Edinburgh Carers - managed by Vocal

Advocacy for carers

What is Advocacy?

Advocacy is about supporting people to express their views and feelings about certain situations they find themselves in. It is also about ensuring that people are aware of, and know how to uphold, their rights.

Advocacy is about supporting carers who are not being listened to, heard or understood by others and to enable them to be responded to appropriately by professionals and services.

The main themes of advocacy are:

• Safeguarding the rights of people who are vulnerable and discriminated against or whom services find difficult to serve
• Empowering people who need a stronger voice by enabling them to express their own needs and make their own decisions
• Enabling people to gain access to information, explore and understand their options, and to make their views and wishes known
• Speaking on behalf of people who are unable to do so for themselves

Why is Advocacy needed?

Carers will often find themselves asking for further support for either themselves of the person they care for. This can happen at times of crisis or great change, when support is more urgently needed.

Carers can often be the first people to ask for help and support at these times. However, they may find that their views are not being fully considered or their needs not being adequately recognised by professionals and services.

Therefore, advocacy is about enabling carers to have the information and strategies available to enable them to access the support and services both they and the person they care for require.

 

What types of Advocacy does VOCAL provide?

VOCAL provides:

• 1 – 1 advocacy support, where the carer is supported by an individual advocate to address the issues they are concerned with
• Self-Advocacy, where we run a range of workshops, training and individual sessions to enable carers to learn and practise techniques they can use themselves to address issues more independently