Leeds Young Carers Support Service
Identifying and supporting young carers and their families in Leeds
Young carers are children under the age of 18, who take on physical, practical, or emotional tasks at home because someone in their family has an illness, disability, alcohol or drugs problem, a learning difficulty or experiences mental ill health.
A young carer may do caring tasks such as cooking, cleaning, shopping, giving medication or just talking and helping when the cared for person is feeling sad.
Lots of children and young people want to help at home and feel proud that they support the person they care for. At the same time, however, the impact of these caring tasks may affect mental and physical wellbeing, cause difficulties at home, in school/college or elsewhere.
We provide specialist information, advice and support to young carers, their families and professionals.
Our aim is to ensure that no child or young person’s life is unnecessarily or inappropriately affected because they are providing care, and the cared for person has the right care and support in place.
How are young carers supported in Leeds
In Leeds we have a “No Wrong Door for Young Carers” Pathway which is a graduated response to how young carers and their families are supported.
This means that the first service to become aware that a child or young person may be providing care for a family member has the responsibility to explore this further and find out what the family feel they need.
A young carers brief assessment tool called “The day in the Life of….” has been developed to support professionals to better understand a child, young person and families situation. This will inform which service may be best placed to provide support in line with the “No Wrong Door for Young Carers” pathway.
The pathway recognises that existing universal and targeted services will often meet the needs of the family, however for those young carers who are undertaking inappropriate or excessive caring tasks, a referral to Leeds Young Carers should be made.
An early help approach is crucial and best practice is to complete “The day in the Life of…” brief assessment tool with all families where there is a parent with a health need and children under the aged of 18 living in the household. This will help ascertain as early on as possible if a child or young person is providing care, at what level, the impact this is having and inform services and the family what support could be offered.
There are 4 potential outcomes of the brief assessment:
- No care is being provided by the child or young person. Be mindful if there are any other adults in the household that could be providing care and may require support. Carers Leeds support adult unpaid carers.
- The child is providing a level of care but taking in to account age, capacity and impact, this is felt to be appropriate and no additional support is required.
You should regularly review this in order to respond effectively if anything changes.
- The child is providing a level of care however the child, young person and/or family requires some additional support. The additional support can be provided by existing services or by referring to further universal and/or targeted services.
- The child is providing inappropriate and/or excessive care. The child or young person should be referred to Leeds Young Carers Support Service and a full young carers needs assessment will be completed with the child/young person and family.
At any point Leeds Young Carers Support Service can be contacted for information and advice even if the outcome of the brief assessment tool does conclude a referral to our service is not required.
How our service can help
Information and Advice
We are here to provide information and advice to young carers, their families, and practitioners.
If you require any advice or support please complete the enquiry form and a member of the team will respond within 5 working days or alternatively you can ring or email us.
Awareness Raising
Our Community Engagement Practitioners deliver practice development and training opportunities to all children, family and adult services in Leeds.
The Practice Development Sessions will provide an opportunity to develop knowledge, increase confidence and improve the identification and support for young carers and their families.
We have a series of online practice development sessions that any practitioner can individually book on to. Please see TRAINING section to view upcoming dates
More dates are available for Leeds City Council staff on their PALs booking system.
Requests for a team or service specific practice development session can also be made. The community engagement practitioner will work with you to help identify training needs and develop a bespoke programme of support.
The We are Young Carer Friendly Leeds programme, is an offer to all settings in Leeds working with children and young people, aged 5-18.
Our Community Engagement Practitioners provide a bespoke package of information, resources and training, which enables settings to review their current young carer identification and support mechanisms, and establish a robust action plan to improve outcomes for children and young people. The programme was written with our LEAP participation group, and ensures among other things, that settings have a Designated Lead for Young Carers and staff are trained and skilled to be able to identify, support and appropriately refer Young Carers in Leeds.
If you are interested or want to learn more about any of these opportunities, complete the enquiry form and a member of the team will respond within 5 working days or alternatively you can ring or email us.
Specialist Support
If a child or young person is providing inappropriate or excessive care a referral for specialist support can be made to Leeds Young Carers Support Service.
Examples of inappropriate or excessive care may be:
- Supporting with personal care such as bathing, dressing and toileting
- Collecting and dispensing medication
- Managing finances
- Providing emotional support
A worker will be allocated to complete a young carers needs assessment with the whole family and agree goals that will help reduce the inappropriate or excessive caring tasks for the child or young person and improve quality of life for the family.
Examples of support provided may be:
- Work alongside health and adult care providers to support health and care needs.
- Provide advocacy for the family
- Support families to access financial advice and support
- Support improved communication with family members and professionals
- Work with schools to improve support for child or young person
- Support children and young people through transition periods.
Sibling young carers
Leeds Young Carers Support Service is not currently commissioned to provide direct support to sibling young carers and their families; however, we can be contacted for information and advice.
We can be contacted via our enquiry form and a member of the team will respond within 5 working days or alternatively you can ring or email us.
Information and services supporting sibling young carers and family:
Training
To support the implementation of the “No Wrong Door for Young Carers” pathway we have developed Practice Development sessions that are available to children, family, and adult services across all sectors in Leeds.
The Practice Development Sessions will provide an opportunity to develop knowledge, increase confidence and improve the identification and support for young carers and their families.
We have a series of online and in person practice development sessions that any practitioner can individually book on to. The dates for these are:
- Monday 4th December 2023, 9.30am to 12pm via MS Teams
- Wednesday 24th January 2024, 10am to 12.30 in person at Hollyshaw House, 2 Hollyshaw Lane, Leeds, LS15 7BD
- Wednesday 21st February 2024, 1.30pm to 3.30 in person at Hollyshaw House, 2 Hollyshaw Lane, Leeds, LS15 7BD
- Tuesday 19th March 2024, 10am to 12.30 in person at Hollyshaw House, 2 Hollyshaw Lane, Leeds, LS15 7BD
To book a place please complete the enquiry form
More dates are available for Leeds City Council staff on their PALs booking system.
Requests for a team or service specific practice development session can also be made. One of our Community Engagement Practitioners will work with you to help identify training needs and develop a bespoke programme of support.
If you are interested or want to learn more about this opportunity, complete the enquiry form and a member of the team will respond within 5 working days or alternatively you can ring or email us.
We Are Young Carer Friendly Leeds Programme
To support the implementation of the “No Wrong Door for Young Carers” pathway we have developed the We Are Young Carers Friendly Leeds (WAYCFL). The We are Young Carer Friendly Leeds programme, is an offer to all settings in Leeds working with children and young people, aged 5-18.
Our Community Engagement Practitioners provide a bespoke package of information, resources and training, which enables settings to review their current young carer identification and support mechanisms, and establish a robust action plan to improve outcomes for children and young people. The programme was written with our LEAP participation group, and ensures among other things, that settings have a Designated Lead for Young Carers and staff are trained and skilled to be able to identify, support and appropriately refer Young Carers in Leeds.
If you are interested or want to learn more about these opportunities, complete the enquiry form and a member of the team will respond within 5 working days or alternatively you can ring or email us.
How to refer
Please refer to the “No Wrong Door for Young Carer” pathway prior to referring. The “How young carers are supported in Leeds” section of our website also provides further information.
The “No Wrong Door for Young Carers” pathway recognises that existing universal and targeted services will often meet the needs of the family, however for those young carers who are undertaking inappropriate and/or excessive caring tasks, a referral to Leeds Young Carers should be made.
Please complete A Day in the Life of… brief assessment tool and the Understanding Me-My Family – PART 1 with the family and email them to us at [email protected].
Please note – If you have previously completed ‘Understanding me/my family Part 1’ with a family you do not need to complete another but are able to update the existing one with any relevant additional information. If you have completed a ‘Understanding me/my family Part 2’, with the families consent this can also be submitted with the Part 1 and the A day in the life of….
If you are a Children’s Social Work Practitioner, please complete A Day in the Life of… and with your completed child and family assessment email [email protected]. Children Social Work Services do not need to complete ‘Understanding me/my family Part 1’ if a completed child and family assessment can be shared with us.
Referrals are screened by managers and referrers notified of any decisions. In the instance a referral is not felt appropriate for our service we will endeavor to provide information and advice.
Service leaflets and resources
FA Leeds Young Carers Leaflet FAMILY
FA Leeds Young Carers Leaflet PROFESSIONAL
A Day in the Life of … tool to identify and support young carers – No Wrong Doors for Young Carers
Visit our Young Carers webpage to hear about the experiences of a young carer, and to find out about other Family Action Young Carers services.
Find out what a young carer is, ways a young carer can care for themselves, links to support available and more, over at MindMate.
Young Carers Support App Android
Contact Details
Find us
If you would like to find out more about our service or are interested in volunteering with us, please contact:
Leeds Young Carers Support Service
Hollyshaw House
2 Hollyshaw Lane
Leeds
LS15 7BD
Telephone: 0113 733 9126
E-mail: [email protected]
