Touchstone has been awarded a Time to Change grant to tackle mental health stigma and discrimination in black communities in Leeds. Time to Change is England’s mental health anti-stigma programme run by the charities Mind and Rethink Mental Illness and funded by the Department of Health and Comic Relief. The programme is distributing grants to local community-led projects as part of its drive to improve public attitudes
After the enormous success of our last post analysing the 2011 Leeds Census Arfan Hanif from the Community Development team has crunched yet more data to explain the ethnic makeup of each electoral ward in Leeds. This kind of information is really important for local services trying to work out who lives on their doorstep, so they can reach out and engage them effectively. As usual, you should feel
Touchstone are proud to announce their membership of the consortium chosen to manage Healthwatch Leeds, together with Health Together, Inclusion North, and Leeds Involving People. Healthwatch Leeds will be the local voice of people who use health and social care services in Leeds from 1st April 2013, and will build on the work of Leeds Link. Although the Healthwatch website isn’t quite ready yet, you can get regular updates
In late Summer 2013 we completed a Social Return on Investment exercise on the Kirklees Advocacy Service. We wanted to find out the wider effect the Advocacy Service has had on the people who use it, the people who refer to it and the wider community as a whole. Social Return on Investment exercises can sometimes seem a bit complicated, but essentially, they are an attempt to give a
Touchstone and PAFRAS collaborated on action research project last year, looking at the mental health needs and experiences of refugees and asylum seekers in Leeds. We are proud to publish the final report - which contains the findings and actions of the action learning sets, and priorities for action, based on analysis of lived experiences of refugees and asylum seekers in Leeds. The findings, conclusions and recommendations for action
This is the first annual report of the Kirklees Advocacy Service - Touchstone's first service designed and delivered on explicitly co-productive principles. In it you will see how we've attempted to model the core values of co-production through everything we do - and what we have achieved in collaboration with the people we work with. We believe that advocacy is much more than speaking up on behalf of others
Touchstone and the Together Women Project are pleased to announce that they have come together in partnership to deliver a new project for women with mental health problems. The Impact Project will reduce the use of custody for women who offend by providing courts with a credible package of measures enabling the use of community sentences for women with identified mental health needs. Over the next two years, we
The Census took place on 27 March 2011 with a response rate of 94%. The first released data was published on 11 December 2012 by the Office of National Statistics. The BME Community Development Team at Touchstone have published this brief analysis of local Census data related to ethnicity, religion and faith to help you make sense of the bigger picture. Please feel free to use this information wherever you wish. You don't need
Comments and quotes from Community Support Team Review Day 23rd October 2012-: Community Support Team Feedback: "My worker is a very nice person to be around and always goes the extra mile to support me" "CST helped me settle down and helped me meet new people" "CST helped me to get home" "I am quite new to the service but I have found the support to be invaluable so
Touchstone's Annual General Meeting will take place on the 7th of December 2012 at White Rose Banqueting Suite. Our Guest Speaker this year is Peter Tatchell. Please join us to celebrate 30 years of Touchstone. Please click on Touchstone AGM invite 2012 to find out more.