‘North Wilts Holiday Club for Children and Young People with Special Needs’ is a charity providing support for families of children with special needs. We run daytime activity sessions and outings for severely and profoundly disabled local young people aged 4 years-young adults during the long summer ‘holidays‘, when many families provide 24-hour care for their wonderful but demanding children, often with no other source of respite care. All of our members have learning disabilities and most also have physical disabilities and/or emotional/ behavioural problems, and their recreational opportunities are extremely limited by their high individual support needs.
We are a comparatively small charity, with a committee mostly made up of parents who already have huge demands on their time and energy. Each year we struggle to find funds, and we rely on grants and donations to fund our running expenses, expected to be around £30,000 this year. Our biggest expense is wages for qualified and experienced child care staff - this expense has increased dramatically over recent years as we can no longer rely on finding volunteers to support them (parents are not asked to help!). Most of our administration, fund raising etc is done by volunteers. We also need funds for door-to-door transport, outings (adapted coaches and entrance fees), hire of the school and caretaker, entertainers (clowns etc) and toys and equipment, and for stationary & postage costs and sundries such as insurance, volunteer expenses, CRB checks for all staff, incontinence pads, etc. We have no compulsory fee as we do
not want any child to be excluded for financial reasons, and families with a disabled child face added financial pressures.
As well as being the only source of accessible leisure activities for most of our members, we are also the sole source of summer respite care for their families, most of whom provide 24-hour care for their wonderful but demanding children during the long summer holidays. We provide a break for families, benefiting parents and siblings as well as the disabled child. We have our main website at http://www.northwiltsholidayclub.org.uk