Page 16 - Community Living Magazine 35-1

in conversation

‘I’ve done

all I want’ Linda Doherty got on the path
to independence at the Elfrida
Society. She tells Seán Kelly
about her 50 years with the
charity and being a champion
of her communities

am at the Elfrida Society to meet Linda local organisation called Centre 404, “You’ve got to explain it to [the staff]
Doherty. We are going to celebrate that where she supported a group of young when they [people with epilepsy] come in
I she has been involved with and people with learning disabilities. “I helped to the hospital. So they can understand it
supported by Elfrida (as everyone calls it) the little ones. I [did] the sandwiches and I and they don’t get worked up with people
for just over 50 years, since she was 20 was showing them how to use a cheese- and all that lark.”
years old. grater,” she says. She also remembers the Power and
I myself worked for the charity, which Control group giving feedback and advice
supports people with learning disabilities Speaking up for access to Transport for London: “We said we need
in Islington, for over 20 years, but that Back at the Elfrida Society, she joined the things like clamps on the floor of buses so
pales beside Linda’s five decades. She has Power and Control group, which the wheelchairs don’t move about.”
brought a pile of photos to help us look campaigned for the voices of people In a more recent meeting with the
back on the old days. with learning disabilities to be heard, police, she and other members told them
What first brought her to Elfrida? “It and for all kinds of services to be made to “crack down” on people using electric
was learning to read and write with more accessible. scooters on the pavement: “They are
Carola,” she says. She is referring to the dangerous. It’s not fair if anyone has got a
education unit, later called Learning for walker.” Doherty speaks from experience,
Life and Work. “But Carola can’t have as she has used a walker to get around for
been here 50 years ago?” I ask. some years.
And so we are off reminiscing and The Power and Control group used to
looking at photos and she summoning up make presentations to Islington Council’s
the names of lots of staff and students Learning Disability Partnership Board. She
from the past. was invited to become co-chair alongside
“I love to see all the old faces again,” Sean McLaughlin, Islington’s director of
she says. “What made my day was when housing and social care at the time.
we had the old crowd here. The old days. Meetings were held in a big committee
We all used to get on with one another. room at the Town Hall and lots of people
Yes, that was the good days!” attended. Was she nervous? “No.”
After attending reading and writing She describes the experience as “all
classes Doherty remembers moving on to right” although she had to point out that
City and Islington College for further staff always spoke first and said what
classes. Meanwhile, she joined the they wanted, and she and the other
Culpeper Gardening Group, which was members of the Power and Control group
run by Community Gardens in association had to demand extra time to say what
with Elfrida. Group members plant, water, they wanted.
weed, harvest, cook and eat their I spoke to McLaughlin recently, who
own vegetables. Vincent 2, named after a supporter: “Tracy won now works for Homes for Haringey. “I
Doherty has an old cutting from a local a huge stuffed monkey. It was bigger than her” guess it was through working with Linda
paper celebrating a huge bulb of garlic at the partnership board that I realised
grown by the group, but there was no She remembers the group going to how limited my previous expectations of
photo of the garlic bulb in the paper: University College Hospital to help give co-production had been,” he says.
“Unfortunately it had already become feedback on accessible information about “I have no doubt she made the same Seán Kelly; Linda Doherty
part of lunch.” epilepsy. “I have got epilepsy. Somewhere impact on many other people so,
Doherty shows me some pictures from here” – she taps her head – “I’ve had it altogether, a great many professionals will
when she did voluntary work for another since I was 5. have improved their practice just by

16 Vol 35 No 1 | Autumn 2021 Community Living www.cl-initiatives.co.uk