This entry of the Joint Working Journal focuses on Steering and Advisory Board 2, which met on 18th November and covers the work of the Wellbeing and Learning Disability Programme and the Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Programme.

Here are some of the main discussion points:

Wellbeing and Learning Disability Programme

The Programme continues to make great progress across the following Regional Learning Disability Strategy priorities:

• ‘Getting the Right Care and Support’
• ‘My Community’
• ‘Making My Decisions and Having My Say’.

Under the priority of ‘Getting the Right Care and Support’, we’ve seen the creation of a dedicated task and finish group chaired by Neil Williams, a person with lived experience. The group’s main aim is to find ways to promote the use of ‘easy read’ versions of materials produced by organisations across the health and social care sector.

This group has already reviewed barriers to ‘easy read’ and agreed the main priorities they will be focusing on. These will include linking ‘easy read’ resources to the Sorted Supported website, creating digital stories to highlight real-life challenges with accessible information, and developing a questionnaire for organisations to assess easy read usage and barriers.

In terms of ‘My Community’, three new projects funded via the Welsh Government’s Regional Integration Fund (RIF) are now up and running. These are:

• Supporting the Delivery of Wellbeing Outcomes through Community-Based Options (Swansea),
• Community Pathways to Independence: Enhancing Day Services through Early Help and Engagement (Neath Port Talbot), and
• Next Steps – From Day Services to Early Help, Prevention and Community Engagement (Swansea).

These projects will work in collaboration with other RIF-funded initiatives within the ‘My Community’ priority to share learning and maximise opportunities to work together and make a meaningful difference to people’s lives.

The ‘Making My Decisions and Having My Say’ priority has oversight of coproduction activities across all the programme’s projects, ensuring that people with a learning disability are supported to share their voices and experiences to help shape services. We’ll bring you more on the progress of this priority area in a future journal entry!

Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Programme

Work is progressing as planned in the mapping and integration of psychological therapies across sectors. The output of this work will focus on reducing waiting lists for therapeutic services and improving trauma services. This will mean people needing therapeutic services at all levels of need will have quicker access to the services which best suit them, for as long as they need, and will be appropriately ‘linked up’ to other support services as required.

Board members also discussed the ‘No Wrong Door’ approach and were informed of plans to utilise the model to improve access to services via multi-agency panels and single points of access. Work on developing these is ongoing, with the first phase concentrating on ‘No Wrong Door’ in the context of the Children and Young People’s Programme.

The Community Psychology project has been underway for some time, focusing on early intervention in the community by tapping into a detailed knowledge of community based challenges/ issues by embedding psychologists in clusters who go on to co-produce interventions with communities.

SAB2 members also considered a Community Psychology funding proposal for a fixed-term funding opportunity for a Practitioner Psychologist in Swansea’s City Cluster to address inequities and support early intervention. This post is needed due to the socioeconomic pressures within the area and long waits for psychological therapies. Based on reports detailing positive outcomes from similar posts across other areas, SAB2 members approved the proposed bid.

The post will be processed and advertised in early 2026, with the hope of us being able to welcome the new Practitioner Psychologist in around April.

This has been the last SAB update for this year, but keep an eye out for our festive Newsletter – the 10th edition of its kind since we revived it following the pandemic! Doesn’t time fly?!

As always, thanks for reading and we’ll be back with more from the SABs in 2026!