This item was published during the term of a previous administration that ended in April 2007
Listen
Mentoring service for lone parents
02/09/2003
A mentoring service that will encourage lone parents to
access education, training and employment was announced
today.
The Lone Parent Mentoring Service will provide
face-to-face advice and guidance for parents living in
Glasgow and a telephone support service for
others throughout Scotland.
The Executive is allocating £97,000 to the new service,
which will be run by One Parent Families Scotland and One
Plus.
Pollok and Glasgow North have been chosen as target
areas for the face to face mentoring service and Scottish
Borders and Aberdeenshire have been chosen as target areas
for the telephone mentoring service. While telephone
mentors will mainly be recruited in these areas, the
telephone support service will be open to lone parents
across Scotland.
Communities Minister Margaret Curran said:
"Helping lone parents to work and to access affordable
childcare are key parts of the Executive's commitment to
tackling child poverty. The aim of this new service is to
support lone parents making the transition into training,
education and employment.
"While the proportion of lone parents in employment has
risen by around 14 per cent since 1997, there are still far
too many families with children experiencing poverty
because parents can't find suitable childcare or can't get
relevant training.
"Parents also tell us that dealing with 'officials' is
very confusing due to the myriad of agencies offering
different services and support.
"We are setting up the Lone Parent Mentoring Service so
that parents can have easy access to someone who can offer
advice and help them move into training and eventually
employment. This is a practical new measure to help us
tackle child poverty and support lone parents whose
families are among the poorest in Scotland."
Speaking about the prospect of using the new service,
lone parent Kim Leonard, 21, from South Glasgow, said:
"I'm a bit scared, terrified, in fact but somewhere
inside me I'm looking forward to a fresh start. This will
give me the chance to look at my life and give me the boost
I need to look at who I am, what I want and what's
possible. I'm glad I have the opportunity of this support
and having a mentor is just great."
One Parent Families
Scotland (OPFS) and One Plus will launch a campaign in
the autumn to recruit mentoring workers and to promote the
new service to lone parents.
OPFS Deputy Director Ian Maxwell welcomed the chance to
try out telephone mentoring, commenting:
"This will provide a valuable new source of support for
lone parents in smaller communities throughout Scotland who
do not have support groups within easy reach."
John Findlay, Director of One Plus, said:
"This is an exciting project which complements other One
Plus activity through our new in-work mentoring programme.
It is an area which needs additional support to encourage
lone parents to consider a fresh start to enable them to
move into employment."
Scottish Borders and Aberdeenshire were chosen for this
service in a bid to reach lone parents in rural communities
who otherwise would not have access to this type of
support.
Glasgow North and Pollok were chosen because of the high
concentration of lone parents experiencing exclusion.
It is expected that the face to face service in Glasgow
will work with up to 50 parents. In addition mentors
themselves are expected to gain from the experience and
will receive support through a training programme. The
majority of mentors will themselves be lone parents.
The proportion of lone parents in employment has risen
from 42 per cent in 1997 to 56 per cent in 2002. There are
approximately 150,000 lone parent families in Scotland.
Other Executive initiatives specifically targeted at
lone parents include support for childcare for lone parents
attending further and higher education and £20 million from
2004-06 to ensure that childcare is not a barrier for
parents in the most disadvantaged areas returning to
education, training or employment.
OPFS has been working on behalf of lone parents and
their children since 1944. The national charity provides a
wide range of services including a national freephone
helpline supported by The Royal Bank of Scotland (tel. 0800
018 5026), free publications and training.
One Plus was set up in 1986 and works throughout west
and central Scotland. It is managed by an elected
committee, the majority of whom are lone parents. One Plus
works with various partners, within the social economy,
creating services, training and employment within local
communities to benefit one parent families.