PSS is an organisation that supports people to live happy and hopeful lives, no matter who you are. We were over-the-moon to be able to show that to the LGBTQIA+ community of Liverpool recently at our first official march at Pride, organised by charity foundation LCR Pride.
PSS team members, senior leaders, trustees from all over PSS and people we support across services like Community Support and Shared Lives came out in force to support and celebrate the diversity of the communities we serve.
This year’s Liverpool Pride was the largest since the event started16 years ago, with over 60,000 people coming along to show their support The decision to take part in this year’s march was in the same year that we launched our first network group for LGBTQIA+ teammates and another for our neurodivergent teammates, too.
Chair of PSS’s LGBTQIA+ networking group, Mandy Howe said:
‘This year marks the 55th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, a big moment in the history of the LGBTQIA+ community. Every year since that day, people across the world have marched to show solidarity and pride in their identity, rather than the shame, stigma and oppression that dominated our social history for such a long time. We felt it was important at PSS to show our support for our LGBTQIA+ community – we still have a long way to go for true equity and social justice for many marginalised communities, especially trans and non-binary, and we want to be part of that positive change’
Hope is supported in Shared Lives and volunteers for PSS. She also takes an active role as an ambassador for Shared Lives Plus and advocates for people with disabilities and their rights to vote. Hope said:
‘Often as people with disabilities or support needs people forget that we want adult relationships. They assume we aren’t capable of them and infantilise us. So, if you are then any part of the rainbow family and stray from heteronormativity, this really throws people, often makes them uncomfortable and makes us even more invisible within social care. Often our queerness is forgotten about and we can be put in situations where we have to go back into the closet or where we can’t be ourselves, which is why it’s so important to make ourselves visible and also to change social care practices so we can live safe and authentic lives.’
Over the last few years, here at PSS we’ve been doing lots of work to help make our organisation the most welcoming, diverse and inclusive place it can be and going to Pride events or setting up our employee network groups are just the start. We want to make real, long-lasting changes to how we do things so that PSS becomes even more welcoming to people; no-matter who they are, where they’re from, what their background is, if they’ve got any disabilities, what they believe in, who they love or how they identify themselves. You can find out more about what we’ve been up to here