Pan-Wales Skills for Living scheme launches at North Wales conference

A new and exciting support service for care leavers funded by Welsh Government through the Sustainable Social Services Grant, Skills for Living, has officially launched at an Action for Children conference on the impact of Adverse Childhood Experience (ACEs) in North Wales on Wednesday 6th April.

The service is a partnership between Action for Children and Llamau and is modelled on the flagship skills for living programme delivered by Action for Children’s Multi-disciplinary Intervention Service (MIST) project in Torfaen.

Amanda Edwards, Action for Children’s Skills for Living practice team leader, said: ‘I’m delighted we’ve launched at such a key conference for children and young people. Skills for Living is a psychosocial skills building intervention for young people leaving care aged between 16 and 24. We provide a therapeutic intervention based on Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) to improve the emotional and social well-being of young people as they negotiate the challenging issues when leaving care.

‘The service is for young people who experience significant distress and relationship difficulties, who struggle to maintain consistency and who may not be fulfilling their potential. Llamau focus on employability and together we will be working to give young people the practical and life skills to enable them to transition into happy, healthy adults.’

The conference at the Kinmel Manor Hotel in Abergele highlighted the effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in light of recent Public Health Wales (PHW) studies. PHW research showed the long term impact of bad experiences in a child’s crucial early years can mean more chronic illness and more pressure on frontline services further down the line.

For further information on Skills for Living, please contact Amanda Edwards on 01978 264040 or S4Lnorthandmid@actionforchildren.org.uk

For further media information please contact Alastair Love, media officer at Action for Children, on 02920 347068 / 07718 244 297 / alastair.love@actionforchildren.org.uk

Out–of–hours enquiries should be directed to the duty press officer on 07802 806679/ media.team@actionforchildren.org.uk

How Action for Children works: from before they are born until they are into their twenties, we help disadvantaged children across the UK. We help them through fostering or adoption – and by intervening early to stop neglect and abuse. We make life better for disabled children. We influence policy and advocate for change. Our 7,000 staff and volunteers operate over 600 services, improving the lives of 390,000 children, teenagers, parents and carers every year. We succeed by doing what’s right, doing what’s needed, and doing what works for children.