Call for evidence outcome

Review of the National Autism Strategy 'Think Autism': call for evidence

Updated 21 July 2021

1. Introduction

In April 2014 the government published ‘Think Autism’ a strategy for meeting the needs of autistic adults in England. The strategy supports the Autism Act 2009.

This year the Department of Health and Social Care, working with the Department for Education, will review the strategy and will extend it to cover children as well as adults. To help us to do this we want to hear first-hand from autistic people (adults, children and young people), their families and their carers about their experiences.

We are using the term ‘autism’ to refer to all categories of diagnoses on the autistic spectrum and welcome responses from people who identify with them, whether or not they have a medical diagnosis.

We also want to hear from professionals who provide care and support in a range of settings (for example across health, social care, education and the voluntary sector) to autistic people, their families, and carers. We have therefore developed 2 surveys:

• a survey for any autistic person in England who has a diagnosis of autism or self identifies as autistic
• a survey for families of autistic people, unpaid and paid carers in England, and any organisation in England that works with autistic people

The survey can be accessed online.

We will use your views to check where progress has been made to date and importantly to find out about those areas where more needs to be done in the future at both national and local level.

We know that not everyone will be comfortable with providing views via an online survey. Please note these surveys are one part of our work to gather evidence and alongside this we are working with a range of organisations and networks to gather views, including face-to-face meetings with autistic people.

2. How to respond

You can give us your comments online at: https://consultations.dh.gov.uk/autism/2e4ae18d

Alternatively, you can print the surveys and send your response through the post to:

The Autism Policy Team
Dementia and Disabilities Unit
Room 1N14
The Department of Health and Social Care
Quarry House
Quarry Hill
Leeds
LS2 7UE

The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete.

3. When is the closing date?

The survey will close at 11.59pm on Thursday 16 May. After this we will be looking at what you have told us.

4. How we will use the information

Any information you provide will be confidential unless you want this to be shared. The results will be used by the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Education:

• to see what autistic people’s, their families’ and carers’ experiences are of care and support
• to see where further improvements may be needed
• to see how we can improve the way services and support are provided at national and local level

Any information you provide will be used to help us to develop a new national strategy for improving the health, care and wellbeing of autistic people, their families and carers and will not be used for any other purpose. Where we use any short quotes, we will ensure that they do not identify you.

5. Understanding the survey questions

We have tried to make the survey as easy to complete as we can.

We have tested the questions with some autistic people and family carers. We know that some people may need help to complete the survey. If you need help you might want to ask someone in a support role such as – a carer, friend, family member or personal assistant.

Thank you for taking the time to complete our surveys, your views are important to us. We want to work harder than ever to improve care, support and awareness of autism.