Our story

“In around 2016, I found myself at a crossroads. I had been working for a national disability charity, where I had set up a beneficiary-facing legal team. Unfortunately, the charity could no longer afford to run the service, and the team was to be made redundant. At the time, this felt deeply worrying— not just for my colleagues but because I knew our clients would be left with nowhere else to turn. 

This was a moment when the wider cracks in the legal aid system were really beginning to show. Disability charities across the sector were starting to close their legal services because they simply couldn’t afford to keep them going. The need for specialist legal advice wasn’t disappearing but the support was. 

An idea takes shape 

Rather than letting the service quietly disappear, I felt strongly that there had to be another way. I asked my team to give me 4 weeks before they started to look for new jobs, to see if I could find a solution and I began reaching out to chief executives across the disability sector with a question: would you be willing to invest in, and effectively crowdfund, a shared legal service for the whole sector? 

The idea was simple but ambitious; a national legal service that didn’t belong to just one charity, but existed for disabled people, older people and carers across the sector at a time when access to justice was becoming harder and harder to achieve. 

A pivotal conversation with Mencap 

I was incredibly fortunate to begin discussions with Jan Tregelles , who was then the Chief Executive of Mencap. Jan invited me to move my existing legal team to Mencap in 2017 to help develop Mencap’s information and advice service, and crucially, we also agreed that I would pilot the wider, sector-facing legal service idea with colleagues at Mencap. 

Thanks to the belief of my legal team colleagues and the support of Jan and other colleagues at Mencap, that pilot began in 2018 with support from social care providing organisations Dimensions and Choice Support. Over time, it became clear that the model worked and that the demand was overwhelming. 

Becoming an independent charity 

In 2020, with funding from the Oak Foundation, we took the next step and spun the service out as an independent national charity: Access Social Care. Jan became our founding Chair, and it feels important to acknowledge her leadership and belief in the project at that formative stage. 

We officially began operating on 1 April 2020, right at the very start of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was an uncertain moment to launch a new charity, but the need for legal support only intensified. 

Growing from a small team 

At the very beginning, Access Social Care was tiny. It was just me and Joanne Williams (our Director of Partnerships and Engagement) as the first two employees. Soon after, Sian Simon joined us as my executive assistant and all-round doer and fixer, making a team of three. 

On 1 April 2020, we TUPE-transferred the community care legal team from Mencap, meaning colleagues retained their existing rights, salaries, and protections. Miriam Valencia as Head of Operations joined at that stage as well. Almost overnight, we grew to a team of around 11 people. 

Where we are now 

Since those early days, Access Social Care has grown significantly. We’ve more than quadrupled in both size and income, expanding our reach and impact, while staying true to the original purpose: ensuring older people, disabled people and carers can access accurate social care legal advice and guidance when they need it most. We have added a product team to develop our online information service, AccessAva and our data work, and a community outreach team to work with underserved communities  

Looking back, it’s remarkable to think that an acorn of an idea and concern for clients could grow into a small but mighty national charity. It’s a reminder of what’s possible when a sector comes together around a shared belief—that access to justice should never be a luxury. 

And yes—it is kind of cool! “