The Argo Trust was established in 1992 and founded upon the shared vision of the parents, families and friends of the residents. After more than 3 years of negotiation by one dedicated man, Peter McLuskie, building began in April 1995.

Here you will find interesting snippets from our archives about the history of Argo. Click on the images to read the articles at length. The articles will open in Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Through the eyes of the parents.

Argo was originally started by word of mouth – mainly parents who felt there were no future viable options for their profoundly disabled children.  Specifically parents wanted a permanent, safe, and stimulating environment their children could call home for the foreseeable future. More importantly it needed to be near where the families were living themselves – some of their children were in psychopaedic hospitals hundreds of miles away from their families. Inspiration for the name “Argo” was taken from Greek mythology – Jason & the Argonauts.  Our first resident was to be Jason, sadly he did not live to move into the home due to the length of time it took from inception to opening.  The home was regarded as the residents “golden fleece”. 

Argo Trust was formed in 1991, registered as a Charitable Trust with an official Trust Deed in 1992.  Parents struggled for the next 3-1/2 years to get the house designed, funded and built.  The parents were involved in all stages – negotiating with government departments, regional health authorities, community funding agencies, area health boards, community housing, the design stages, as well as painting, furnishing and landscaping the finished home. All this happened well as raising other children, working, and for some, caring for their disabled child at home.  Luckily there was youth, enthusiasm and basically no other options at our disposal then. 

The main frustrations we experienced during the initial stages  were that we felt the rules, regulations and requirements of potential funders seemed to shift on a regular basis.  The information and reports they required would be provided, only to find that the requirements had changed yet again.  It seemed at times an exercise in futility but with little alternative we continued – from meeting Cabinet ministers, writing letters to weekly phone calls to remind that we were still here and not going away! Many reports commissioned were sidelined.  At times we were caught between the Governments desire for deinstitutionalisation and their preference for those leaving the institutions to be moved into larger group homes run by bigger organisations.  A parent-based trust in those days was seen to be somewhat outside the square and thought unlikely to succeed as the parents would not have the knowledge to run a quality service. 

However the breakthrough came when the head of Community Housing gave us his personal commitment to make it work – which he followed through with and kept his word – renewing parents faith enormously.  Once we had the site and potentially a building, Government funding, plus support from the community and various charitable trusts helped get the project moving.  Parents and siblings of the residents have really not stopped smiling since the house commenced – in fact if it is possible their smiles become wider each year as every year seems to be better than the last.  To say it has exceeded our expectations would be an understatement.