Christine Lenehan awarded OBE

07 January 2009 

Director of the Council for Disabled Children (CDC), Christine Lenehan has been appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her work with disabled children and their families for over thirty years. As director of CDC and board member of the Every Disabled Child Matters (EDCM) campaign, Christine has been at the vanguard of her field - raising the policy profile of disabled children and young people.

Christine said: 'This is an honour and a tribute not only to me but also to my colleagues that have ceaselessly fought to get and keep disabled children and young people on the agenda.'

Paul Ennals, Director of NCB, said the award was a testimony to Christine's 'hard work and complete dedication to raising the standards of services for disabled children, young people and their families.'

Christine has worked as a social worker in residential and fieldwork settings and for voluntary and statutory agencies. Christine was a member of the expert working group on the Children's National Service Framework module on disabled children and was responsible for the development of its consultation programme. She was also on the advisory group for the publication Improving the life chances of disabled people, issued by the Prime Ministers Strategy Unit in January 2005.

Christine currently hold several strategic roles including being a member of the Stakeholders Group looking at implementing Every Child Matters, the Ministerial Implementation Group for Implementing Aiming High for Disabled Children and the Programme Board overseeing Aiming High for Disabled Children.

ENDS

For more information on this release contact: Vivienne Nwabuzo, CDC Communications Officer. Telephone: 07811 222 794 Email: vnwabuzo@ncb.org.uk


Notes


1. The Council for Disabled Children (CDC) provides a national forum for the discussion and development of policy and practice issues related to services and support for disabled children and young people and those with special educational needs. CDC is based at the National Children's Bureau. For further information on CDC's work, please visit www.ncb.org.uk/cdc


2. Every Disabled Child Matters (EDCM) is a campaign by four organisations working with disabled children and their families: Contact a Family, Council for Disabled Children, Mencap and the Special Educational Consortium. It is a three-year campaign funded by a grant from the True Colours Trust, a Sainsbury's family trust. http://www.edcm.org.uk/


3. NCB's mission is to advance the well-being of all children and young people across every aspect of their lives.  As a membership and infrastructure support agency for the children's sector in England and Northern Ireland, NCB provides essential information on policy, research and best practice for our members and the members of our wide range of partnership bodies which operate under our charitable status and are based in our London headquarters. For further information visit www.ncb.org.uk