Together we are committing to:
- Provide financial support for any of our colleagues who house refugees through the Government’s ‘Homes for Ukraine’ scheme.
- Host dedicated, drop-in online support for colleagues who are housing refugees.
- Explore the use of Everyturn Mental Health residential properties (and partner properties) to house refugees.
- Create a dedicated landing page on our websites, with information in Ukrainian on how to access services.
- Where clinically appropriate, prioritising/fast-tracking refugees into treatment.
- Ready our employment advisor services to work with refugees who are eligible to work on arrival, to get meaningful employment.
- Use Everyturn Mental Health’s Community Development Workers to link into local communities, to create support networks for Ukrainian refugees.
- Create a virtual trauma therapy group across our services for refugees to access.
- Increase our translator resource internally, so we can respond rapidly to increased demand.
- Fundraise across the organisation.
Our Directors of Operations are working closely with our local teams, commissioners, and partners to mobilise our services to provide this support. We will publish further details as our plans develop.
Adam Crampsie, our Chief Executive, said:
“We have all been affected by the devastating pictures coming from Ukraine over the past two weeks, and we are fortunate to be in a position to help those that need it. I am working closely with my own team, and other mental health service providers across the UK, to get measures in place so we can provide relevant and important support to anyone affected by the war.
“We have seen a lot of broad promises by the Government of fiscal support to local authorities and hosts of these refugees, but money needs to be spent wisely. We are keen to work with relevant organisations so we can pool our resources and make sure that systems are set up as quickly as possible for anyone who needs mental health support during this incredibly hard time.”
Providing this support is entirely in line with our organisational goals of integration, reach, outcomes, and social value.
We’re proud that being a charity enables us to be agile, flexible, and responsive to changing situations, allowing us to provide this critically-needed support.