The UK government launches a multi-million pound autism strategy to improve the lives of people with autism.
Backed by nearly £75 million in the first year, it aims to speed up diagnosis and improve support and care for people with autism. The funding includes £40 million through the NHS Long Term Plan to improve capacity in crisis services and support children with complex needs in inpatient care.
People with autism face multiple disadvantages throughout their lives, with too many struggling to get support that is tailored to their needs at an early enough stage and facing stigma and misunderstanding, often leaving them lonely or isolated. Through this new strategy, steps will be taken to improve diagnosis, which is crucial to help people get the support they need, and improve society’s understanding of autism.
The 5-year strategy was developed following engagement with people with autism, their family and carers. It will support autistic children and adults through better access to education, more help to get into work, preventing avoidable admissions to healthcare settings, and training for prison staff to better support prisoners with complex needs.
“Improving the lives of autistic people is a priority and this new strategy, backed by almost £75 million in the first year, will help us create a society that truly understands and includes autistic people in all aspects of life. It will reduce diagnosis waiting times for children and adults and improve community support for autistic people. This is crucial in reducing the health inequalities they face, and the unacceptable life expectancy gap that exists today.” said Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid.
“Far too many autistic people still struggle to get the support they need in childhood, and as adults – and this is often exacerbated by not getting a timely diagnosis. This landmark strategy will help give autistic people equal opportunities to flourish in their communities as well as better access to the support they need throughout their lives.” said Minister for Care Helen Whately.
This new strategy has been developed with the views and experiences of autistic people provided in response to the government’s call for evidence in 2019. The strategy will run until 2026 and aims to:
- improve understanding and acceptance of autism within society: developing and testing an initiative to improve the public’s understanding of autistic people – both the strengths and positives as well as the challenges, working with autistic people, their families and the voluntary sector. This will help people recognise the diversity of the autistic community – that every autistic person is different. It includes improving understanding of the strengths and positives of being autistic, as well as the challenges people might face in their daily lives and how distressed behaviour can manifest itself
- strengthen access to education and support positive transitions into adulthood: testing and expanding a school-based identification programme based on a pilot in Bradford from 10 to over 100 schools over the next 3 years. Early findings from the pilot show children are being identified earlier and getting support quicker
- support more autistic people into employment: improving the accessibility of job centres for autistic people, to get them the right help to find jobs or employment programmes
- tackle health and care inequalities: providing £13 million of funding to reduce diagnosis waiting times and increase availability of post-diagnostic support for children and adults, and address backlogs of people waiting made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic
- build the right support in the community and supporting people in inpatient care: providing £40 million as part of the NHS Long Term Plan to improve community support and prevent avoidable admissions of autistic people and those with a learning disability, and £18.5 million to prevent crises and improve the quality of inpatient mental health settings
- improve support within the criminal and youth justice systems: reviewing findings from the call for evidence on neurodiversity, and developing a toolkit to educate frontline staff about this, and the additional support people might need
