Strong Voices

IHC members can now renew their memberships for a one- or three-year term.

A new category in the IHC Art Awards this year is giving young artists with intellectual disabilities the opportunity to win on a national stage.

Belinda Donaldson is our new IHC i-Volunteer coordinator. Her role is to implement an online/virtual volunteer programme to help link carers and people with intellectual disabilities with online friends. Belinda isn’t new to working with IHC Volunteering and for the past several years has been working behind the scenes on annual customer satisfaction surveys and updating the coordinator manual.

Thanks to a brainwave of IHC Art Awards Ambassador Dame Denise L’Estrange Corbet, the three top works in the 2020 IHC Art Awards were auctioned live at Webb’s art auctioneers in Auckland, in association with a WORLD Legacy Charity Project event called Artists 4 Artists.

In December the Human Rights Review Tribunal issued a decision – five and a half years late – that it would hear a complaint from IHC that our education system discriminates against disabled students.

Charlie Waigth was a lifetime crusader for his daughter Catherine and for people with intellectual disabilities throughout the country.

People with intellectual disabilities have lost a strong advocate and a true friend with the death of Charlie Waigth in Auckland.

IHC has set up an 0800 freephone service – Awhi Connect 0800 442 311 – to give families direct access to support and information.

Christine Lee believes in the power of storytelling to build acceptance of people with intellectual disabilities.

It was like an early Christmas. One after the other couriers arrived at IHC’s national office in Wellington bearing packages of all shapes and sizes. These were works that had made it through the judges’ first selection for the IHC Art Awards 2020.