Mencap's Hear My Voice Campaign – it's about getting the views and voices of people with a learning disability into the UK's 2015 General Election

my_voicethmb People with a learning disability – and the millions of family members, carers and support workers connected to them – can make their voices heard on the issues that matter to them at the 2015 General Election.

Hear David's voice -

My name is David House. I work for Harrow Mencap and I have a learning disability. I am Chair of Harrow Mencap's forum for people with a learning disability.

I have organised lots of events to encourage people with a learning disability in Harrow to register to vote.

I have also invited local and national candidates to our forum meetings so they can answer our questions.

Getting answers from your candidates

We meet before the event so we can plan what we want to ask candidates. People ask questions on all sorts of things: jobs, transport, cuts to services, health, policing, even fly-tipping! (That one's from me).

Candidates answer some questions easily, but when a question is harder, they often skirt around it in a clever way. Some candidates are good at communicating with people with a learning disability, some need to go back to school and be trained by people with a learning disability!

Getting a candidate to attend an event

To get candidates to come we write letters and email to invite them first, and then usually we need to chase them to remind them. I know they are busy, but I expect them to come because they are our representatives, and we pay their wages!

Mencap's Hear my voice campaign (England, Wales and N. Ireland) is here: http://www.mencap.org.uk/hearmyvoice?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Be%20Mencap%20-%20May%202014