Criminal Justice Liaison & Diversion Support Practitioner

We are looking for an experienced support practitioner to join our Liaison and Diversion Team.

Liaison and Diversion is a process of supporting people coming through the criminal justice system. The main things that L&D services do for the people they see are identification, screening, assessment and referral to other services.

Identification:Criminal justice agencies working at the Police and Courts stages of the pathway are trained to recognise possible signs of vulnerability in people when they first meet them. They then alert their local L&D service about the person.

Screening:Once someone is identified as having a potential vulnerability, the L&D practitioner can go through screening questions to identify the need, level of risk and urgency presented.

Assessment:Using a trauma-informed approach and approved screening and assessment tools an L&D practitioner will undertake a more detailed assessment of the person's vulnerability.

Referral:The L&D practitioner may refer someone to appropriate mainstream health and social care services or other relevant interventions and support services that can help.

This post is subject to Police Vetting and an enhanced with children's and adult's barred list Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Check and full NPPV Level 2 Police Vetting.

Main duties of the job

Liaison and Diversion is an integral part of the 24/7 Urgent Care Model.

The 24/7 Urgent Care Model forms the urgent care pathway within Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust.

The 24/7 Urgent Care hub provides mental health assessment, intensive community interventions, advice, support and guidance twenty four hours, seven days a week across several access points for individuals presenting in crisis.

This service has brought all urgent care teams together to create one central hub and thus diverts service users away from blue light services and affords them the right access to the right care at the right time in the most appropriate environment.

This includes 24/7 self-referral access to a mental health assessment by a mental health professional via a telephone line which reduces long waiting times in AED and contact with other emergency services. The components which are part of the 24/7 Urgent Care Model include Mental Health Liaison, Criminal Justice Liaison Teams, Street Triage Cars, 24/7 Urgent Care Hub, Clinical Decision Units and Crisis Resolution Home Treatment Teams.

Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.

We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.

At the heart of all we do is our commitment to 'perfect care' - care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We're currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.