Since 2010, BuDS has helped its volunteers towards work. Our Reach4Work project, created in 2018, codified and developed that help, creating a professional wrap-around service for our disabled volunteers who want to move into or closer to work.
BuDS is exceptionally successful at moving disabled jobseeker volunteers into or closer to work…
BuDS has compassion for people suffering at the end of life and wants everyone to be able to experience a peaceful and dignified death. We recognise the spectrum of strong views held about the issue of ‘Assisted Dying’ or ‘Assisted Suicide’.
As a community of disabled people, BuDS strongly holds that the lives and wellbeing of disabled people are of equal value to that of non-disabled people. BuDS exists to uphold and defend the interests of disabled people. ‘Assisted Dying’ significantly affects the interests of disabled people, especially now that an Assisted Dying Bill is before the Commons, and BuDS therefore needs to engage with the issue and have a policy position on it.
If you would like to jump straight to our policy position, you can do so using the menu below.
Read MoreAre you feeling lonely or stressed at home? Need a friendly chat with someone who understands? The BuDS BuDDies are here to help!
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BuDS publishes some of our articles in EasyRead format. These articles are produced by our volunteers, and so our capacity is limited. Over time we will publish more EasyRead articles. Please be patient with us whilst we grow this project.
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The BuDS Enquiries Team answers questions and queries from disabled people about a very wide range of issues. We try to fill the gaps left by other support services and helplines, so we often support disabled people with complex and difficult issues.
Any disabled person with a connection to Buckinghamshire can contact the Enquiries project for help. Parents, carers, and supporters can also contact us on behalf of a disabled person. We don’t have strict rules about who we can help: we will always do our best to support you and will let you know immediately if, for any reason, we can’t.
The Enquiries project is staffed entirely by volunteers, many of them disabled people themselves. We are often very busy and there may be a delay in getting back to you. We are sorry about this, but we can only do so much. The Enquiries project is not a crisis or emergency service.
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Buckinghamshire Disability Service (BuDS) is a user-led disability charity operating in Buckinghamshire and across England. We are a successful, dynamic and influential charity, focused on supporting disabled people by fixing the biggest issues facing them. We aim to build a world which is Fair4All, including disabled people.
BuDS works by permanently removing barriers facing disabled people and finding answers to the big issues facing them, alongside helping individuals. Our projects and partnerships deliver unique and lasting change and effective support that helps tens of thousands of disabled people in Bucks and across England.
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The BuDS SEND Transitions Service is a three-year project funded by The Rothschild Foundation. The purpose of the SEND Transitions Service is to improve the experience of disabled children and young people moving through key transitions within school education and from school education into work or further/higher education. It will do this by:
The SEND Transitions Service is made up of workstreams from a number of BuDS projects, principally Fair4All Education and Reach4Work.
To learn more about the Reach4Work workstream, which is looking at disabled young people’s transition from education to employment, click here.
Fair4All Visitors is a BuDS project to help visitor attractions to be more accessible and inclusive for disabled people.
The Fair4All Education project tackles the most important educational issues facing disabled children and young people, and their parents/carers, in Bucks.
The core of the Fair4All Education project is a ‘working community’ of professionals, parents, carers and disabled young people who are passionate about making a real difference. Working under the BuDS umbrella, the Fair4All Education team works together to define an agenda for action and plan how change will be made to happen.
Read MoreDisabled people are often excluded from outdoor public events. This is not because they do not want to attend these events, but because the way the event is organized and staged creates barriers that make it difficult or impossible for them to attend. BuDS’ free-to-use Fair4All event project helps event organisers remove those barriers and attract more disabled people to their events, making them more successful. There are over 40,000 disabled people in Buckinghamshire and over 100,000 families with a disabled member, so being more accessible can significantly boost an event’s popularity and attendance.
Event organisers are often not aware that they are creating barriers which are reducing the appeal of their events. Event management training and qualifications do not usually cover disabled accessibility and inclusion. Disabled people are so used to events not being accessible that most do not even try to attend, which means event organisers do not see the difficulties that disabled people face.
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Disabled people are sometimes subject to abuse, insults or physical violence because of their disability. The BuDS Fair4All Attitudes and Hate Crime project supports people affected by disability hate, helps them report it to the police if they wish, and campaigns to change attitudes and combat hostility toward disabled people.
Read MoreThe IAG team works tirelessly to produce easy to read, fact-checked and reliable articles about issues relevant to disabled people. During the Covid-19 pandemic, these have included weekly risk posts which break down the latest case, hospitalisation, death and vaccination statistics; analyses of Government policy, and scientific updates about the coronavirus. To read these posts, please see below or visit our Facebook page using the button below:
If you would like to volunteer for the IAG team as a researcher or writer, please visit our volunteering page to find out more.
The Fair4All Card is a secure, evidence based card that can be used by any disabled person to communicate the reasonable adjustments they need.
We created the scheme in August 2020 and have grown from offering around 12 reasonable adjustments to now offering over 40.
Find out more about the scheme below.
Since 2021, BuDS has been required by law to publish an Annual Report and Accounts. You can download these reports and accounts by using the buttons below.
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As a user-led activist charity, the role of BuDS Trustees is different from that in many other charities. As a charity, we are by policy strongly Trustee-led. It is inherent in our status as a user-led organisation that the BuDS Trustee Board is the clear leadership and direction setting body for the charity. Accordingly, we expect and require all Trustees to have a strong commitment to our values and objectives, and for Trustees to play an active role in the life of the charity.
75% of BuDS Trustees must be, and must identify as, disabled people within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010. We expect our Trustees to bring and share their lived experience as disabled people when we are making decisions. We aim to ensure that all significant impairment groups are represented across the Board. We work inclusively and accessibly so that disabled Trustees do not experience barriers to their participation.
It is BuDS’ policy that all Trustees are re-elected at the Annual General Meeting (AGM). In practice, Trustees tend to serve for a period between 2 and 5 years. Prospective Trustees shadow the Trustee Board for a minimum period of 3 months before becoming eligible to be co-opted.
Sadly, to protect our Trustees from online abuse, we do not publish information about our Trustees beyond that which we are legally required to disclose. This information can be found on the Charity Commission website by clicking the button below.
BuDS continues to grow and develop, and the charity has to have a legal form which is suitable for the future. This article explains what Trustees are doing to evolve BuDS to give it a secure future.
BuDS carried out a public and member consultation in 2023, which overwhelmingly supported the changes listed below. The 2023 Annual General Meetings approved the changes, and gave Trustees the authority to put them into place.
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BuDS wants to be a charity which has strong, clear values which guide our work and everything done by our trustees, staff and volunteers.
BuDS first adopted formal values in 2020. We review them regularly, and the following values were adopted by the 2024 Annual General Meeting:
- BuDS is an inclusive & diverse working community of and for all disabled people
- BuDS is a strong, honest, voice for disabled people
- BuDS is a proactive charity that lives the social model, removes barriers and finds answers
- Fair4All is at the heart of all BuDS does
- BuDS is an empowering, reflective, caring, supportive, kind and safe organisation
- BuDS has an open culture and is committed to collaborative working
Twice each year, the BuDS Trustees will assess how well BuDS has kept to its values, and report back to the Annual General Meeting.
The BuDS Annual General Meeting for 2024 was held online on 18 January 2025. As an “unincorporated association” of disabled people, the AGM is the opportunity for our members to make key decisions including electing Trustees and approving strategies and key policies, and hearing about BuDS’ work. The AGM also formally approves the annual report and accounts.
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The BuDS Annual Report covering the period of April 2022 – March 2023 was published on 31 January 2024. The Chair of Trustees’ Introduction is below, and you can read the full report and all its annexes using the buttons below.
Read MoreIn preparation for the 2023 BuDS Annual Meeting, the Minutes of the 2022 Annual Meeting have been published so that people can look them over ahead of their discussion. They can be downloaded from the link below.
You can download the 2023 Annual Meeting presentation here.
The BuDS Annual Meeting for 2023 will be held online at 3 pm on Saturday 13 January 2024. This isn’t a stuffy meeting but a celebration of all we have done in this extraordinary year. There’s plenty of opportunity to ask questions and get involved in our work. This year, we are also making some big changes to evolve BuDS so that we can help more people.
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In April 2023, BuDS Trustees agreed that the charity’s main strategic objective for the year ahead would be to complete the transition from Covid-19 contingency funds to conventional charitable funding, and so enable all of our current projects to continue and expand. By July 2023, it was clear that we were succeeding in re-funding our current projects, and that we needed to change our strategy to reflect our quick growth. BuDS Trustees have therefore agreed an updated strategy for the remainder of the current financial year. This can be downloaded below.
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On this page, you can find all of BuDS’ key policies. These are constantly reviewed and updated, so you may find different documents available compared to the last time you visited this page. Documents are available as PDF downloads. If you would like the documents in any other format, or have any questions about the policies, please email us.
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