Touchbase Care – Living Life on Your own terms

Touchbase Care is a community centre on Tontine Street that supports adults with disabilities and neurodiversity. All the members have access to workshops, events and outings that enable them to develop skills and live life on their own terms. Folkelife met CEO Richard Martin to find out more about what’s on offer.

“We are a well-being centre based in the Creative Quarter in Folkestone.  We offer lots of therapeutic activities to our members, and have massage therapists and other holistic therapy and low-level counselling on site.  Touchbase Care has an allotment, we do forest therapy, well-being activities, and then lots of things like art and craft, film and animation and so on.”

much more than a ‘day care centre’

“Then there’s the walks around our local area, there’s a group out at the moment visiting the Turner Gallery in Margate.  We organise a holiday, this year we’re going to Butlins. And we also offer life skills such as cooking, and qualifications to show empathy, online safety and things that transfer to people’s lives.

“People can self-refer, but we get a lot of our members via social services.  Some people are funded via the local authority, and that can be a fully-funded place, part-funded or somewhere in the middle.   We’re currently supporting 70 individuals a week, and it’s not easy for them to get funding, not as easy as it should be by any means. 

“Friday is our busiest day with 30 members attending, and on a Monday we might have 20.  It depends on who we have as to how much support from staff and volunteers we need, and sometimes the quieter days can be harder due to the needs of those we’re supporting.”

funding

“Funding is the age old question.  We never have enough for what we would like to be able to do, and although we get some from the local authority, the majority of our funds come from grants and applications we have made, and the community fundraising that we are very grateful for others doing. 

“For the past two years, the Folkestone Festive Tractor Run have raised funds for us, and this has been fantastic to receive.  Those funds are what we call ‘unrestricted’ so we can choose how we spend them.  A lot of grants nowadays will fund some things, but not others. For example, we can often struggle to pay staff costs, or heating bills for the centre, yet can find funds for tickets for a performance.  So these unrestricted funds mean we can pay our ‘core’ costs, and staff the events we want to run, in a heated building – which, believe me, makes life a lot easier!

“Currently, it costs nearly half a million pounds for us to be operational each year.  There are lots of hidden costs, such as the bins – they cost £100 a week, which adds up to a lot over the year.  But we love what we do, and to be able to reduce the cost of our projects for our members, is the most important thing.”

living and working together

“What we are passionate about is that ours is a real community here.  We have people from all walks of life, with different disabilities.  Quite often you will find services for people with specific conditions – Autism, or suchlike.  We don’t want that.  A real community is one where everyone lives and works together, so we want to break down those social barriers. 

“Why should you be confined to only being in a group with people like you? That’s not real life.  And so if we can start to break down those barriers, and encourage our members to challenge those boundaries too, then I think that makes for a better community all round.

“I think our community presence helps us too.  Not only did the Tractor Run raise funds for us, but Rachel Leigh Bakes fundraised over Christmas with donations from her cakes.  We’re part of the Kent Chamber of Commerce, and the Folkestone Rotary Club as a corporate member and that gets us out into the community to show what we do.  I was lucky enough to meet the King when he came to Deal and Walmer in 2025.  It was great to tell him about what we do, and be an advocate for our members.”

staff and volunteers

“We have 14 members of staff and a core team of volunteers, of around 12 to 13 people.  Some of those help with the allotment, some drive, they do a variety of things.  

“Being a volunteer with us is a commitment, and there’s an application process, and we ask for references.  We have to be sure that our volunteers are dedicated to helping us, which does put some people off.  It’s not a case of turning up for an hour when you have some free time, we need to build a schedule of activities around who we have, knowing that they’ll be here to support individuals, and the whole group. 

“We have a wide range of skills within our staff group.  A number are artists by trade; we started off as an arts group, and have diversified over the years. We have two qualified massage therapists, people with film and animation degrees, a ceramicist.  My background is in teaching, and we have those with health and social care qualifications, so it’s a real variety.  We’re passionate about building people’s careers too, so there’s training on offer if you work for us too. We also have a board of trustees who bring their own expertise too.”

the members

“I think of us as a well-being centre, and well-being is a term thrown around a lot.  I like to pose the question, what wouldn’t our members get if we weren’t here? That means we have to look at their lives, and see that if they weren’t here at Touchbase, they might not see anyone all day.  Covid was difficult for all of us, but I remember having a conversation with one of our members just after we opened up who said something along the lines of ‘I’m glad we all went into Lockdown, as now people understand what my life is like all the time.’  And that is quite heartbreaking.

“We take the ability to just pop out for granted.  The ability to just hop on a bus, or get a taxi, or use our mobile phones. A lot of our members struggle with technology, or might not have access to their own money to pop out to the shops if they’ve run out of something.  And what about if you’re a wheelchair user?  If you can’t transfer from your chair to a taxi, then you need to rely on the wheelchair taxis.  Now these are often used during the school run, so if you want to go out, you need to organise your life so you’re not going out around school drop-off or pick-up times.  And that’s not always possible.   Quite often, if those drivers have done the early school run, they might finish work at 4pm, so how are you to get out in the evening if you want to go somewhere?

“So being able to come here, have those social interactions with others, being able to have a variety of activities to entertain, it’s really important.  There are those that are autistic who need a regular pattern to their daily life, and if we can give that here, along with a massage, which is all part of the service, it’s important.  You can see it’s uplifting, being part of a community and having your voice heard boosts your self-esteem, your confidence, your motivation.  We see our members try new activities, maybe they’ve never cooked before, and you can see what a change that makes to them.”

living with disabilities

“Life can be so hard for some of our members, and there are a lot of barriers put in their way.  There is a demand to get disabled people back to work, but that’s not always possible.  Some might not know when it’s appropriate to say, or not to say something, and having someone in the workplace who can support them is not always practical.  

“I think if someone asked me to define Touchbase I would say we are a place where someone can come and be themselves, develop in a way that they see fit, and in a way that they can go out into wider society and be allowed to integrate into society.  Ideally, we wouldn’t need to be here, but I think that’s a long way off.  

“Touchbase is about the charity, and about its members. Our staff are here as facilitators, to support, but we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them.  Everything is led by our members, suggested by our members, and for our members.”