History
1989
The foundations of Advocacy Matters Wales began as “Citizen Advocacy in South Glamorgan”.
The Organisation was initially based in a church in Ely and focussed entirely on that community – in particular the residents of Ely Hospital.
Due to the Care in the Community initiative and increasing demand for advocacy services the organisation expanded greatly over the next few years.
We began to offer Citizen Advocacy to adults with learning disabilities throughout Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan.
1996
The organisation became a ‘registered charity’ and a ‘company limited by guarantee.’
We also changed our name to ‘People in Partnership (PiP)’.
2000
Over the years we have had (and continue to have) many outstanding citizen advocates volunteering for the organisation.
The advocacy relationships that these volunteers build up often turn into long term friendships. This enables the volunteers to provide advocacy as and when needed for their advocacy partners, on a wide range of issues.
However as the organization grew, we identified that there was an additional need for more specific issue based advocacy provision. Some people did not require a long term partnership, but clearly needed advocacy support in the short term for specific problems.
To address this need, in January 2000 we employed two Casework Advocates to work with adults with a learning disability in Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan.
Casework advocates are employed by the organization to work with people in the short term, using an issue based approach.
2001
We began to provide an accessible advocacy service to the residents of the independent hospitals run by ‘Independent Community Living (ICL).’
Many of the residents have a combined Learning Disability and Mental Health diagnosis and are detained under the Mental Health Act.
2003
PiP moved with Cardiff People First, The Friendly Trust and Cardiff and the Vale Parents Federation to accessible office premises in Cardiff. This move marked a significant step for all four charities in service development by improving partnership working and consolidating access for people with learning disabilities through a range of advocacy and advice services.
We also changed our name to ‘Advocacy Matters (Wales)’, to make it easier for people to understand what we do.
2005
We began to develop our Advocacy Matters Wales Service User group, so that our service users could be supported to have a direct voice in our organization.
2007
We secured funding to enable us to provide casework advocacy to Adults with Asperger Syndrome in Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan.
2008
We began to provide an accessible advocacy service to the residents of the Pine Tree court independent hospital, run by ‘Ludlow Street healthcare.’
Many of the residents have a combined Learning Disability and Mental Health diagnosis and are detained under the Mental Health Act.
2009
We secured funding to enable us to provide casework advocacy to people with a Learning Disability in Bridgend.
2010
We secured funding to enable us to provide casework advocacy to people with a Learning Disability in Rhondda Cynon Taf.
2011
It’s been over 20 years since we started.
We are now a well established organization that provides a range of advocacy services across South Wales.
Over the years we have continued to maintain a network of citizen advocacy volunteers across Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan. To facilitate this we employ a full time citizen advocacy coordinator.
We currently employ eight Casework Advocates.
They provide casework advocacy to people with a Learning Disability in the following areas:
Cardiff, the Vale of Glamorgan, Bridgend and Rhondda Cynon Taf.
They provide casework advocacy to people with Asperger Syndrome in the following areas:
Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan.
They continue to provide an accessible advocacy service to the residents of the Craegmoor (formerly ICL) independent hospitals and to the residents of Pine Tree court .
We continue to employ a Taking Part Worker who supports our Service User Group.
Over the years we have also often been asked to provide an independent Taking Part Worker to other organisations. Our Taking Part Worker can enable a service provider to work together with the people who use its services, to try and improve the quality of those services.
