About the Worker Support Centre

The Worker Support Centre (WSC) is a Scotland based charity that promotes decent work and prevents exploitation. We support marginalised and isolated workers in labour sectors where there is a high risk of abuse and exploitation. We work in partnership with workers to build power to secure and advance workplace rights. We prevent human trafficking for forced labour by acting to reduce the risks of worker exploitation. WSC values include: respect for human rights, representation, transparency, equality and innovation.

WSC support includes advice, mediation, advocacy and assisted reporting to enforcement agencies. Our worker engagement informs policy change activity to address harms faced by those in high-risk work. In 2023 and 2024 WSC activities were targeted at workers in seasonal agriculture on the UK Seasonal Worker visa (SWV). During this time, we provided advice, support, and information to 1031 people in relation to the SWV. WSC is now embarking on a new project to engage workers in health and social care to advance care workers’ rights through worker education and power sessions. To learn more about work, visit workersupportcentre.org.uk

About the role

This role is focussed on advancing care workers’ rights by supporting WSC’s peer engagement work including actively conducting outreach to workers and facilitating worker education and power sessions. In this role you will support WSC meet two of its four core objectives to work together with workers to claim spaces for power and representation in decision making; and to build the field of knowledge about workers and their experiences to influence policy. This role also includes handling a small caseload, providing health and social care workers with information, support and impartial advice with any issues that may arise during outreach or sessions. This role will work closely together with our Peer Engagement team and Outreach Caseworker.

WSC strives to achieve representation of individuals with lived experience of the issues on which we work at all levels of our organisation and actively promotes applications from individuals with experience of the issues on which we work. For this role we would especially welcome applications from individuals with experience of working in the health and social care sector.

NB A Basic Disclosure Check is required for this role.

We are offering an exciting opportunity for a new member of staff to join our team and be part of a ground-breaking approach to mental health services!

Thrive Edinburgh brings together a collaboration of partner organisations who work together to improve the mental health and wellbeing of people across the city, with the aim of supporting people to live well and fulfil their potential.

We are looking for an experienced Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioner to join our North-West Edinburgh Thrive Welcome Team, someone with at least two years of experience in delivering mental health support. This role is part of a multidisciplinary team, including Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioners, Peer Workers, Mental Health Nurses, Occupational Therapists and Social Workers. Together we deliver a multi-disciplinary approach, so people can access support when and how they need it.

You will support the delivery of regular Thrive Drop Ins in North-West Edinburgh. You will also deliver short-term individual support, improving people’s mental health and wellbeing, supporting self-management and community connections through the person-centred support you offer.

If you have experience of delivering mental health support and are interested in this opportunity, we’d love to hear from you!

Are you passionate about being part of a team who support individuals and families who have experienced baby loss across Scotland? With thanks to the continued support of the National Lottery who have funded our Hospital to Home Project in the Lothians since our Pilot and now for a further three years, we are looking to recruit a part time Hospital to Home Worker.

Hospital to Home is an opt out service which supports families to transition from the hospital setting to being back in the community. 6-8 sessions are offered, to support and guide families in the very early days of their loss, enhancing existing community services to provide long term peer bereavement support.

More information on the role, candidate essential and desirable criteria as well as the staff benefits offered can be found on the Job Description included below.

More about us:

Held in our Hearts is a small but mighty and growing Scottish charity providing baby loss counselling and peer support to families. We have over 40 years’ experience of offering compassionate bereavement care to individuals and families and working closely with a range of partners including the NHS, Scottish Government and the third sector.

Our values of empathy, connection and love underpin all that we do and guide us as we continue to grow and expand our services and reach. Our support services include counselling, one to one peer support, our innovative early intervention Hospital to Home service, group support and events.

In recent years, we have expanded our team and extended our geographical reach to bereaved families from Edinburgh and the Lothians to Fife, Forth Valley and the Highlands.

For more information about our charity, please feel free to visit our website at heldinourhearts.org.uk

Dementia Friendly East Lothian is committed to supporting people living with dementia and unpaid carers to have connected and meaningful lives; to exercise their rights, have choices and be respected and valued citizens.

What we do is determined by people living with dementia and unpaid carers with a focus on peer led support, dementia enabled communities and coming together as a community to share ideas and influence the things we care about. Our work led to the establishment of the Musselburgh Meeting Centre which we opened in April 2023. We are developing the Meeting Centre approach across East Lothian as part of the East Lothian Dementia Strategy. Musselburgh Meeting Centre is a ‘hub’ with an important role as a resource for practice and learning.

About the job:

The Development and Communications facilitator is a new post and will play an essential role in developing the Meeting Centre approach across East Lothian.

We are looking for a motivated person who supports our values and approach to join our small and enthusiastic team and to develop the Meeting Centre approach.

You will work in partnership with experts by experience, the Musselburgh Meeting Centre Team and community partners and services to support communities to develop the Meeting Centre approach, facilitate a vibrant and inclusive community of learning and practice. Communicating and connecting people, ideas and practice is a key part of the role in East Lothian and working closely with Meeting Centres Scotland to connect with Centres across Scotland.

You will:

• Work with the Meeting Centre Team to ensure Members and Friends are fully involved in co-producing our work, as leaders and experts by experience

• Work with communities to support local initiatives

• Organise and deliver DFEL Gatherings, workshops, social media, blogs and newsletters

• Support Musselburgh Meeting Centre events and comms, including community days and fund-raising events

• Provide information and analysis and support the evaluation strategy for DFEL to demonstrate our impact and value

• Share and draw on learning and practice from the Musselburgh Meeting Centre and Meeting Centres Scotland and UK

About you:

You will share our vision and have the enthusiasm and commitment to work with us to make our aspirations a reality. You will be a ‘people person’, with excellent communication skills working with diverse groups and face to face and using a range of media and channels. You will have experience of promoting opportunities for people and groups to share ideas, practice and learning. Ideally you will have experience of coproduction. You will be flexible, adaptable and enjoy being part of a team and working in a new and evolving area.

We positively welcome applications from people living with dementia and unpaid carers/supporters and people with a wide range of experience, relevant to the requirements of the job.

We would like you to draw on all your skills and experience, including those gained through self-management and living with dementia or another long-term condition, unpaid work, paid work, volunteering and your personal life. Ideally this experience is round dementia, but we know that there are many similarities with living with and supporting other long-term conditions.

There are no essential qualifications for the post, you must demonstrate you have the essential skills. Training is required for the successful applicant, and it is a condition of your probation that you develop the levels of competence required over your probation period. We will provide training, mentoring and support to the successful applicant and this can be undertaken paid and in work time.

About Dementia Friendly East Lothian CIC:

Dementia Friendly East Lothian is a social enterprise focused round changing lives and communities. Our approach is inspired and fueled by the power of people with lived experience to lead and influence decisions that matter to them and the important role of communities in helping people stay connected and manage living with dementia. Our work is led by people with dementia and care-partners.

As a community-led social enterprise, started by an unpaid carer, we work in ways that build personal and community capacity and assets. We believe we will go further together and that how we work is a measure of our success and value. Change happens when people coming together to talk, share and plan through community conversations, peer led support and Gatherings. You can read how we got here on our website: dfel.org.uk