Not for me, without me
For the children who were never asked.
The Family and Disability Alliance is the UK charity for the voice of every disabled child — and the families who love them.
Budget envelope
Confirmed before the meeting
Local policy
Applied as standard
Professional assessment
40 minutes, one visit
The child’s voice
REQUIREDCannot close — 1 required field is empty.
Close recordNothing about a child, decided without the child
The system we're changing
This is not bad luck. It’s a design.
99%
of parental appeals against EHCP decisions succeed at the First-tier Tribunal.
Because the plans are wrong.
88%
of complaints to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman about children's SEND casework are upheld.
One of the highest uphold rates in the public sector.
£8bn
projected annual SEND deficit by 2027 on current trajectories.
The wrong decisions cost more than the right ones would have.
Every one of these numbers is a family, a child, and a decision that was made without asking the child at the centre of it. Each mark below is a decision. The ochre ones are the times a child was actually asked.
WORKFour programmes. One alliance.
We combine what no other charity holds together.
A family community, free casework support, paid practitioner training, and a national reform campaign — under one mission. Each programme feeds the others.
Family Advocacy Alliance
A national community of families of disabled children. Monthly online gatherings, peer advocates, and a shared library of what worked.
Casework Support Service
Free help with the processes that eat parental time — EHCPs, tribunals, ombudsman complaints, continuing healthcare panels.
Practitioners' Programme
CPD training for SENCos, LA officers, clinicians, and social workers on how to centre a disabled child's voice at every decision.
The Right to Be Asked
A national campaign to reform how Article 12 of the UNCRC is delivered in English SEND law. The law we already agreed to needs delivering.
ORIGINWe were you
Pa and Ancha Joof spent a decade fighting for their three sons through a SEND system that never asked the boys themselves what they needed. Abdou is autistic. Jibreel lives with a rare, life-threatening auto-immune condition. Imran, at thirteen, has grown up as a young carer the state has never formally assessed.
The system spoke past all three of them. It filed reports about children none of its authors had properly met. It made decisions in panel meetings the children were never invited to.
FADA is the alliance we wished we’d found.
Every seat at the table was taken. Every seat but the one that mattered most.
Not for me, without me.
BOOKThe book that started the alliance
Not For Me, Without Me
Pa Joof & Dr Ancha Bala-Joof
Three letters, one to each of their sons — the letters the state should have written, and never did. It is respectful of the professionals involved, and specific about the system. It is the argument FADA exists to act on.
JOINThree ways to join
You’re not doing this alone anymore.
Family
Free
Whatever you're facing, you belong here. Community, casework, resource library, monthly gatherings.
Professional
£30–£120 / yr
Teachers, SENCos, clinicians, social workers, LA officers, lawyers. Practitioner community, training, and a campaign voice.
Organisation
£500–£10,000 / yr
Schools, MATs, local authorities, clinics, law firms. Includes bespoke practitioner training.
The FADA Advocacy Card
The card that carries your child’s voice into every professional interaction. Not another disability card — the first UK card that certifies the child has been asked.
Voice captured for
SARAH · 12–14
The founders’ letter
Once a month, Pa and Ancha write a letter — about the campaign, the family, the alliance, and the field. Straight to your inbox. Free.
No spam. No signup wall. Unsubscribe anytime.