Personal Assistants are directly employed or contracted by the individuals and families they support. ECC are therefore not in direct contact with all PAs and do not have oversight of the total number of Personal Assistants working in Essex. However through the COVID Vaccination Programme, ECC reached over 3000 PAs working with adults and children.
Following research with people with lived experience, we recognised that PAs sometimes feel isolated and are not consistently accessing the training they feel they need or employer supervision to ensure they are fully confident and able to deliver high quality support.
Individuals also reported challenges with recruiting suitable PAs and many told us that they subsequently rely on family and friends to fulfil the role.
Direct Payment Support Service provider, funded by ECC, is developing a matching tool to support people to find PAs.
PAs can support people according to their individual needs and aspirations. Support may vary from personal care, respite, support to access the local community and pathways to employment and meaningful occupations. They can also support people across all cohorts and ages.