First we had Volunteer Week, then we had Carers Week, now we’re in Learning Disability Week AND Refugee Week.  All these ‘weeks’ present opportunities to promote the work of Carers Leeds and celebrate the contributions made by unpaid carers.

 We were pleased to hold two events in Volunteer Week to support our 65 volunteers who so generously give up their time to enrich our service.

Carers Week is a great opportunity to put carers on the map and we took every chance we could to promote our service and celebrate the role of carers.  We were on the TV and the radio, we were in supermarkets and on Briggate, we were in One Stop Shops, we were in the Yorkshire Evening Post, we were in Leeds City Market playing table tennis and chatting to shoppers.  We took 2 coaches of carers and people with care needs to Scarborough (don’t ask about the coach that broke down) .  Wherever you went, you could see someone in one of our new corporate blue T shirts.  It was exciting, fun and exhausting.  Huge thanks to our staff team who organised all these events.

As part of Learning Disability Week,  we took our information stands out to the Compton Centre, the Reginald Centre and Mencap to promote our work supporting carers of people with learning disabilities.  And we’re delighted to say it stayed dry for our stall at Picnic in the Park today.

We have also been privileged to be involved in a Networking Event organised by the fantastic project Pafras as part of a programme of activities for Refugee Week.  Many refugees and asylum seekers in Leeds are caring for another person, maybe because of mental or physical health issues related to their experiences before arriving in the UK.  We are always ready to work with these carers – Refugee Week is a chance for us to say ‘refugee and asylum seeker carers are welcome and encouraged to get information, advice and support from Carers Leeds’.

Helena Bladon, Development Manager, Carers Leeds