Winterbourne’s Silent Majority

In 1981, I went on placement as a clinical trainee to a large mental handicap hospital in Surrey. I had never encountered people with learning disabilities before, and I was shocked to the core. But I was a qualified general nurse, and I was used to clearing up the messes bodies make when they’re ill [...]

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Michael Gilbert, murdered by the people he lived with

This is the man whose name I could not find. It was on a news item that preceded a programme I had recorded and I am relieved that I did not imagine it but horrified that the details were far worse than I had thought. here are some quotes from the newspaper: ‘Michael Gilbert, 26, [...]

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Vulnerable Victims: a new page to record our shameful society

People with learning disabilities used to be unseen members of our communities, hidden away in institutions with no voice and little contact with their more advantaged neighbours. The changes in philosophy that came with Wolfensberger’s ‘Normalisation’ thrust in the early 1980s led to closure of institutions and the end of inappropriate incarceration for people whose [...]

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Death of David Askew, a man with learning disabilities

This 64-year-old man did nothing wrong. He had learning (intellectual) disabilities and struggled to cope with the day-to-day demands of an ordinary life. All he wanted was the comforts of his home, his trips to the shops, and his cigarettes. What he needed and maybe didn’t know so much about was the support of his [...]

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