About the role

Domestic Abuse Counsellor
Service: Family Action North Somerset Healing and Empowerment Domestic Abuse

Salary: £28,884 - £31,698 FTE per annum (£11,553.60 - £12,679.20 per annum for part-time, 14.8 hours per week)

Location: North Somerset; office base in Weston-super-Mare with travel across the area for delivery

Hours: 14.8 hrs (possibility of increased hours) to be worked across 2 or 3 days

Contract: Permanent

Family Action & the Role’s Impact:
At Family Action we support people through change, challenge or crisis. It’s what we’ve done for over 150 years. We protect children, support young people and adults and offer direct, practical help to families and communities.

We see first-hand the power of family to shape lives, for better or worse, so we speak up for the importance of family in national and local policymaking, amplify family voices and represent the changing needs of families in the UK today.

Are you a qualified counsellor or psychotherapist with experience of facilitating therapeutic groups? Family Action is seeking a counsellor who will provide inclusive, trauma-informed, time-limited counselling for young people aged 14 and over and adults, alongside developing and facilitating groups for adult survivors. This is an opportunity to help shape provision that responds to people’s experiences, needs and feedback.

Main Responsibilities:

• To provide inclusive counselling for a diverse range of young people (from 14 years) to adult survivors of domestic abuse in line with the commissioned timeframes and objectives.
• Plan, promote, deliver and evaluate psycho-educational pre-therapy groups, post-counselling support and drop-in activities for adult survivors.
• Undertake counselling and group assessments, assess suitability and need, and manage and review clinical risk and safeguarding concerns.
• Develop and deliver training for a small team of volunteer group facilitators and support their contribution to group provision.
• Maintain accurate, timely and confidential records, use outcome measures and gather service-user feedback to inform delivery and demonstrate impact.
• To have an active interest in working with those affected by domestic abuse, and recognise the impact that trauma has in relation to this.
• To ensure you understand and comply with Family Action’s procedures for promoting and safeguarding the welfare of children and vulnerable adults.
• To maintain confidential, up to date and accurate records of all sessions and plans, carefully considering the sensitive nature of the work, regarding statutory investigations and court proceedings.
• To liaise with referrers and other professionals and agencies as appropriate and where required, including signposting.
• To regularly review the group work programme and incorporate Family Action outcome monitoring tools and/or develop tools where necessary.
• To facilitate the contribution of client feedback, ensuring that with permissions lived experience of adult survivors of abuse is heard to inform the project.
• To attend in-house Family Action training and clinical supervision.

Main Requirements (for details check the job description and person specification):
• A professional counselling and/or psychotherapy qualification, with a minimum Level 5 counselling diploma and working towards Level 6.
• Registration with BACP, UKCP or another relevant professional body, and recognised professional accreditation or active progress towards it.
• Experience of counselling survivors of domestic abuse, trauma-informed practice and working with young people aged 14–25.
• Demonstrable experience of facilitating therapeutic groups and undertaking group assessments.
• Experience of working with diverse communities and an understanding of domestic abuse, interpersonal trauma, mental health and social exclusion.
• Strong assessment, clinical risk management and safeguarding skills, alongside sensitive handling of confidential information.
• Knowledge of the criminal justice system and relevant mental health and child protection frameworks.
• The ability to build professional relationships, organise your workload and work independently and collaboratively.
• Confidence using IT and case-recording systems to maintain accurate records.
• You will be client centred and committed to ensuring there is equality of access to the service and that service users are treated with dignity and that their specific needs are prioritised to improve their sense of wellbeing.
• You will have a strong track record in quality, performance, and safeguarding. With a client-facing approach, you will be passionate about engaging our service users in all aspects of our work including co-production.
• There will be 3 hours per month of paid clinical supervision plus line management supervision with the Clinical Service Manager.
• Appointments are subject to Family Action receiving a satisfactory disclosure from the Disclosure and Barring Service Enhanced DBS

Benefits:
- an annual paid leave entitlement that commences at 25 working days FTE, and after 1st April 2027, rises to 30 working days FTE plus bank holidays
- up to 6% matched-pension contributions
- enhanced paid sick leave and paid family leave provisions
- eye care and winter flu jabs vouchers
- cycle to work scheme
- investing in your professional development with ongoing quality training and career development opportunities

We are forward looking, ambitious and committed to continuous improvement. We are a people focused, can-do organisation, which strives for excellence in all we do and operates with mutual respect.

To Apply:
• Click the ‘Apply’ link below and fill out our digital application form
• Closing Date: Sunday 22nd November at 11:59pm

For any queries, or if you would like to discuss any aspect of the selection process or the potential for flexible working, please email: mariya.zlatinova@family-action.org.uk

All appointments with Family Action are subject to satisfactory Safer Recruitment checks.

Our commitment to Equality, Diversity & Inclusion:
We are happy to consider any reasonable adjustments that candidates may need during the recruitment process and you will be asked whether you require any adjustments if shortlisted for interview. We also make reasonable adjustments on the job, where required.
We are committed to Equality, Diversity & Inclusion in all that we do and welcome applications from all sections of the community. Intersectionality is important to us and we welcome applications from ethnically diverse communities, LGBTQIA+ candidates and disabled candidates. We are committed to increasing the representation of these groups at Family Action because we know that greater diversity will lead to even greater results for families and children and we strive for our workforce to be truly representative of the diverse communities we support.

All candidates with a disability are welcome to apply under the Disability Confident Scheme and request priority consideration for an interview, provided they meet the essential criteria for the role.

To help remove financial barriers to working with us, we will reimburse reasonable travel costs if you are invited to attend an interview in person.

*Ordinarily Family Action appoints new starters at the starting point of the salary scale (with subsequent annual pay progression), unless you have experience that would justify appointment further up the salary scale or there are any other exceptional reasons.