http://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/ @T4CG
http://www.larche.org.uk/ @L’ArcheUK
PRESS BRIEFING
An evening with Jean Vanier in the company of Archbishop Justin Welby and Cardinal Vincent Nichols chaired by Sarah Montague in the River Room, House of Lords, 6 - 8pm, Monday 19 January 2015
‘Living together for the common good: why do the strong need the weak?’
Running order
6.00pm Arrival and registration6.10pm Sarah Montague opens the event
6.15pm Jenny Sinclair of Together for the Common Good introduces Jean Vanier
6.20pm An address by Jean Vanier
6.45pm Archbishop Justin Welby and Cardinal Vincent Nichols join Jean Vanier in conversation
7.05pm Q & A and discussion with assembled company
7.30pm Sarah Montague invites everyone to stay on as refreshments and snacks are served
8.00pm depart
Key points I
Living together for the common good: why do the strong need the weak?
Together for the Common Good has organised this event in partnership with L’Arche UK to challenge and nourish thoughtful people of all political persuasions. People across the spectrum are looking for ways in which all members of our society can prosper, and ways to build a society that is coherent and where everyone has their place; an economy where everyone is valued, whatever their contribution.
The common good is an ancient tradition and at the same time a new approach that transcends the old divisions. Everyone is required to play a role, and in so doing build greater social cohesion and inclusiveness. This is well expressed in the real, lived experience of L’Arche communities. Jean Vanier has shown a practical way forward that has profound implications extending way beyond the disability sector. He will tell us how society is impoverished if it fails to embrace the gifts of the marginalised, and what the strong have to gain by living in community with the weak. His talk explores the value of community living, not just for people with disabilities, but for all of us. This event will be filmed and shared afterwards.
Together for the Common Good is a national network encouraging people of goodwill, of faith or no faith, to work together as agents of change for the common good. It is grounded in the living tradition of the Gospel, drawing inspiration from the social traditions across the Christian traditions, in particular Catholic social thought, and is independent of any church institution or denomination. More on T4CG here.
Jean Vanier is a philosopher, writer, religious and moral leader and the founder of the major international organisation, L’Arche, which advocates community living for people with learning disabilities. L'Arche communities embrace those of all faiths and none, united in the belief that the poorest and weakest in society can teach us what it means to be truly human. More on Jean Vanier here and on L’Arche here.
This event is the second in the Together for the Common Good series of cross-party conversations in Parliament and comes at a critical time. We are living in an increasingly fractured society with widening, divergent views and a period of constitutional instability. We are also seeing the growing phenomenon of ‘communities of the left-behind’; rich and poor are living parallel lives, and there is a growing gulf between our political class and the people they seek to represent.
Continued over…
Key points II
1. What happens to a society where its uncompetitive, weaker citizens are marginalised? Is that good for business? Wouldn’t it make us more fulfilled if everyone was able to play their part?
2. How can we achieve the common good if our system generates legions of those who are financially and educationally excluded? Our success as a society, and social cohesion, will be destabilised by these fractures.
3. Is our economy structured in such a way as to value the contributions of all? The common good is not possible without everyone involved.
4. In these times of economic challenges, is our drive for efficiency and competitiveness dehumanising our social care sector and creating accidental casualties?
5. The ethos shared by L’Arche and Together for the Common Good is one of collaboration and mutual self-interest, based on a love of humanity.
6. The common good is predicated on the idea that people of different views and circumstances come together, acknowledging differences and vulnerabilities and valuing their complementary gifts in common purpose.
About Jean Vanier
Key facts:
· Jean Vanier founded L’Arche in 1964, offering community living for people with learning disabilities
· L’Arche is now an international network of 146 communities in 35 countries, with 11 in the UK
· He advocates that the poorest and weakest in society can teach us what it means to be truly human
· His insights reach way beyond the disability sector and are relevant for the whole of society
· He is a philosopher, writer, religious and moral leader, and is a lay Catholic, not a priest
Born in 1928, Jean Vanier was the son of the 19th Governor General of Canada, and began his career as an officer in the British Navy. At the end of the Second World War he helped to receive prisoners from concentration camps as they arrived in Paris, and felt called to devote his life to working for peace.
L’Arche began in 1964, when Vanier invited two men with severe mental handicaps to leave a bleak asylum in Paris and live with him in a cottage in the village of Trosly-Breuil near Compiègne. Today, there are L’Arche communities in every continent – 146 of them, in 35 countries, from Bangladesh to Burkina Faso, Ireland to the Ivory Coast, Palestine to the Philippines, and 11 here in the UK. L’Arche communities exist for people with learning disabilities (what used to be referred to as ‘mental handicaps’) and are widely thought of as a living witness to human transformation. While Jean Vanier is a Catholic, L’Arche embraces those of all faiths, and none, united in the belief that the weakest and poorest in society can teach us what it really means to be human.
Jean Vanier is much in demand as a speaker in venues ranging from prisons and hospitals to business schools and banks. His achievements have been recognised by governments and churches all over the world. A recipient of the Legion d’Honneur, he has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, has received the American Pacem in Terra Peace and Freedom Award, the Rabbi Gunter Plaut Humanitarian Award, the Gaudium et Spes Award, and is also a Companion of the Order of Canada. http://www.jean-vanier.org
Quotes: Jean Vanier is the author of many books. These quotes below are extracts from his latest publication, Signs of the Times: Seven Paths of Hope for a Troubled World:
· “Something new is coming to birth with the crowds of poor and vulnerable people which our societies, our way of life and the development of medicine have created. An encounter between strength and weakness can make possible an interaction through which the weak can find a certain security and develop, and the strong can learn to accept their own vulnerability and discover the real meaning of human life.”
· “When the strong and the weak live together, a compassionate love is born… The weaker people awaken tenderness in the hearts of the stronger; they transform them into ‘real’ people, capable of true compassion. They stronger reveal to the weaker their deepest human value. So each person, weak or strong, becomes someone uniquely valuable. At the heart of society’s ills is a call to create more community.”
About L’Arche
The L'Arche Model: L’Arche homes and programmes operate according to a not-for-profit “community model” which is distinct from "client-centred", medical, or social service models of care. At L’Arche,
· people with disabilities, and those who assist them, live together in homes and apartments, sharing life with one another and building community as responsible adults.
· everyone is believed to have the capacity to grow and to mature into adulthood, and to make a contribution to society, regardless of physical or intellectual limitations with which they may be living;
· the important goals of achieving personal growth and maturing socially as an adult are things which are understood to be nurtured most effectively within the context of a community whose policies and practices support and promote, among other things:
o development of long-term, mutual, interdependent relationships;
o maintenance of a stable, life-giving home environment;
o training and formation of those who provide assistance to community members with disabilities; and
o cooperation with outside professional care providers.
The mission of L'Arche, as defined byL'Arche International, is to:
· make known the gifts of people with learning disabilities
· foster the development of communities that respond to members' changing needs
· engage with local cultures while working toward a more human society.
In pursuit of this mission, L'Arche strives to:
· create small faith-based communities of friendship and mutuality between people of differing abilities
· develop lifelong support systems for the benefit of all, especially those who are highly vulnerable due to old age and/or multiple disabilities
· highlight the unique capacity of persons with disabilities to enrich relationships and to build communities where values of compassion, inclusion and diversity are upheld and lived by each person.
L’Arche as a faith-based organisation maintains, promotes, and strives to act upon the following principles:
· whatever their strengths or their limitations, people are all bound together in a common humanity;
· everyone has the same dignity and the same rights, including the right to life, to a home, to work, to friendship, and to a spiritual life;
· a truly just and compassionate society is one which welcomes its most vulnerable citizens, and which provides them with opportunities to contribute meaningfully to the communities in which they live;
· systems of belief - be they secular or religious - make the world a better place only when they promote the dignity of all human beings, inspiring us to be open to people of different intellectual capacities, social origins, races, religions, and cultures.
About L’Arche UK: there are 11 L'Arche Communities in the UK where people with and without learning disabilities share life together, living and/or working in community: Kent, Bognor, Brecon, Edinburgh, Inverness, Ipswich, Kent, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Preston and Flintshire.
Communities vary and can be made up of a mix of small family-sized homes, flats, shops and day resource activities. Communities in the UK provide day provision services to adults, including arts and drama workshops, crafts and candle making, bookbinding, gardening and woodwork.Like other support providers L’Arche is regulated and inspected to ensure a high quality of provision. Although grounded in the Christian tradition, L'Arche Communities welcome people of all faiths and none.
CONTACT
L’Arche UK: more information at http://www.larche.org.uk/
Heather Coogan, E: mailto:, M: 07979 810 770
Briefing on Learning Disability in the UK
Statement from L’Arche UK
”Foremost, we are not activists for a cause, we are the witnesses of an experience. We are not here to say, ‘This is good, this isn’t’. The invitation we extend to others is ‘Come and see,’ because that's the invitation we received." (Stéphan Posner, Leader of L’Arche in France2014)
As the economic cuts have taken hold there has been a significant impact on funding for people with disabilities. It is increasingly the case that only people with severe disabilities are receiving support packages. Many people with milder disabilities receive little or no support and, for those with families, caring responsibilities fall to siblings and parents - who are often elderly. For those without family there is an increasing danger of complete social isolation where people live alone without family, formal support or friendship. Even those people who receive state support often find that their ‘care package’ only meets basic needs – to be kept ‘safe’. So for many people with disabilities their greatest challenge comes not from their disability but from their isolation.
Our experience is that a life rooted in a network of friendships and having a place where we can belong and contribute, is more likely to lead to flourishing, both for the individual and for society as a whole. This will be helped by a commissioning, policy and regulatory framework that recognises the need to belong; that supports friendship, connections and interdependence; that values informal support and does not take it for granted.
We value a genuinely person centred mind-set, not a systems based approach, where people feel empowered to make choices, take risks and live life.
Learning disability issues in the UK
1. Increasing centralisation, regulation and professionalisation of care is damaging human relationships
Increasing centralisation, regulation and professionalisation of the care sector is damaging the ability of people to form real human relationships at many levels. Voluntary and community initiatives are often treated with suspicion by regulators rather than welcomed. http://www.centreforwelfarereform.org/library/by-az/open-letter-on-regulation.html
2. Disabled people are suffering government cuts more than other groups
A series of independent reports have demonstrated that disabled people are suffering government cuts more than other groups (through cuts in benefits, housing and care) and the UK Government is currently being investigated by the UN for its possible failure to fulfil its duties under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. For example, 500,000 fewer people now receive social care than they did four years ago (a cut of 28%). Example:
http://learningdisabilityalliance.org/totally-wrong-list/
3. People with disabilities ability to be heard has been reduced
The combination of cuts to advocacy, Legal Aid, and the pressure placed on charities to avoid speaking out on issues that might seem unduly political under the Lobbying Act, has left people with disabilities with only a very limited ability to question or challenge Government policy. http://learningdisabilityalliance.org/totally-wrong-list/