The Autism Bill was given Royal Assent and became “The Autism Act” when it was signed by Her Majesty the Queen in November 2009. This action could well be unique in historical terms as well as in its content and should be a turning point in the development of services for adults and adolescents with an Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC). The full text is available online (see below) but in brief it requires that the government produce plans to develop diagnostic and many other services for England and Wales by April 1st 2010 and that full legal guidance be presented before December 1st. The content is, in itself, startling and represents the first time that legislation about a specific condition has been prepared. This may be a result of politicians’ increasing awareness of the importance of the condition and of the financial and social consequences of doing nothing.
Even more remarkable is the way in which this legislation has passed through Parliament at all. The story is testament to the power of the democratic process.
The British Parliament has a tradition whereby individual elected members can propose legislation for consideration. Very rarely does it succeed in becoming law and even more rarely does it do so without the support of the governing party and its political machine. It seems highly unlikely that such an occurrence has ever occurred before. Very few of these Private Members’ Bills can be introduced each year and there is a ballot of all members to see who will be lucky enough to have this opportunity. On this occasion, the name at the top of the list was that of Cheryl Gillan the Conservative Party Member for Chesham and Amersham. Immediately following this announcement, The National Autistic Society (NAS) approached Cheryl and introduced their plans for this bill. They were not alone for 16 other autism related associations and many individual parents made contact and lobbied for this action. Cheryl agreed that this was a cause worth fighting for and agreed to sponsor and support it. The bill was supported by the “Front Bench” of senior members of her party. Initially, the government were unsupportive and suggested that they would prepare their own legislation and exerted pressure to have the Gillan bill withdrawn. Against the wishes of the government, Cheryl persisted with her bill and it was introduced to Parliament on 27th February 2009. With the support of a substantial number of rebellious government (Labour) and Liberal Democrat members the bill was passed through this first reading and finally passed through the House of Commons on 19th June 2009.
By this time, it was obvious that there was overwhelming support for the “Autism Bill” and it went to the House of Lords for approval on 10th July where it was introduced by the (Labour) member Baroness Pitkeathly. It was signed by the Queen and became “The Autism Act 2009” on November 13th. Throughout this period, there has been intense activity from grassroots organisation who had organised demonstration and meetings and had lobbied individual MPs. In parallel with this, the Department of Health organised a consultation process to consider a “future strategy for adults with autistic spectrum conditions”. It was chaired by the NAS Chief Executive Officer Mark Lever and was revolutionary in that the parents of people with ASCs as well as those with the condition themselves and other professionals were encouraged to contribute. This consultation process is to continue as ideas will be considered by an “external reference group” before adoption and inclusion in final plans.
Certainly, this is a very impressive demonstration of the democratic process in action and at such speed! It shows that when all those with genuine interest unite to sing in concert from the same song sheet and give the same message, genuinely useful legislation will result. Great credit is certainly due to those who conceived, supported and drove these initiatives. We must now work to ensure that good legislative intentions are not lost in the translation into realisation. The world has been watching all of this and will continue to watch and, hopefully learn how it should be done. It is very few occasions when one feels the need to praise politicians but this is one of them. Thanks Cheryl.
The Autism Bill itself can be found on the National Autistic Society website:- www.NAS.org.uk
Paul Shattock
(Printed with the permission of the editors of "The Autism File" - Winter 2009).
