Articles in Learning Disability

BuDDy Tours To Waddesdon Manor & Chiltern Open Air Museum

Would you like a free trip to Waddesdon Manor or the Chiltern Open Air Museum to help us improve their disabled accessibility and inclusion? If you’re a disabled person, or the parent/carer of a disabled child, why not join our BuDDy Tours of these two famous attractions? A BuDDy Tour is a guided tour of a visitor attraction, accompanied by BuDS volunteers, where you’ll have the chance to tell us about how accessible and inclusive you feel the place is for you. All disabilities and impairments qualify, including ‘invisible’ ones.

We will be at Waddesdon Manor on Saturday 24 September and at Chiltern Open Air Museum on Sunday 25 September. Admission is free, and refreshments are also included. Trips will be Covid-safer and suitable for clinically vulnerable people.

Please let us know if you would like to attend one or both venues by emailing volunteering@buds.org.uk. But be quick!

Waddesdon Manor
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Covid-19 Risk Assessment: Week Ending 16 September 2022

The next wave of Covid-19 is about to begin or is already building up. That’s the sad conclusion we’ve reached after looking at all the available data. We want to warn everyone not to be lulled into a false sense of security by the lower infection levels we have now. The last Covid wave has finished, but the next one is about to begin, so keep being Covid-Careful.

Around 1 in 89 people in Bucks are still infected with Covid-19 so your chance of meeting someone who will give you Covid is still VERY HIGH. In your average busy supermarket, there will be three people breathing out Covid for you to catch.

Our advice remains to wear a FFP2 or N95 filter mask in public places, breathe clean air, avoid crowds and busy places, work from home if you can, and protect your older and vulnerable relatives and friends. These simple precautions will help save you and your family from serious illness or long-term disability.

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BuDS staff and volunteers wearing masks stand around the statue of Sir Ludwig Guttmann at Stoke Mandeville Stadium

BuDDy Tours

A BuDDy Tour is an escorted tour by a mixed group of disabled people to a visitor attraction, to assess how accessible and inclusive the place is for disabled visitors. BuDS, through our Fair4All Visitor project, carries out several BuDDy Tours every year. The aim is to give constructive feedback to the visitor attraction, and to help them continually improve their disabled accessibility and inclusion.

So far in 2022, BuDS has arranged BuDDy Tours to the National Paralympic Heritage Centre at Stoke Mandeville Stadium, Waddesdon Manor, and the Chiltern Open Air Museum. Further BuDDy Tours are planned to other leading visitor attractions across Buckinghamshire.

BuDS welcomes disabled people to join us on these Tours. We like to make sure that all impairment groups are included. As well as a guided tour of the attraction, we usually include refreshments, and we can help with transport too. Carers can be included if necessary. If you are interested in joining a future tour, please contact volunteering@buds.org.uk, leave us a voicemail on 01494 211179, or message us through social media.

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BuDDy Tours of Waddesdon Manor & Chiltern Open Air Museum

As a mark of respect for HM The Queen, BuDS has postponed our planned BuDDy Tours of Waddesdon Manor and the Chiltern Open Air Museum (COAM). The Tours will now take place on Saturday 24 September (Waddesdon Manor) and Sunday 25 September (COAM).

A BuDDy Tour is an escorted tour by a mixed group of disabled people to a visitor attraction, to assess how accessible and inclusive the place is for disabled visitors. If you’d like to be part of either or both Tours, please e-mail volunteering@buds.org.uk straight away. Admission is included, along with a meet and greet with the site managers. BuDS Representatives will accompany the tours and be on hand at all times.


The BuDDy Tours were organised to support the Visit Buckinghamshire Boost, Boost Accessibility project. The BuDDy Tours were delivered by BuDS volunteers, in partnership with Visit Buckinghamshire, Buckinghamshire Business First, and Buckinghamshire Council. The Visit Buckinghamshire Boost programme was funded by the UK Government through the UK Community Renewal Fund.

Covid-19 Risk Assessment: Week Ending 2 September 2022

The Covid risk in Buckinghamshire has continued to decline over the last week. However, there is still a VERY HIGH risk of meeting an infected person at work, at the shops or when out and about. People still need to stay Covid-Careful, because Covid-19 has NOT gone away. We predict that around 1 in 83 people in Bucks are still infected with Covid-19.

Covid isn’t going away and there is just as much virus around as there has ever been. What is happening now is that so many people have recently had Covid that the virus is running out of new people to infect. So numbers of infected people are falling quickly, like a fire running out of fuel. But that situation can’t last long, as we explain below.

Please don’t feel safe because you have had Covid before or are fully vaccinated, or because numbers are currently going down.

Our advice remains to wear a FFP2 or N95 filter mask in public places, breathe clean air, avoid crowds and busy places, work from home if you can, and protect your older and vulnerable relatives and friends. These simple precautions will help save you and your family from serious illness or long-term disability.

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