The Hargreaves Foundation supports Newlife the Charity for Disabled Children

The Trustees of The Hargreaves Foundation are pleased to announce funding support for Newlife, the UK’s largest charitable provider of specialist equipment for disabled children.

Newlife exists because they believe that disabled children, young people, and their families, have a right to the same opportunities as their peers and to access the services and support they need to live a good quality of life. Each year, their specialist mobility equipment transforms the lives of over 2,500 disabled and terminally ill children, helping improve health and wellbeing, provide new opportunities, reduce social isolation, and enable greater independence.

Equipment is vital for giving children greater independence, but in Newlife’s recent report, ‘Fight for our Future’, their survey of over 1000 parents revealed only 2 in 5 children have the equipment they need, with almost a quarter of local authorities having children wait over a year to be assessed – in some places it’s over three!

With support from The Hargreaves Foundation, Newlife will provide 20 children aged 0-19 with the funds to purchase specialist equipment like wheelchairs, powerpack add-ons (which give power assist to a manual chair), buggies and buggy accessories. This can be transformative for children and families, giving them greater freedom to go places and do activities they enjoy like day outings, or playing on the grass and socialising in playgrounds where there’s uneven surfaces.