Our story

In 2004, a group of women with learning disabilities in Newcastle upon Tyne called The Wrong Audreys had many questions about love and life that few carers or relatives were prepared to answer. These included: “Where do babies come from?”, “What actually happens when you have sex?” and “How do you get a boyfriend?”.

With support, these women used a range of drama and theatre activities to create our first Josephine. The success of the work led in 2011 to the development of our male character, Jack, as part of Them Wifies, an organisation, our forerunner, which used creativity and the arts to help disadvantaged women to lead happier, healthier and more positive lives. Following the  closure of Them Wifies in 2015, The Josephine and Jack Project was established as an independent charity and community interest organisation the following year. The staff and volunteers remained, allowing us to benefit from their experience and learning while working with Josephine and Jack. The Josephine and Jack Project is run by Chief Executive Simon James, who is assisted by Administrator and Projects Officer Rachel, a board of four experienced trustees, and eight sessional course leaders.  

Since launching as an independent charity in September 2016, we have directly supported more than 700 individuals on in excess of 60 courses and have granted four organisations a license to use their own Josephine and Jack figures across the UK. Another is already in the pipeline, and this helps provide us with a sustainable revenue stream, enabling Josephine and Jack, who are trademarked to the charity and designed and made in the UK, to reach hundreds more people with learning disabilities each year.

Josephine and Jack have featured in the Channel 4 documentary Supported Loving, about the rights of people with learning disabilities to have full loving relationships if they wish.

We were also voted Community Organisation of the Year (Disability) in the 2019 National Diversity Awards and were highly commended in the Small Charity of the Year category in the North East Charity Awards 2019.