VOLUNTEERS: Help offenders to live a crime-free life

Pact, which offers a lifeline to people affected by imprisonment, is hunting for new volunteers to provide emotional support to those who have been jailed or their families caught in the middle.

The charity is looking for community support volunteers from across Sussex to join it and help offenders and ex-offenders through coaching, mentoring and befriending.

It’s all part of an effort to rehabilitate them back into the community, safely.

Duties could include accompanying offenders to appointments and meetings, meeting with prisoners in custody before release from jail and at the gate on day of release, where appropriate, as well as a range of other roles.

To find out more about any of the opportunities featured this week, contact Volunteer Now! by calling 01243 864220, emailing [email protected] or seeing www.vaac.org.uk

Other vacancies available in the Gazette area this week include:-

A fundraising assistant is needed to keep the West Sussex Parent Carer Forum’s balances in the black.

The group is for parents and carers of children and young adults, under the age of 25, with learning difficulties and disabilities.

The work involves helping to raise awareness of the charity at events up and down the county, as well as attempting to bolster its membership numbers and retaining its current band of volunteers.

The cause also supports parent carers in their communities and will provide them with a chance to shape their futures.

The fundraising assistant would be needed to help with funding applications, as well as community fundraising events and other fundraising-related jobs.

Helpers are needed to back Age UK West Sussex’s home from hospital services.

The scheme offers vulnerable adults and older people, living alone, help when they come out of hospital. The aim is to offer practical support to people as they settle back into their homes, and to develop a plan of action for them to continue living independently.

It also helps to re-establish each person back at home ensuring they are not isolated after their stay in hospital. A volunteer is matched to each person who would like a visitor for six weeks. During this time volunteers would help by escorting the person to GP and hospital appointments, doing a bit of shopping or simply having a chat over a cup of tea.