Weekly News 14/03/2025

On Tuesday 11th March, to mark International Women’s Day, our CEO Sanchita joined Farrer & Co LLP for a conversation about this year's theme: “For ALL women and girls: Rights. Equality. Empowerment.” Sanchita was joined by Barbara Mills KC, the Chair of the Bar Council and Ellie Wardrop of the 93% club, sharing their experiences as women in and around the field of law, and why rights, equality and empowerment are so crucial for women.  

Sanchita shared both personal and professional insights, including how at the start of her career we were still working to secure the understanding that violence against women does fall within human rights and state accountability. Now, we have a legal framework in the UK, in the Human Rights Act, which is being used to improve the lives of women across the UK – and why it's such an important tool for accountability when women are failed.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR) is a parliamentary committee that looks at new laws to see how they could impact on people’s human rights. They are currently looking at the draft Mental Health Bill. 
 
They invited members of the RITES Committee to join a roundtable of Lived Experience Experts who have been impacted by the mental healthcare system. Members of the RITES Committee shared their experiences of accessing, or trying to access, mental healthcare and their insights on what the new Bill might mean for people’s rights. 

The JCHR will be publishing a report based on the evidence they gathered. 

Skills for Care are running a survey on behalf of DHSC to find out how ready the adult social care sector is for the proposed reforms to the Mental Health Act  

Skills for Care (SfC) provide tools and resources to support employers and individuals with recruitment and skills development in the adult social care sector in England. They have been asked by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to find out how ready social care providers, commissioners and User Led organisations are for the proposed changes to the Mental Health Act.  

Skills for Care specifically want to hear from people who work in adult social care that support autistic people and people who have a learning disability. They are interested in how ready people feel for the reforms and what barriers or challenges they anticipate in implementing the proposed changes.