Spastics Society
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Scope logo
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| Formation | 1951 |
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| Headquarters | London, N7 |
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Region served
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England and Wales |
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Chief Executive
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Mark Atkinson |
| Website | www.scope.org.uk |
Scope is a disability charity working with disabled people and their families in England and Wales. It runs support services such as schools, a college, residential care, training, short breaks and runs a helpline providing information and advice on disability. Scope also campaigns for the full inclusion and equal participation of disabled people in society.
It was founded as the National Spastics Society on 9 October 1951 by Ian Dawson-Shepherd, Eric Hodgson, Alex Moira and a social worker, Jean Garwood, with the aim of improving and expanding services for people with cerebral palsy.
From 1955 to 1989, the society ran the Thomas Delarue School, a specialist secondary boarding school at Tonbridge, Kent. Scope still runs schools for disabled children in West Sussex and near Cardiff as well as a Further Education College in Lancaster, which was founded in 1977.
Over time, thanks in large part to the influence of Bill Hargreaves, the first trustee with cerebral palsy, the charity’s aims extended to improving and expanding services for people with cerebral palsy and disabled people in general. Bill’s pioneering work in employment in the 1950s supported over 1,500 disabled people into their first jobs. In 1962, he set up the 62 Clubs where disabled people could choose and control their own leisure activities. Through its employment services, Scope continues to support disabled people to have the same opportunities as everyone else.
In 1963 it merged with the British Council for the Welfare of Spastics to become The Spastics Society. The Spastics Society provided sheltered workshops and day centres for people with cerebral palsy (commonly referred to as spastics at the time, despite spasticity being a symptom of only one variant of cerebral palsy), who were seen as being unemployable in mainstream society. The Society also provided residential units and schools, as well as opening a chain of charity shops.
The term spastic was long used as a general playground insult. In the 1980s, this became more charged, partially because of the Blue Peter programmes following the life story of Joey Deacon in an attempt to show disability in a positive light during the International Year of Disabled Persons. Consequently, the society changed to its current name to Scope on 26 March 1994, following a two-year consultation with disabled people and their families.
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