Welcome to 2019

Dear colleagues, welcome to 2019. I hope that you had a peaceful festive period. On behalf of the Board I would like to thank you for your support and valued contribution to the organisation in 2018 and to providing much valued and needed support over the festive period. The feedback I have received has been very positive – it is important that we are there and to recognise the difference we make.

As we enter another year there is none more significant that this our 30^th. When Fair Deal was established by a group of parents and carers of people with a learning disability in 1985 to make a difference to the lives of people who were living in Lennox Castle. How could they have known what an influence they would turn out to be in Castlemilk and across Glasgow.  The parents and carers wanted an organisation that was flexible, respectful, responsive and a fair employer and I am confident that those values remain at the forefront of the organisation. In September 1989 Fair Deal was “born”; the constitution was approved and charitable status awarded, which gave the parents and carers the bedrock on which to build the organisation. There have been many changes over the years and many more to come – it is important that we remain focussed, flexible, empowering, and innovative to ensure that we remain one of the leading Social Care organisations in the city of Glasgow. We can only really achieve this with your support and encouragement, as the biggest local employer here in Castlemilk we want to be able to respond to new service design and delivery and maintain our incredible trained, committed workforce.

The key priorities for 2019 are to take forward the following:

30 years of Fair Deal: We have a working group up and running and there are plans afoot for how we will celebrate this milestone. In December we met with and consulted with over 50 people about what they would like to see regarding how we will celebrate Far Deal’s first 30 years. There will be more information to follow.

The Glasgow framework: We were successful in our application to be on the Glasgow framework which should see an opportunity for us to develop new initiatives within the community through our core support and community connections. We will be looking to develop opportunities for older people in the South of Glasgow and refreshing our current social and leisure programme. If you have any suggestions regarding the support provided by Fair Deal, please e-mail me.

Fair Deal Quality Forum: The quality forum has been an important development and we would like to find away of involving our team members to help shape the organisation. We are looking for people who are interested in working with colleagues to shape the organisation. If you get involved you will be working as part of a team to ensure that we continue to deliver quality support across that organisation and that we consider the opportunities for our workforce and their development.

The Kenny Macliver award for excellence: The quality forum will review the final draft of the award paperwork and we are aiming to launch it in March 2019. We will keep you updated.[1]

Investor In Young People [IIYP]: We will be moving forward with our annual review and I’m sure the assessor will be keen to hear from our team. I will keep you updated about dates etc. Any questions please e-mail me.

Connecting Neighbourhoods: This will be one of the main priorities in the year ahead and as mentioned in the December newsletter we are working with a range of partners who provide night time support to 50 people living in the Castlemilk area. You will hear more about this in January, for more information please contact Margaret Fenton on margaretfenton@fair-deal.org or Pauline martin on paulinemartin@fair-deal.org

Connecting On Board: This piece of work remains a priority for the organisation. We are looking at how we can make more use of the people carrier at Fernhill and are considering whether we should have one specifically for there. More info to follow. The independent travel initiative #VAMOS – Let’s Go is progressing well with training beginning early January. We should have more to report and update you on in the spring.

Community Connections – Social and Leisure programme: We are currently reviewing the service we provide across the South of Glasgow, with the aim of improving various aspects of the programme and identifying more venues. This has been a very successful programme and we want to continue to deliver at a high level.

Help Yourself grow [HYG]: We have moved into year 4 of the 5-year funding for HYG. Our key priorities here are to ensure that we continue to meet the outcomes of the funders, promote HYG and identify key aspects of a sustainability strategy to take forward in 2019/2020.

Once again, I would like to thank you for your ongoing support and commitment and wish you peace and happiness in 2019.

Ann Marie Docherty

Chief Executive

January 1^st 2019

[1] FD 2019 New Year message 01012019 v1