Some Disabled children receive support payments from the Local Authority called Direct Payments. Families can spend this money on hiring helpers called PAs to support the child or young person to access activities to increase their independence. Having a PA for a child or young person allows the disabled child and their family to experience time apart from each other, learning new life experiences and providing respite for siblings.

During Covid, families of disabled children have struggled to find suitable PAs for their children and activities have been at a stand-still meaning that children have been unable to access support and activities that help them. The children have been at home, for months on end, with no access to activities outside of the home. This has had a profound impact on children and families’ mental health.

The DP money has continued to be paid but families in some cases have been unable to spend it, despite being in need of the support, the PAs just aren’t out there!  And if they are, Covid measures have made it difficult to use them safely.

Bristol City Council are now taking back the money paid to parents/carers rather than allowing them to spend it now that restrictions are easing. They are saying that because we haven’t spent the money, they are going to take it back, just at the critical point where things are opening up again and we are more in need now than ever!

Covid has been hard for families of disabled children. Really hard. DP payments allow that ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ feeling, where you know your precious child can have fun without you, be in safe hands, and able to engage with activities you otherwise would not be able to access. 

Taking that money away from families, just at the point where they need the help and can actually get the help, is a crushing blow to families and children.  

This petition is to persuade Bristol City Council to reverse their decision and give back the money to disabled children who need it the most.