‘This is not your bog-standard charity shop’ | Manchester News

A charity running a shop staffed by autistic adults said neurodivergent people “deserve the chance” to work.

Space4Autism has opened the site in Macclesfield town centre to help its team gain skills and experience, which they hope will lead to future employment.

Chief executive Cheryl Simpson said those with autism “just need people behind them supporting them”.

Government statistics show only around 30% of adults with autism are in employment and Ms Simpson said the project’s goal is to support people into work.

Ms Simpson said she came up with the idea as the charity has been doing more and more work with autistic adults.

“It is not just your bog standard charity shop, it is for autistic adults to come here as part of the Launchpad Crew and to give them the confidence and the skills in running a retail shop to hopefully try and either get them work experience or to get them a job somewhere at the end of it,” she said.

Corby is 19 and one of the members of the Launchpad Crew.

“I have more confidence talking to other people,” he said.

He said he enjoys working on the till and talking to customers, and as a result of his experience, he would like to work in a shop full-time.

To support staff, Chris Smith has been handed the role of employment buddy.

He gets to know the members of the team and joins them on visits to potential employers which they hope will offer work experience placements and potentially future job opportunities.

“Some of them have had experience where they’ve been in the workplace, and they’ve not been supported in the right way,” he said.

“I’m an autistic adult who has struggled in the workplace, so I can use that knowledge to say to them ‘this happened to me’ which is brilliant to help them to see that there is a way for you to get into the workplace and enjoy it – you just have to find the right job.”

For the charity’s employment co-ordinator Lis Brown, it’s also about changing people’s perceptions.

“From the autism point of view a lot of people have got that negative attitude, so we wanted to show them that’s not actually true,” she said.

She added the members of the team were “very employable and very focused” on their roles.

Government statistics show only 30% of people with autism are in employment.

This is compared with around 50% of disabled people.

A recent House of Lords report, looking into the 2009 Autism Act, found that many autistic people would like to be in work.

“Supporting more autistic people to find and stay in work is not only critical to enabling those who wish to work to fulfil their aspirations, but would also help unlock economic benefits for the country as a whole,” the report said.

The project has had support from the local council.

Giles Sowden is the team manager for skills and lifelong learning at Cheshire East Council and said the “standard courses” did not offer enough.

“What we wanted was something forward thinking, giving lots of different experiences, work experience as well, and routes into employment and that’s what Cheryl’s vision was,” he said.

He added that he’s been working with other councils in the area who are also interested in the project.

“Other people across Cheshire and Warrington are now saying ‘this is what we should be doing’,” he said.

Councillor Laura Crane said any project that could support neurodivergent people into work was “worth its weight in gold”.

“So many projects when we’re talking about work experience, gaining entry into work are about the behind the scenes, CV writing etc,” she said.

“This is there, it’s real.”

Ms Simpson’s ultimate goal is to help her staff find permanent employment.

“If that doesn’t happen, even if we can just get them going for work experience, or just giving them those skills and confidence,” she said.

“They can do it, they just need people behind them supporting them to enable them to get there.

“They’ve worked so hard, they’ve shown to us they can do it, they just deserve that chance.”