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Supported Needs and Disability Coordinators trained across HMGoG - 800/2024

December 02, 2024

Last week the Ministry of Equality's SNDO team trained 40 staff members from across Government as Supported Needs and Disability Coordinators. This was first announced in Parliament by Minister Santos earlier this year and fulfils a manifesto commitment of the GSLP/Liberal Government.

The role of the Supported Needs and Disability Coordinators is multifaceted; they must support their colleagues who have supported needs and disabilities themselves or care for loved ones with needs, support service users who access their department, and be included in their department’s policy making meetings to ensure that the needs of persons with supported needs and disabilities are taken into account. The purpose of this is to take a more proactive and meaningful approach to supporting persons with supported needs and disabilities.

During this week’s intensive training participants learned about:

  • Lived experience of disability through Para Sports
  • The role of occupational health
  • The role of occupational therapy
  • Reasonable Adjustments in the workplace
  • Neurodiversity in the workplace
  • Delivering meaningful change
  • Courageous Conversations
  • Dementia Awareness
  • Autism Awareness
  • Disability Legislation
  • UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
  • The National Disability Strategy
  • What’s available in the local community

The Coordinators will have respected time to conduct this role as well as regular meetings with the SNDO for guidance.

A special thank you to the trainers; Dr Karl Alvarez, Louise Ross, Stephanie Bugeja, Clare Francis, Nicole Stevens, Lorraine Martínez, Gillian Guzman, Karen Truman, Nicole Buckley, Benjamin Borastero and Jenny Victory.

Minister for Equality, the Hon Christian Santos GMD MP, said: "This is another step in the right direction to creating an inclusive and safe environment for all be it in our work places or the wider community. At the last election we promised to introduce disability coordinators throughout the public sector to ensure that departments take ownership of their responsibilities under the Disability Act, so I am extremely pleased that this manifesto commitment has been completed".