On 1st February, the National Autism Project report, The Autism Dividend: Reaping the Rewards of Better Investment was presented at an event in the Senedd of the National Assembly for Wales. The event was kindly sponsored by Dr Dai Lloyd AM, who welcomed the findings of the report and expressed his hope that its recommendations would be useful in supporting the efforts being made in Wales to meet the needs of autistic people. He reminded the audience that Wales was the first country in the world to launch an all-age ASD Strategic Action Plan in 2008. Hilary Gilfoy, ex-CEO of Autistica, and an advisor to NAP, then introduced the project, its origins and its goals.
The Director of the project, Dr Ian Ragan , described the main findings and recommendations of the report and stressed the hope that Wales and the other devolved nations of the UK would use the report as an authoritative source of information to guide policy and select research priorities. The final speaker, Claire Fitzgerald, from Autism Spectrum Connections Cymru (ASCC), welcomed the report from the perspective of an autistic person and spoke with great humour and passion about the need of autistic people to be more involved in all aspects of life.
The final speaker, Claire Fitzgerald, from Autism Spectrum Connections Cymru (ASCC), welcomed the report from the perspective of an autistic person and spoke with great humour and passion about the need of autistic people to be more involved in all aspects of life.
We were pleased by the number of people who attended the event, especially the Assembly Members, Dr Dai Lloyd and Mark Isherwood.
The main part of the report was translated into Welsh and can be downloaded from this website.
The National Autism Project team would like to thank Gareth Morgan from ASCC for all his help in setting up this successful and enjoyable event.