John Enjoys a Holiday Break at the Kingwood Caravan
20 July 2026
Autism at Kingwood are very proud to announce that our Head of Fundraising and Communications, Philippa Stannard, was awarded the Communications Guru Award at the inaugural Women Achieving Greatness in Social Care Awards (the WAGS) at the Hilton London Bankside on Wednesday 30th November.
Philippa’s award was largely in recognition of her amazing work on the #BetterPay4SocialCare campaign and for her tireless campaigning for financial recognition for care workers.
Philippa said she hopes the award will “raise awareness of the woeful underfunding of social care which means providers are unable to pay care workers what they deserve”.
The WAGS said of Philippa’s achievement:
“Launching the #BetterPay4SocialCare campaign in 2020, Philippa deployed exceptional communication strategies to ensure this campaign was a great success. Liaising with over 25 organisations, local and national Government, Philippa is more than deserving of the title ‘Communications Guru’ and others in the sector can learn much from her example.”
The Women Achieving Greatness in Social Care Awards (WAGS) aims to celebrate the achievements of women leaders in social care. The WAGS Awards is the gala event for the Women Achieving Greatness in Social Care (WAGS) initiative, a collaboration between Care Talk magazine and Kent Integrated Care Alliance (KICA), whose ‘purpose is to promote gender equity and promote and celebrate the incredible achievements of our female workforce.’ (https://www.thewags.co.uk/about-us/)
With over 85% of the Social Care workforce being female, it is essential to recognise the role that women play in the Social Care sector, which underpins the global economy as well as providing immediate support for over 1 million adults in the UK alone (https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/audio-video/key-facts-figures-adult-social-care data for 2019/2020). Without #BetterPay4SocialCare and other caring professions, we will not have pay equity.
Notes for Editors
About Philippa Stannard: Philippa has over 25 years of experience in Fundraising and Communications roles. She has been Head of Fundraising and Communications at Autism at Kingwood since January 2019. In 2020, Philippa launched the #BetterPay4SocialCare campaign calling for the real living wage for social care workers.
For more information, please contact abi.cowley@kingwood.org.uk
Useful links:
The WAGS Awards: https://www.thewags.co.uk/awards-categories/
The WAGs: https://www.thewags.co.uk/about-us/
We provide supported living and outreach support, helping and enabling autistic people to live in their own homes and make their own choices about the lives they want to lead.
Our relationship with the families of those we support is incredibly important to us and we work in partnership with families wherever possible.
All Autism at Kingwood support staff receive our Specialist Autism Training, making us leading care providers in Autism support.
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