Sense Scotland

Wed, Apr 22nd 2026 at 12:40 pm - 2:00 pm

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The Club enjoyed an excellent talk from Jennifer Niven, chief fundraiser for Sense Scotland, a Scottish charity with bases throughout central Scotland. Sense's core function is to provide support to families in need, especially those with children with complex sensory disabilities which make communication difficult. The charity was established some forty years ago by a group of parents with children who were blind or deaf. The parents were concerned both about their children's current needs but also about the child’s future care after the parents had died. This proper concern for children when their parents are no longer there to care for them is a frequent theme in the work of other similar charities.
The support provided comes from about 1000 staff spread across much of Scotland. At present about 600 people are being cared for, some for as little as 2 or 3 hours per day, some for as much as 24 hours per day. The care can be delivered from babyhood right through into adulthood. Funding for staff
giving the daily support to those in need comes from the local authority. The funding for actually running the charity has to be raised from donors in the usual way and the annual target for this is about £1.3 million. This money is used to fund the administration of the charity and to pay for the varied programmes, including music, which it puts on. Jennifer stressed how challenging the funding of the charity had recently become given the recent changes to NIC and other costs to both employer and employee. She however remained confident that these challenges would be overcome.
Karen Robson concluded the meeting with a generous vote of thanks.