Hammersmith and Fulham: leading the way with co-production

By Victoria Brignell. Member of Hammersmith and Fulham’s Disabled People’s Commission.

On June 20^th, Hammersmith and Fulham Disabled People’s Commission will officially launch its report calling for co-production in the way the council operates. If it’s implemented fully, it will have far-reaching consequences for how the council is run and how it delivers services to residents.

Entitled Nothing about Disabled People Without Disabled People, the report’s key aim is that disabled people should be actively involved in directing all aspects of the council’s work.

A cutting-edge initiative

The DPC was set up by the council in September 2016 and over the year that followed it carried out an extensive investigation into the experiences and views of local disabled people. Led by Tara Flood, who has been a disability rights activist for more than 20 years, the ten members of the DPC are all disabled and lived in Hammersmith and Fulham.

It was soon clear in the DPC’s research that not only do services need to be improved but local disabled people want to take part in making the decisions that affect their lives.

The way ahead

Now that the report has been published, the next stage, of course, is to put its recommendations into practice. No one is underestimating the scale of the challenge ahead. It could be argued that producing the report was the easy part. The real effort starts now.

What will undoubtedly help is that the report has the full backing of Steve Cowan, the council leader, and was approved unanimously by the council’s cabinet in December.

Disabled residents have already been closely involved in drawing up the plans for Hammersmith Town Hall’s refurbishment. More significantly, a implementation group is being established, made up of disabled residents and senior council officials, to drive forward the co-production agenda across the council.

Tara Flood comments: “Focusing on co-production was a risky move for the DPC, not because co-production is a bad idea – far from it – but because co-production has been much misunderstood. The DPC report recommendations set out all the strategic changes that need to be implemented by the council if real and lasting co-production is to become a reality. There is no doubt we’re doing ground-breaking things in Hammersmith and Fulham and it has been a privilege to be part of it.”

A trailblazer for other councils

Meanwhile, what’s becoming increasingly apparent is that councils elsewhere in London and beyond are starting to notice what’s happening in Hammersmith and Fulham. The pioneering changes underway in this West London borough are sending quiet ripples through local government.

The history of government is full of examples of reports which promise a great deal but deliver little. Members of Hammersmith and Fulham’s DPC hope that their report will be different and that co-production will soon be a reality in this part of the capital at least.