was a great day for many of the children and young people we support to enjoy various activities, spend a day with us, and bring parents and siblings along too.

Everyone loved meeting our alpacas, goats, pigs and bunnies, while enjoying lots of sensory and creative activities.

We had tremendous support on the day from across Autism Together with CVS, ATAS, Marketing and Fundraising all involved. We also enjoyed fantastic support from community partners and volunteers, including our loyal supporters the Bearded Villains. The feedback we received was excellent and we hope it may be possible to turn it into an annual event.

One of our support services that often goes unsung, but is vitally important to the running of our entire organisation, is the IT team. As with all departments, during the past pandemic-hit year, the IT team oversaw a number of innovations and updates to help make life easier for care managers and central office staff.

These included important moves towards a paperless office, such as the setting up of a digital signature system to enable the issue of paperless staff contracts.

Perhaps of most interest is the work IT has been doing in the background around future improvements to IT and telecoms systems. Much planning has been done for a new ‘wide area network’, meaning all sites will have access to our cloud-based central systems.

Meeting our values

Our social calendars are once again filling up, thanks to the return of the Meeting Together Forum. This group, made up of people we support, which meets regularly with staff to discuss issues and share ideas, is 11 years old in 2022. A party is being planned to belatedly celebrate their decaversary, one year late, post-pandemic.

One of the jobs for the Forum is to plan the monthly discos at Giles Shirley Hall. These have made a welcome return, attracting many new faces and regular attendees to come along, enjoy some food and drink and have a boogie! It really is lovely to see people enjoying themselves together again.

and were pleased to have seen so many mini projects taking shape, transforming outside spaces and people working together to produce some lovely results. The Courtyard, Manor Place, The Greens and Giles Shirley Hall were just some of the places to get a garden refresh.

Seeing people working on these areas and the resulting sense of pride has been wonderful. We have also seen some much-needed work completed inside Giles Shirley Hall, providing new bathrooms and flooring throughout.

A recent innovation has been the trialling of a system allowing our staff to access documentation relating to positive behaviour support (PBS) for the people in their care.

Staff members have a direct link to the PBS information they need to see and must tick to say they have read this. Management can then pick this up in supervisions. One staff member said: “It makes looking at paper work a lot easier.” Kevin Mulligan, manager of our Community Health & Wellbeing team, said: “It has been great to use and record the evidence of the staff team reading any documentation.”

Another exciting innovation this year came with the visit of a Pets As Therapy MEMBERS OF THE M E E T I N G TO G E T H E R dog to see some of the people we Georgie was a new joiner to our Raby FO RU M support. Louis is a very friendly dog who CVS service this year. After struggling through visited several of our services, bringing joy the pandemic period, Georgie was unable to wherever he has been. Not only has Louis visited attend school any more, so joined us. He now attends people who love dogs, he’s also been helping those who are three days a week and enjoys a variety of activities such as not such big canine fans and have been worried about dogs. swimming, bike riding, craft work, horticulture and animals.

The people we support have enjoyed some really positive He has an amazing, cheeky and bubbly personality, and fits in experiences, which has been brilliant to be a part of. We look really well. forward to seeing Louis and maybe some other pets, next year.

Franky started to attend CVS this past year too. He ended up attending Raby CVS for 3 days of the week, as our staff worked Over the past year we have seen several successful grants hard to get to know Franky, his personality, and how to work won to transform some of our larger garden areas. We’re well with him. He now takes part in regular activities and looking forward to seeing the finished projects in the coming enjoys feeding the pigs. He has a nice quiet area to relax in, months. with lots of sensory equipment to interact with. He has settled During lockdown we really saw the benefit of outside spaces, in brilliantly and really enjoys his time at CVS. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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R A I S I N G AWA R E N E S S AT T H E T R A F FO R D C E N T R E

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Community engagement

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Throughout the year, so many of our supporters have been very generous with donations, both in terms of money and items for our services. One successful example of this was through our Amazon Wishlist. In fact, since the start of the pandemic, we have received around £10,000 worth of items.

The items donated have been requested by staff and people we support across our services, from Supported Living to CVS. The team over at Raby Gardens is one area that has benefited and the team had this to say to all who had been so generous: "A huge thank you to everyone who made a purchase from the wishlist. You have no idea how much your help means. Your fundraising and donations are also hugely appreciated.

"We have received donations this year which have allowed us to purchase a new tractor, lawn mowers, drills, strimmers and many other items. Thank you for your acts of A WISHLIST D O N AT I O N kindness, which are so important and so appreciated."

The Gardens team also received vital donations from the Liverpool charity Calder Kids. They unfortunately were having to close their programme, but Nicky Johnston, a parent of one of the people we support, was Chair of the charity and got in touch to see if we would like any of their equipment.

We ended up receiving lots of sensory items, soft play and craft items, furniture and more. After receiving these, Nicky got back in touch and donated a large sum of money too, which helped us purchase our new tractor, new tools, wood to build new flower beds, alpaca sheds and goat houses too. Huge thanks to all at Calder Kids for their support.

This past year was a bumper one for Fundraising as they smashed their targets, reaching 138% of their yearly goal.

Congratulations to the team for doing fantastic work in difficult economic conditions.

The year kicked off with a huge highlight as Fundraising worked with the Communications team to take Autism

Awareness Month online once again. To lead April’s festivities, they created a new event – Get Active For Autism!

The idea was to challenge our supporters to walk, run, swim or cycle 53 miles during the month, while raising at least £53. We chose 53 because in 2021 it was our charity’s 53rd birthday. The best part was, people could do this all over the UK, at a time that suited them, or even in their own homes if the weather wasn’t too good. The event was a hit and we raised £11,000!

April also saw work start on the Sensory Garden at Raby, having reached our £50,000 target to build it. This much loved, and continuously used space – with its trampolines, chill-out areas and sensory zones – has brought a great deal of joy to the people we support and staff alike. Everyone has agreed that the sensory garden has been a huge success, especially during lockdown.

Over the year, the team has built ties and worked closely with many large businesses including M&S Bank, BDO, Dobbies and The Trafford Centre. We partnered with national garden centre chain Dobbies to help them develop autism-friendly quiet grottos. We later worked with The Trafford Centre to revise their hidden disability guide to visiting the shopping centre.

Part of the Fundraising team’s remit is to secure funding for various projects and services undertaken throughout the organisation. One such was to allow our Autism Training and Advisory Service to provide vital Autism Advice Sessions to adults, children and families. With statutory agencies struggling with capacity, these sessions are a lifeline to autistic people.

We were also successful in securing over £23k from M&S Bank, to transform five of the gardens of our properties. The money was used to purchase garden furniture, in-ground trampolines, summer houses, greenhouses and sensory equipment.

Volunteers from M&S Bank have agreed to visit us during the next financial year to get hands on and help with sprucing up gardens, painting fences, sheds and more. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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The Fundraising team’s job is not just to ask people for money, they also look for offers that our supporters may be interested in. One such is our “Free Wills” scheme. Basically this allows our supporters, staff and families of the people we support to access will-writing services, free of charge This is particularly useful for parents, who wish to set up Trusts for their loved ones. There is an option at the end of the process to make an equivalent donation to our charity of the money they would have spent in creating their will.

In terms of events, the pandemic understandably prohibited our ability to get out into the community,

however we still held a Christmas Market, over two weekends, at Woodside Ferry Village in Birkenhead.

We also took part in the Christmas Tree Festival at St Barnabus' Church in Bromborough, decorating and entering a themed Autism Together tree which helped spread a message of autism acceptance and awareness by providing information on our charity and its services.

The local community then visited and voted for their favourite trees. Our tree actually came second in the voting, as we were just pipped for top spot by Oval Ski Club with their highly original 'ski tree'.

Gannett Foundation Donation

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Thanks to a donation of over £5,000 from the Gannett Foundation, through the support of Wirral Globe readers, we have provided free autism advice sessions to 52 people in the first half of 2022, with many more booked for the rest of the year.

Of the sessions so far, 10 were with young autistic adults who have been referred to join our Connected club. Connected is a social group we run in Wirral to help young autistic adults avoid social and emotional isolation.

Our autism advice sessions are available to people on the autism spectrum, their family and carers. We offer these in person at our head office in Bromborough, or online if that suits people better.

These sessions have different uses and outcomes, depending on the individuals involved, including: • Coming to terms with an autism diagnosis and what this means for the individual, leading them in selfacceptance.

• Recognising their significant sensory sensitivities and putting in coping strategies through discussion.

• Allowing the place, time and expertise for someone to www.autismtogether.co.uk

"I love it, it's my lifeline. I love everything about it - I love the people, I love the staff. I could never thank the staff enough for caring for me."

disclose, reflect and build trust. Many of the people we talk to have experienced trauma.

Laura, who has advice sessions with our ATAS team • Recognising strengths and building confidence.

• People have gone on to find jobs they are interested in, and we support them in the workplace through suggesting autism-specific reasonable adjustments.

Financial review With the exception of the actuarial assessed costs, the strategies put in place to improve the financial health of the organisation continue to pay dividends, resulting in net income for the year of £701k (2021: net income of £881k) after actuarial assessed additional costs relating to the defined benefit pension scheme of £691k (2021: £492).

INCOME Income increased 3.5% compared to last year from £23,678k to £24,517k.

Income in all major service areas has improved with the exception of Community and Vocational Services (CVS).

CVS has been significantly affected by Covid-19 and there has been a reduction in the numbers attending compared to pre-pandemic. Costs have also fallen in CVS to compensate the drop in income.

EXPENDITURE Expenditure has increased by 4.5% from £22,797k to £23,816k in the year, largely reflecting the increased overall income, but also that significant pay increases were given to frontline staff in the year and a loyalty bonus was paid to retain staff.

Some of these additional costs were covered by Covid related grants, but not all. In addition, there was an increase in the actuarially assessed cost for the defined benefit pension scheme of £691k (2021: £492k). Payroll costs still represent over 82% of our income and have increased 4% against last year.

Other costs have increased by 7% from £3,442k to £3,692k which reflect the increasing levels of activity during this year of the pandemic.

CAPITAL EXPENDITURE This year we spent £188k (2021: £470k) on property improvements and equipment. Capital expenditure remained low in the year, reflecting the pandemic impact.

CASH FLOW An overview of the cash movements during the year are given in the statement on page 24. After adjusting for non-cash items, such as movements on the pension deficit and depreciation, operations during the year generated positive cash flow of £2,143k (2021: £1,627k).

The other contributors to cash outflow in the year has been investment in property and facilities of £188k (2021: 470k) and net cash used in financing activities of £830k (2021: net cash used of £618k) reflecting the repayment of loans.

FUTURE ISSUES With the support of several local authorities, led by Wirral, we have been able to significantly increase the pay of our support staff now paying the Real Living Wage as a minimum. We had previously aligned to the National Minimum Wage.

In order to continue to support this, in addition to the significant increase in inflation and in particular energy costs, we need our local authority funders to reflect this in their fee uplifts in the future and will negotiate hard to achieve this.

In addition, staffing shortages have meant that we have not been able to expand CVS services, or fill voids in Residential or Supported Living, nor maximise our Respite facility even though we know the demand is there.

We continue to explore different recruitment and retention initiatives including recruiting internationally and conducting a staff engagement survey in 2022/23. www.autismtogether.co.uk

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FINANCIAL FIGURES FOR 2021/2022

Staff expenditure

2022 £20,124m 2021 £19,355m

2022 2021 £’000 £’000 EXPENDITURE 30 30

Staff expenditure Other expenditure Total Capital expenditure

20,124 3,675 23,799 188

19,355 3442 22,797 470

2,143 (188) 1,955

1,627 (470) 1,157

CASH FLOWS Net cash from operating activities Net cash used in investing activities

Net cash used in financing activites Net increase in cash and cash equivalents Cash and cash equivalents at beginning of year Cash and cash equivalents at end of year

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(830) 1,125

(618) 539

1,926

1,387

3,051

1,926

2022 2021 £’000 £’000 FUNDS

General funds Restricted funds Fixed asset fund Other designated funds Pension (deficit)/surplus Total Funds

INCOME

Residential CVS Respite Supported Living Children & Family Other income Grants & donations Total

2,200 61 4,999 1,051 (1,191) 7,120

1,664 54 4,391 810 (2,933) 3,986

2021 2022 £’000 £’000 10,238 5,365 546 7,472 44 65 787 24,517

9,853 5,683 395 6,764 48 258 677 23,678

Residential

Other Income

Supported Living

Grants and Donations

CVS

Respite

SENIOR LEADERSHIP TEAM, TRUSTEES & PATRONS SENIOR LEADERSHIP TEAM

Children & Family

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CHIEF EXECUTIVE

Sue Stubbs QUALITY & SUPPORT DIRECTOR

Jane Carolan HR DIRECTOR

Jim Strain BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR

Angie Kemp FINANCE DIRECTOR

Louise Parnell COMPANY SECRETARY

Louise Parnell

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TRUSTEES

CHAIR Catherine Ames VICE CHAIR Edward Behan INCOMING CHAIR Iain Cadman

Carole Battersby John Callcott Tony Cragg David Evans Nuala Kennedy Kate O'Dempsey Christopher Smart Jayne Unalkat

Full audited accounts and financial statements will be filed with the Charity Commission and Companies House. Copies may be obtained from the Registered Office, Oak House, 6 Tebay Road, Bromborough, CH62 3PA.

PAT R O N S

Mrs Trish Chapman Dr John Kennedy CBE, KSG, KMCO, DL www.autismtogether.co.uk

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Staff word cloud from the past two years...

MCDONALD'S CHIPS

Toilet roll shortages

ARTS AND CRAFTS GOOD LEADERSHIP

STRESS More information

DETERMINATION GOVERNMENT L O N G WA L K S

ADAPTING BEING

VI TAL WORK

LOCKDOWN

Clap for the NHS WRITING LETTERS

FACEBOOK PORTAL

DEADLINES

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PRIDE

MENTAL HEALTH

Helping people fulfill their potential

FRUSTRATION

MENTAL SUPPORT

BAKING

ESSENTIAL WORKERS

USEFUL

Talking it through

RISK ASSESSMENTS

Trying to stay positive

PPE

HELPING COLLEAGUES

HUMOUR

Right decisions/ wrong decisions

FACEMASKS ISOLATION

RESILIENCE STAYING POSITIVE

FREE DONUTS

SUPPORTING EACH OTHER

TESTING

WORRY

NANDO'S CHICKEN

Making a difference SENSORY GARDENS

SADNESS

Feeling like part of something important

BEING BRAVE

SUPERMARKET QUEUES

GARDEN BBQS

ADDRESS-CARD Wirral Centre for Autism, Oak House, 6 Tebay Road, Bromborough, Wirral, CH62 3PA Envelope-open enquiries@autismtogether.co.uk TWITTER @autism_together facebook AutismtogetherUK

0151 334 7510 www.autismtogether.co.uk

www.autismtogether.co.uk

Reg. Charity Number: 1007878 Reg. Company Number: 2658268