- Area:
- South East England
- Programme:
- Awards for All England
- Release date:
- 2 10 2012
A dedicated counselling service specifically for victims of human trafficking will be delivered across Kent, following a grant of almost £10,000 from the Big Lottery Fund (BIG).
Dover Counselling Centre, which is one of 68 organisations across the South East region sharing a total of £542,275 in grants today, aims to improve the self-esteem, resilience and confidence of people who have been trafficked into the UK through its counselling service, and encourage access education and training opportunities.
Last month, the United Kingdom Human Trafficking Centre’s 2011 baseline assessment revealed the increasingly diverse reasons why people are being smuggled into the country. It concluded that 11 per cent of victims were trafficked for the purposes of domestic servitude, one per cent for organ harvesting, five per cent for multiple exploitation, 17 per cent for criminal exploitation, 11 per cent for labour exploitation and 31 per cent for sexual exploitation. Compiled by information submitted by police forces, the UK Border Agency, the Gangmasters Licensing Authority and other organisations, the report suggested more than 2,000 potential victims of human trafficking were identified last year in the UK.
Christine Atkin, Clinical Manager at Dover Counselling Centre, said: “The referrals we have had so far are quite varied - we have had quite young people aged 18 right up to middle-aged men and women and whole families. They are mostly Eastern European, particularly Polish.
“In a lot of circumstances it is about employment exploitation whereby they respond to an advert in their own country and they go through a contact, and quite often it is somebody they have heard of in their own town that has got a set up in Britain, and then they save their money and come to what they think is a career. And quite often they get here and it isn’t what they have been led to believe and that is where the exploitation takes place.”
Ms Atkin recently worked with a family where a woman was coerced into prostitution after beginning work as a cleaner. She said: “She was being exploited through employment but then it became sexual. What we have got are very anxious, stressed, traumatised people, and when they come to me and tell their story, they are reliving it. A lot of them are awaiting a decision as to whether or not to return. Some of them have no identification papers.
“This money will just be so invaluable. Quite often we work with interpreters, which of course places extra demands on the counsellors and on our service.”
Another of today’s awards is going to a Newbury-based charity called 14-21 Time to Talk which will run a 10-week course for families addressing child-to-parent abuse using their £9,550 grant. This will enable parents to regain their authority and provide an opportunity for children to reflect upon their attitudes and behaviours. The project will support young people, mostly teenagers, who are violent towards their parents, and often come from a home with a history of domestic abuse. Running separately but concurrently alongside the course for young people will be training sessions for parents exploring how their actions can affect their children’s behaviour.
The As You Are Centre Limited in Southwick, West Sussex, will use their funding of £10,000 to deliver therapy sessions for adults with a history of childhood physical abuse and neglect, and train volunteers to be able to deliver peer-led sessions in the future. This will reduce the isolation of clients and enable them to address issues such as shame and stigma in a supportive environment.
Havant Association for Women's Aid in Havant, Hampshire, will use their grant of almost £9,600 to deliver a range of workshops on the subject of domestic abuse targeted at young people in the area. This will provide interventions against domestic abuse, support and advice and reduce issues and isolation of the young people involved.
Also receiving funding today is:
- Global Generation Church in Thanet, Kent, will use its £10,000 grant to provide British sign language training to young people attending the youth group, enabling the inclusion of deaf teenagers in its social activities.
- Guildford County School in Guildford, which will spend its £8,680 grant to deliver weekly ICT sessions via sixth form students to local elderly people, enabling pensioners to learn more about computers and the internet and to improve their links with young people.
- Careers Development Group in Fareham, Hampshire, will recruit, train, and induct expert volunteers with specific professional or trade skills in order to share these with and support unemployed people back into work across the South East, using their grant of £6,119.
- The Rainbow Trust in Mole Valley, Surrey, will use their £9,780 funding to expand their volunteer base throughout the UK to provide family support for children with life threatening or terminal illness, such as through one-to-one support for families, drop-in centre facilities and transport for isolated families.
- The Myasthenia Gravis Association in Woking, Surrey, will use their £7,480 grant to distribute information to medical professionals including dentists, practitioners and opticians about the condition in order to enable quicker diagnosis. The disease is a disorder of the junction between the nerve and muscle and impairs the ability of the nerve to contract muscles.
- Moving on Group in Eastleigh, Hampshire, will use their grant of almost £3,000 to provide support and socialising opportunities for bereaved long-term carers through holding a fortnightly coffee morning and a range of social activities including trips and seasonal lunches.
- Winchester Youth Counselling in Hampshire will use their £8,520 to deliver surf therapy sessions to young people leaving the local authority care system or who are NEET and have mental health problems but do not want to take part in or respond to talking therapies.
Today’s funding comes from BIG’s popular small grants scheme, Awards for All, which offers grants of between £300 and £10,000.
See a list of todays grants
- 410KB
Sacha Rose-Smith, BIG’s Head of the South East region, said: “The Awards For All programme helps local communities and the lives of people most in need through social and environmental projects. It’s evident from the sheer range of awards across the region this month that projects vary enormously, from initiatives supporting individuals who have been trafficked into the country or suffered domestic abuse, to one which provides a social network for former long-term carers who are isolated following bereavement.”
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