Who are we?

The Richmond Parent Carers Action Group (RPCAG) is an independent forum, set up by parents of children with additional needs living in the London Borough of Richmond-upon-Thames.

What do we do?

We help you to influence the development of Services provided by the Local Authority. You give us your feedback by attending meetings, emailing or phoning, and we pass it on (unattributed) to the LA. Our aim is to provide parents and carers with an opportunity to support each other and generate new ideas around improving services for our children. We ensure we have representation at important meetings in the Borough and regularly invite Borough Officers to come and answer your questions. We need your views, so please join us and come along / get in touch!

Join us now!

Join us using this form.

RPCAG membership is open to all carers of children aged 0-19 who have any kind of disability (physical, learning, communication, behavioural, sensory and rare disorders) as well as children with health conditions that mean they have additional care needs. You must however live in the Borough of Richmond-Upon-Thames. We don't mediate on individual issues but we do highlight specific problems or patterns of problems that are occurring on your behalf.

We meet monthly in term time - usually at 10:30am on a Friday morning (with the support of Me Too & Co) and at the Crossway Centre in St Margaret’s. Emails are regularly sent to Group members, other parents of children with additional needs, relevant local Voluntary Organisations, SEN professionals, Council Officers and Councillors.

Background

In May 2007, the UK Government published a report entitled Aiming High for Disabled Children: better support for families (AHDC) which was the culmination of their extensive Disabled Children Review. It describes a programme to transform services for disabled children, with substantial new funding and measures designed to make the system work better. The long-term goal was to transform the life chances of disabled children and was/is closely linked to the Every Child Matters programme. In the report the Government stated that the AHDC programme aimed to deliver:

• Access and empowerment for disabled children and families
• Responsive services and timely support
• Improved service quality and capacity.

One of the corner-stones of the policy was to encourage (and provide funding for) the formation of Parent Forums across the country to give parents of disabled children a voice in local empowerment mechanisms, foster better relationships between service providers and parents, and allow parents to contribute their expertise to help shape Services. As a result of this major advance in Government policy, we established the RPCAG in 2007 (with facilitation by Contact a Family) to represent the views of parents at strategy meetings in Richmond. We are affiliated to Me Too & Co – a Richmond based Charity helping families of children with additional needs – who support us with administration, financial management and general expertise.

While this specifically targetted Aiming High funding is drawing to a close, Richmond is one of the few Boroughs that has ring-fenced money in their budget to ensure that initiatives started with it don't come to an end.