This year, People’s Voice Media turns 30. That means that for 30 years, we have worked alongside communities to create spaces where people can tell their own stories, share knowledge, and influence change. To celebrate our birthday, we are calling people together for a week of conversation, learning and community – Stories for Change. Find out more below or book your sessions now.

We’re getting rid of conference lanyards and dry sandwich buffets this year – this is a conference you can join from the comfort of your sofa. All sessions will take place on Zoom, and will be interactive, conversational spaces with a focus on building knowledge and practice as a community of people who care about lived experience storytelling.

What will the conversations be about?

We’ve spent a lot of time over the past 30 years championing the value of lived experience stories and trying to get people in power to recognize the expertise held by people who have first-hand knowledge to share. It does feel like the rest of the world is finally catching on. However, at the same time, the culture in which stories are created and heard has transformed. Speaking about your lived experience now means engaging with a structure of digital platforms owned and controlled by billionaires, algorithmic gatekeeping, AI deepfakes, a media landscape hostile to issues of social justice, and shifting questions about who gets to speak and be believed. We are now in an age where anyone can publish their story online, yet whose voice gets heard, believed, and acted on still depends on old and unequal rules. Technology has given communities new ways of organising and connecting, but inequalities around access, power, representation, and whose stories are trusted, remain. The Zoom conversations we have across the week will centre around this question:

Who holds the power around these stories, and how do we make sure they are seen as real evidence, knowledge, and insight?

How will the week work?

We will be hosting five guided sessions across the week, taking place on Zoom from 1pm – 2:30pm each weekday. Each day builds on the learning and questions from the previous one, but all sessions will make sense as standalone events, so you can attend as many or as few as you like.

Here’s the schedule for the week:

Day 1: Monday – The Storytelling Landscape Now, 1-2:30pm

What does it mean to tell lived experience stories in the current moment? Join us for the opening provocation of our week of conversation and learning. In this 90 minute online session, we will confront the storytelling landscape as it actually is: digital access and exclusion, the rise of fake news, disinformation, AI-generated content and a public conversation pulled apart by polarisation. To set the scene for our learning this week, we name the conditions everyone telling a story now has to work within.

Day 2: Tuesday – From Problem to Possibility (A Calling-In), 1-2:30pm

How do we build community around lived experience storytelling in the face of current challenges? This is a 90-minute online reflective practice session about our collective role as guardians of stories. Where Day 1 names the problem, Day 2 turns towards the solutions. This is a calling-in space for building a movement that protects and champions lived experience storytelling, and for asking what the community needs to do to advance storytelling in the face of everything named the day before.

Day 3: Wednesday – Showcase: How Community Reporting Makes the Difference, 1-2:30pm

What can we learn from recent projects employing lived experience storytelling? A showcase of real examples of how People’s Voice Media and partners’ work happens. In this session we’ll explore the difference Community Reporting can make through three case studies of lived experience storytelling in practice.

Day 4: Thursday – Mobilising Knowledge, 1-2:30pm

How does learning from lived experience stories get transformed into real-world change? This session explores what happens once the data is gathered – how does community knowledge connect to research, policy, commissioning, services and campaigning – and what are the blockers to success in this area?

Day 5: Friday – Celebration and Community Commitments, 1-2:30pm

A birthday bash with a difference. We’d love you to join us at the end of our week of learning and conversation in a special Friday session to celebrate 30 years of People’s Voice Media. This is a collection of human stories – voices from People’s Voice Media’s history, Community Reporters, partners and the grassroots. We will also share insights and findings from the Gobby Community Reporter survey and what we’ve learnt across the week. We will close by agreeing commitments that the community will carry forward together.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I have to attend every session? No, just book on to the ones you are interested in or able to attend. Although the sessions are designed to “speak” to each other across the week, the content, learning and discussions should also stand alone.

Can I attend all the sessions? Yes, absolutely, we’d love to have you join us for the full week. Just make sure you register for each session separately.

How do I book? You can choose your sessions and book via the events page on the Community Reporter website.

Do I have to pay to sign up? No, all sessions are completely free to attend.

I have access needs, how will you make it so I can join in the sessions? Drop us an email enquries@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk and let us know how we can make it easier for you to participate in the session. You don’t need to have a diagnosed disability to do this – just an idea of what we can do to support you or an access problem that we can try to solve. We will also send out a communication nearer the event to ask people about specific adaptations.

Can you cover personal assistant costs or other attendance costs? We have some budget put aside to support people who would otherwise not be able to join in the sessions – please get in touch with enquiries@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk to discuss this.

Why is the conference online? We know that sometimes people who would like to attend our annual conference face barriers because of travel, accessibility, cost, caring responsibilities, geography and people’s different circumstances. Moving online for this year gives us a chance to experiment with a way of meeting up that removes some of those barriers. However, we know that online does not automatically mean accessible. Running an event digitally can also exclude some people or present difficulties, and we are trying to work with everyone attending to make sure we put in place as many things as we can to open up participation and adapt things to suit as many people’s needs as possible. If you have an idea for anything that would support towards this aim – please do let us know by emailing enquiries@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk.

What will happen after the event? We don’t want these conversations to end there. We’ll be taking the learning into the year ahead, and using it to inform our planning, combined with the things we find out from the Gobby survey that is running alongside the event.

What topics will be discussed and how are you looking after people’s psychological safety?
Some of the conversations during the week will explore sensitive and personal issues around social justice, lived experience, power, and inequality. Where we think there are potential triggers, the facilitators will give notice about this before and during the session. All sessions will be run according to our anti-racist principles and guidelines for communication. We will share details of relevant support organisations during each session, and encourage people to participate in ways that feel right for them.

How can I contribute to the discussions? We want to make sure that everyone can contribute in a way that feels comfortable for them. This might be – through talking in a large group, contributing in a breakout room, writing your thoughts in the chat, using tools such as Flinga or Mentimeter. If we use any additional online tools, we’ll always do a demo first to show people how to use them, and if you’re struggling, please do ask the team for help!

Who will be facilitating the sessions? The sessions will be facilitated by members of the People’s Voice Media team, alongside co-producers from the Community Reporter Network. Some workshops will also have special guests from our projects or from other organisations connected to our work.

I have another question not covered here. If you’ve got a question – there’s a good chance other people have too! Please email us enquiries@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk or leave a comment below and we’ll get you the answers, and update this guide too.

The Department for Work and Pensions is reviewing Personal Independence Payment (PIP) – a benefit that shapes the daily lives of millions of disabled people across the UK. Decisions made in this review will affect how people can pay their bills, access support, move around their communities, and live with dignity. That is why we are bringing people together for a roundtable discussion, and why the voices in the room matter so much. People’s Voice Media’s Head of Partnerships and Practice, Isaac Samuels, tells us why it’s vital that we create this space.

Lived Experience Roundtable on PIP

What is it?

On 5^th May 2026 at 6pm, People’s Voice Media are hosting a 90-minute online roundtable on PIP, as a space for people to share their stories, insights, and reflections. This will help shape a response to the current Personal Independence Payment (PIP) Review led by the Department for Work and Pensions.

This session is part of the wider national Call for Evidence, and it’s really important that the voices of people who live with the realities of PIP are centred, heard, and valued.

About the space

At People’s Voice Media, storytelling is at the heart of how we create change. This space will be grounded in that, offering a supportive environment to share real experiences of PIP, including:

• What’s working and what isn’t
• Experiences of applying, assessments, and decisions
• Where the system feels unfair or inconsistent
• How experiences differ across communities and intersecting identities
• What a more human, fair, and dignified system could look like

Why We’re Holding This Space

Reviews of this scale are too often shaped by data points, policy papers, and assumptions about what disabled people need – rather than real experiences of navigating the system. We wanted to create a space where that balance is corrected. We want people who have actually applied for PIP, been assessed for PIP, appealed decisions, waited anxiously for letters, and built their lives around this support to be able to speak honestly and be heard.

The roundtable is a focused conversation around two simple but powerful questions: What is working well? What is not working so well? From small practical improvements to bigger structural concerns, every contribution helps build a clearer, more truthful picture of how PIP is functioning today.

The insights, stories, and recommendations that come out of the discussion will be carefully captured and turned into a collective lived experience response to the government’s PIP review. We will also share key themes back with participants, partner organisations, and decision-makers who can act on them.

What PIP Enables Me to Do

I want to speak honestly for a moment, because this isn’t just a policy conversation for me – it’s my life. As a disabled person living with mental health conditions, PIP is not a luxury or an extra. It is one of the quiet, essential things that makes a decent life possible. Without it, the gap between simply surviving and actually living becomes very wide.

On a practical level, PIP helps me cover the real costs of being disabled – costs that people outside this experience often don’t see. It helps me pay for taxis on days when public transport is too overwhelming, or when leaving the house at all takes everything I’ve got. It helps me keep my home warm when my body and mind need stability. It helps me buy the food that supports my medication and my energy levels. It helps me pay for the little things – noise-cancelling headphones, a weighted blanket, the right kind of lighting – that make the difference between a manageable day and a day lost to sensory overload or a mental health dip.

But the impact goes far beyond receipts and bills. PIP gives me the breathing room to look after my mental health. It means I can attend my therapy appointments without having to choose between them and my electricity bill. It means I can say no to situations that would push me into crisis, because I am not financially forced to say yes. It means I can rest when I need to rest, instead of pushing my body and mind past the point of collapse and ending up worse off.

PIP also enables me to contribute. That part matters to me. Because I have this support, I can do the work I do: advocacy, storytelling, showing up for my community. I can hold down relationships. I can be a good friend, a present family member, a reliable colleague on the days I’m well. People often frame disability benefits as something that holds people back. For me, the truth is the opposite: PIP is what makes participation possible. It is the scaffolding that lets me show up in the world.

Living with a mental health condition alongside a disability means my needs shift. Some weeks I manage well. Other weeks, everything is harder. PIP gives me the stability to weather those shifts without falling off a cliff. It gives me dignity on my hardest days and independence on my best days. It means I don’t have to justify my existence every time my symptoms flare up.

This is the reality I want the review to understand. PIP isn’t just a payment – it is access. It is safety. It is the difference between being pushed to the edges of society and being able to take my place within it. When PIP works, it works quietly in the background, enabling people like me to build a better life. When it doesn’t, the consequences are serious – not just financially, but physically, emotionally, and psychologically.

That is why my voice, and the voices of others like me, need to be in this review.

Why Lived Experience Voices Are So Important

Lived experience is expertise. No one understands the impact of a policy better than the people who live with its consequences every day. When disabled people are at the centre of conversations about disability benefits, policy becomes sharper, fairer, and more effective. Decisions made without that expertise tend to miss the mark, creating systems that are harder to navigate, more stressful to engage with, and less responsive to real need.

Centering lived experience is also a matter of principle. “Nothing about us without us” should be the minimum standard. If the government is serious about improving PIP, then the people who rely on it must be genuinely heard, not just consulted as an afterthought.

What to Expect

The space will be rooted in lived experience storytelling, and offer different ways to contribute. Your insights will directly inform a collective lived experience response to the review.

Date: Tuesday 5 May

Time: 6:00pm – 7:30pm

Location: Online (joining link will be sent once you confirm your place)

How to join: Please email isaac@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk with any questions, or to confirm you’d like to attend, and we’ll send over the joining link and any final details.

If you have any access needs or would prefer to contribute in a different way, please just let us know. We’ll make sure the space works for you.

We are grateful to everyone who is showing up to share their story. Your voice will shape what we take to government – and that is exactly how it should be.