Meet Phil & Rachel

Hi, we’re Rachel and Phil Shatliff and we’ve been members of the Lancashire Parent Carer Forum Roundtable since its inception. We are the Chair and Treasurer of East Lancs Down’s Syndrome Support Group respectively, voluntary posts we have held since we set up the charity about 15 years ago. We started with just 4 families and now support over 100 across East Lancs, Blackburn and beyond. Our youngest, of 3, Lucas, has Down’s Syndrome and led us into a whole new world, most of which is fabulous! Lucas is now 19 and has thrived through mainstream school and is currently loving his catering course at Blackburn College, alongside a paid role at Nell’s Pizza in Manchester.

Our focus with the charity is to support families with a member with DS from diagnosis through to adulthood, with an emphasis on social interaction, enabling families to have a safe space to meet others with similar experiences, make friendships and share concerns and joys alike. We also run a social group for our older members (13+) as we have found this is something missing in many areas – we have people travelling long distances to take part which reinforces the need and it has been wonderful to see our young people grow in confidence, social skills and developing relationships. Lucas met his girlfriend of two years at the group, and it is wonderful to see them grow up together.

Another key area for us is education – with the right inclusive approach, and understanding of the learning profile of DS, many children can and will benefit from mainstream education. This support is not generally available, so we fundraise in order to provide specialist input to schools across Lancashire, through our Specialist Education service.

We collaborate with many other DS groups across the country and are affiliated with the 2 main national groups, the Down’s Syndrome Association and DSUK/Positive About Down’s Syndrome. We also support lobbying groups such as the National Down’s Syndrome Policy Group and the Advisory Group of individuals with Down’s Syndrome. We recently took members of our group to attend the first National DS Summit in London. We also collaborate closely with the North Lancs DS Group in an aim to represent and support individuals and families right across Lancashire.

Personally, we have both retired from corporate careers to focus on the charity. We love spending time with our wider family including 2 grandchildren, especially watching Man City FC together; we love travelling, and we both love music, Phil playing trombone in many groups, from brass bands to orchestras, Rachel playing the French horn a little but singing a lot in many different choirs.

We have joined the Round Table because we want to ensure the voice of people with DS is heard across the County and in every key decision made. We regularly ask our members for feedback and have developed a county-wide “I Choose Board” of young people to share their views on what they want and need from their lives to be fulfilling and enjoyable, and as independent as possible. We also see great benefit in collaborating with other SEN groups to inform the decision makers in Lancashire, in the County Council and Integrated Care Board, about what is needed across the disability community, as so many challenges and concerns, as well as opportunities, are similar