The Welsh Assembly Government's commitment to placing "users' views at the heart of policy and practice and every care package" is a valuable starting point for the introduction of personalisation in Wales ("Wales at odds with England over personal budgets", 19 June 2009). However, this falls well short of putting citizens in control of their support services, which is what Disability Wales' members tell us they want.

The fundamental issue is the right of disabled people to have choice and control over support provided by the state. Instead of remaining as passive recipients of "care" assessed, provided and managed by professionals, many disabled people now want access to supported self-assessment and control of their support budgets to enable them to make their own arrangements for practical assistance.

Disability Wales, as the national umbrella body for disabled people's organisations, is monitoring implementation of the personalisation agenda in both England and Scotland with great interest. The models of citizen directed support being introduced in England are more far reaching and empowering than the person centred approach currently being proposed for Wales. The 'mutual care approach' being developed in Scotland rightly emphasises the need for commissioners, providers, service users, carers and the wider community to work together to achieve whole system transformation.

Whilst we fully support the development of a Welsh model for personalisation to take account of the different cultural context in which we live and work, we maintain that the core principles of service user choice, control and empowerment must not be diluted. At the same time, we wish to see personalisation being taken forward within a wider framework that is rooted in community development and the Welsh tradition of mutuality to ensure that the inter-related issues of poverty and inequality are not neglected.

Our newly adopted Independent Living Strategy includes a number of actions which aim to ensure that genuine citizen directed support is made available to disabled people in Wales. This approach is entirely in line with the Welsh Assembly's own strategy for social services over the next decade, as set out in 'Fulfilled Lives, Supportive Communities'. This states that "The Welsh Assembly Government will work with stakeholders on supporting new models of service including... individualised budgets".

Rhian Davies

Chief Executive, Disability Wales