Bury, Greater Manchester, once cooked toffee. Adored locally and exported globally, Bensons Confectionery sweetened the town’s air and filled dentists’ wallets from the 1910s until 1989. Their famous red tins were decorated with a logo of a slightly sinister child with a toffee for a head and the strapline “Something good from Bury.”
I’m too young to have sampled their goods, but I learned about Bensons from a woman who worked there.
Joan* was employed by Bensons in the 1980s. She worked on the factory line, picking out bags of sweets that had failed to seal and feeding them back into the packaging machine.
I met her while working with Persona Care and Support, a social care provider, as part of my role with the IMPACT Centre. She has a learning disability and attends a Persona day service at a community centre in Whitefield five days a week.
Joan shines when recalling her job at Bensons and another as a spinner with a local textile company. At work, she could express her talents and gain independence—as well as some welcome cash. But as local industries declined, so did Joan’s job prospects. She hasn’t worked in over 30 years.
An achy problem
Like chewing a hard toffee, progress to support adults with learning disabilities to learn skills and get jobs has been achingly slow.
The 2000s were a high point for government policy activity on learning disability. Strategy papers like 2001’s Valuing People brought about changes to institutional daycare settings and focused on supporting people’s independence and choice. A follow-up in 2009, Valuing Employment Now, aimed to “increase radically” the number of people in paid work by 2025.
2025 is here, and that radical increase never arrived. Today, only around 5% of adults with a learning disability in England are in paid employment—a figure that has barely budged since 2009., (1,2)
It’s a shocking stagnation.
We’ve seen a narrowing in how people with learning disabilities contribute to their communities. Opportunities that once ranged from manufacturing and mining to jobs on farms and with local newspapers now rarely exist.
Past industries don’t deserve rose tinting. Working conditions were often poor and people with learning disabilities risked exploitation. Nevertheless, a recent estimate that employment levels for people with learning disabilities are 5 to 10 times lower today than 100 years ago points to squandered potential. (3)
So, how in the 2020s can communities make more of the people’s talents? Joan’s experience with Persona offers some encouragement.
How good day opportunities can help
At their most basic, day services, which are often tucked away in community centres and church halls, should create safe environments where people can socialise, follow routines, and engage in activities such as art, music and exercise.
But they can offer so much more. By running structured programmes where people learn to keep time, use technology, budget, travel, and make decisions, providers can support people with learning disabilities to gain practical skills for greater independence and community participation. Providers can also facilitate work and volunteering placements, both within their services and by allying with local organisations.
Persona has created a range of flexible volunteering positions that can give people supportive spaces for growth and smooth their paths into paid jobs. Joan has worked as a Persona Kitchen Assistant, allowing her to learn, be part of a team, and even sport a fine yellow lanyard. She speaks with pride about contributing to the running of the service and is grateful to the staff who supported her training.
Her experiences reflect the capacity of day services to bring out the potential in people.
As part of IMPACT’s Demonstrator programme, we are working with people with learning disabilities, staff, families, and carers to strengthen Persona’s services. We are also looking outwards, drawing on research and engaging like-minded organisations about ways to support people with learning disabilities to progress throughout their lives.
As Bensons once did in its heyday, we want to help local people find purpose and pride in what they do. The toffees in their red tins are long gone, but we want to showcase more good things from Bury and share ideas for other social care organisations to chew over.
*I have replaced their name.
* Credit Bury Archives
(1) NHS Digital. Measures from the Adult Social Care Outcomes Framework (ASCOF), England 2021-22. Leeds: NHS Digital; 2022.
(2) Department of Health. Valuing Employment Now: Real jobs for people with learning disabilities. London: Department of Health; 2009.
(3) L Delap, ‘Slow Workers: Labelling and Labouring in Britain, c. 1909–1955’, Social History of Medicine (2023). DOI: 10.1093/shm/hkad043