Getting involved in local decision-making
Local Involvement Networks (LINks)
LINks aim to give citizens a stronger voice in how their health and social care services are delivered. The network groups seek to find out what people want, monitor local services and use their powers to hold them to account. Run by local individuals and groups and independently supported, LINks will have been established in most areas by the end of 2008. Each local authority providing social services has been given funding and is under a legal duty to make contractual arrangements that enable LINks’ activities to take place.
LINks should offer useful mechanisms to make change happen. For example, they are able (under the law) to enter certain publicly-funded health and care services to see them at work. Find out more and locate your local LINks co-ordinator here.
Our NHS, Our Future and the new NHS Constitution
Lord Ara Darzi’s review of the NHS in Our NHS, Our Future: NHS Next Stage Review and the proposed new NHS Constitution should help people with neurological conditions to gain greater control over the services they access. The detail is still unclear, but the Alliance has produced a brief summary of the launch reports for our member organisations. You can download a summary of the Darzi Review Final Report here
You can also visit Our NHS, Our Future for more information.
The Long-Term Conditions Delivery and Support Team
The LTC Team’s purpose is to help anyone interested in improving delivery of Long Term Conditions services by bringing all LTC information together in the same place with easy access to assessment tools, expertise and a community of people with a common interest in the subject. There is an LTC Team regional lead based in each UK Strategic health Authority (SHA) with whom you can work with to achieve better services. Their contact details are listed below:
| Ian Salt | National Programme Manager | ian.salt@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Tom Loader | Programme Administrator/Communications | tom.loader@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Sandy Clarke | South West Region | sandy.clarke@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Dr Stephen O’Connor | South East Region |
Stephen.o’connor@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Paula Williams | South Central Region | paula.williams@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Laura Gordon | London Region | laura.gordon@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Heather Ballard | Eastern Region | heather.ballard@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Position Currently Vacant | East Midlands region | |
| Jon Whiting | West Midlands Region | jon.whiting@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Lynne Barr | Yorkshire & Humber Region | lynne.barr@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Malcolm Simpson | North East Region | malcolm.simpson@ltc-team.org.uk |
| Sharon Lloyd | North West Region |
sharon.lloyd@ltc-team.org.uk |