Last Thursday we held our second Big Gathering event at the Oakwood Centre in Woodley. Everyone who is part of our Get Involved Network was invited to join in, including people who draw on social care, their families and people who work in support services.  

We had a range of short talks on topics which had been raised during recent Community Conversations that were linked to the Social Care Future vision. We also shared some highlights and achievements from the past year, as we move closer to the social care future vision.  

Over 100 people took part in the day, which was designed to be fun, informative and inclusive. There were also activities and opportunities for people to make stronger connections. The Link hosted a befriending table over the lunchbreak while Ability Catering shared tasty sandwiches, cookies, cake and flapjacks. There were smiling faces in the dramatherapy session as people tried to escape an egg, throwing punches in the Boxercise session, while everyone tried to make music in the drumming! 

What now? 

We are keen to hear people’s feedback on the day – what you liked and what you would change, so we can make future events better.  We will be sharing a feedback questionnaire with everyone who came. We have also asked all the speakers for the top tips from their talk and will share these soon. 

In our community conversations earlier this year, we heard that time restrictions on the disabled bus pass were impacting on people’s ability to get to work or attend activities, including medical appointments, education and leisure.   

Following on from this we brought teams together from across the council to talk about how we could make things better and agreed to remove all time restrictions from the disabled bus pass and disabled plus companion bus pass. We announced this news at the Big Gathering event, as one of the changes made this year in response to your feedback. 

From Sunday 1 December residents with the English National Concessionary Travel Scheme (ENCTS) disabled bus pass and disabled plus companion passes, will be able to use the passes at any time of the morning or night when boarding a bus in the borough.   

Making bus travel more accessible 

You can apply for a disabled bus pass on our website for free bus travel.  If you are unsure about using the bus, you can find out about travel training with Ability Travel or download a Safe Journey Card from the Reading bus website, which helps you let the bus driver know you might need their support. If you use a wheelchair, there are allocated wheel spaces on board buses. If you use a mobility scooter you will need a mobility scooter permit to travel - please contact Reading Buses directly who can discuss this with you.

We are reviewing the way we work with local care providers to ensure we have great support for people where they live, so they can stay safe and happy. We want to involve residents in thinking about what works well now and what could be improved around the care they are currently receiving from their council funded care providers.  

You could be receiving help with things like: