We are planning the ‘gentle and phased’ reopening of our three centres over the coming months - with our blended and remote support continuing for those who choose to stay at home.

We have been working hard to support service-users – autistic adults and adults with mental health needs and learning and physical disabilities – through the lockdown, and have received positive feedback about our remote Covid-19 ‘Living & Learning’ service.

With Government lockdown restrictions easing and following advice from Northamptonshire Adult Social Services (NASS), Northamptonshire County Council (NCC) and Public Health England (PHE), we are now able to share plans to gradually welcome people back to our Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough centres.

John Bruce, strategic director at Teamwork Trust said: “We intend for the process to be very gentle and phased so that we can keep everyone feeling safe, supported and happy.

“We are aiming to reopen the Kettering centre first in early July, the Wellingborough centre around the end of July, and our Corby centre at the beginning of August, but these timescales could change so we are keeping in touch with service-users, parents and carers.

“The centres will look a bit different with new social distancing rules in place to minimise the risk of coronavirus, but what’s also different is that members will now have a choice about how they would like to access our services - choosing activities in the centres or continuing our blended home service. We will be talking through the options with everybody over the coming weeks.

“It has been a difficult period but we are looking forward to carefully easing everybody back into a new routine.”

An overview of some of the other measures which will apply at all of Teamwork’s centres:

• Teamwork Trust staff are still committed to fostering a safe, friendly, welcoming and supportive environment at all times.
• We are planning to set up online ‘walk throughs’ and virtual reality maps so that service-users can familiarise themselves with how the centres will look before they return.
• All centres will be deep cleaned before they are reopened, and deep cleaning will continue on a regular basis – usually overnight or early morning when the building is empty.
• We will have easy-to-follow processes in place to ensure 2m social distancing – these will include arrowed one-way systems, individual work areas, restrictions on the number of members taking part in tasks, and many other changes which our friendly staff will guide everyone through.
• We will stagger start/finish dates and times to minimise the number of members and staff in the centre at any one time – Teamwork staff will discuss this with those affected.
• We will have a quick and easy process to temperature-check everyone who enters the building
• We have purchased large amounts of antibacterial gel for members and staff to use, and we will continually encourage hand washing and good hygiene.
• Further changes will be announced as the date to reopen gets closer.

For more information on Teamwork’s remote Covid-19 service click HERE