'Enabling Financial Flourishing in Law, Policy and Practice: The Impact Agenda'

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This Fellowship aims to consolidate and disseminate new knowledge emerging from a research project which explored how support can improve the day-to-day financial experiences of adults with cognitive impairments.The key objectives of the Fellowship are: 1) to make a meaningful contribution to increasing academic knowledge about the challenges faced by people with cognitive impairments in their financial lives, 2) to contribute to policy change through producing a Policy Briefing document targeting policy actors and financial service providers, and 3) to achieve practical impact by obtaining funding for a network which draws together the expertise of disabled people, academics, social care professionals, banking and other experts who can offer insight and take practical steps to help improve the financial lives of disabled people.Research revealed that people with cognitive impairments face a plethora of overlapping challenges in every element of financial life. This includes getting proper access to social care, using the benefits system, getting accessible information and essential community services like banking, navigating obstacles caused by mental capacity law, obtaining housing, managing contracts, and dealing with social exclusion, stigma and discrimination. These factors often overlap and compound the social disadvantage experienced by disabled people.This Fellowship will disseminate new understandings of how the law, policy regulation and its real-world impact is affecting the financial lives of people with cognitive impairments.This will occur through 3 distinct channels:1) Firstly, by enhancing academic understandings about how the law and public policy choices are conceived in theory and how they are implemented in practice, in ways which can disadvantage adults with cognitive impairments. The Fellowship will result in two academic articles which offer new insights into law and policy reform, as well as the transformative impact that good support can have in the lives of disabled people. One article will focus on improving access to the support that disabled people need across their financial lives, while the other will develop a new theoretical approach to understanding and improving how law and policy operate in reality.2) Secondly, the Fellowship aims to inform relevant social actors and thereby contribute to relevant policy and guidance reform through a Policy Briefing. This document uses the voices of disabled people and their supporters to demonstrate the financial exclusion experienced by adults with cognitive impairments. This will be sent to Government bodies (such as the Disability Unit), regulatory bodies (such as the Equality and Human Rights Commission) and disabled people's organisations and support providers to help them better understand how to accommodate and respect the rights of people with cognitive impairments.3)Thirdly, I will apply for funding to establish a knowledge-sharing network between academics, disabled people, their organisations, support providers, policy bodies, law makers and banks. Once funding for this network is secured and the network is established, the aim is for stakeholders to make connections and work together to improve financial experiences for disabled people. All the stakeholders will be asked to feed into collaborative, knowledge-building workshops, with the aim of developing a 'Financial Self-Advocacy Toolkit' for adults with cognitive impairments and their supporters. This Toolkit will include accessible practical guidance which helps with financial living. It will cover things like how to access financial and care support, how to interact with the Department for Work and Pensions or the bank, understanding what assistance or adjustments you are entitled to and tackling discrimination. This could help disabled people to achieve more equality in their financial lives.