A powerful new art exhibition is currently taking place at St Peter’s Church in Harrogate, running until Saturday 7 November, to raise awareness of a national campaign demanding crucial changes to the law surrounding vulnerable adults.
Titled ‘From All Walks of Life’, the mixed-media exhibition features more than 100 artworks created by local artists and community groups, including the Hub at Autism Plus in Knaresborough. The pieces focus heavily on the imagery of shoes - utilising paint, fabric, paper, and mosaic - to symbolise people moving forward together through a shared experience. The display serves to highlight the devastating reality that hate crime, mate crime and exploitation can affect vulnerable people from any background.
The art project is designed to draw public attention to the campaign for Christopher’s Law, started by Fiona Laskaris following the murder of her autistic son, Christopher in 2016. Christopher was exploited and killed in his own home after local services assumed he had the capacity to make decisions, despite a documented history of abuse and his family repeatedly raising safeguarding concerns. The campaign is calling for a Vulnerable Adults Bill and vital reforms to mental capacity assessments to ensure authorities step in when someone is at risk.
Fiona Laskaris said: “There is an urgent need to create a legal duty to assess mental capacity whenever credible doubts are raised, particularly for decisions that could leave a vulnerable person at risk of serious harm. Too often, capacity is judged simply by responses given during a brief interview, rather than being properly evaluated against a person’s relevant history and concrete evidence. When a vulnerable person begins declining a needs assessment, disengaging from support services, or refusing consent to share relevant information, mental capacity must be properly assessed. Concerned families need to be listened to and taken seriously, not blocked out. Disabled people’s deaths must be properly scrutinised to learn from failings, rather than being brushed under the carpet.”
The campaign also highlights the urgent need for a follow-up to the Vulnerable Adults Project to provide clarity around how and when authorities should intervene in cases of grooming and mate crime. A central focus of the proposed reforms is ensuring that care and contact are handled appropriately, with an emphasis on helping vulnerable individuals make genuinely informed decisions they understand, providing them with the necessary time and support to do so.
Visitors are encouraged to drop in, view the artwork and learn more about the campaign for Christopher’s Law. The exhibition at St Peter’s Church on Cambridge Road is open daily from 10am to 3.30pm, with an early closure at 1pm on Friday, before concluding this Saturday.
