Main area Prison mental health services Grade Band 3 Contract Permanent Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week (Monday - Friday - Office hours) Job ref 350-SC7387732
Site HMP Altcourse Town Liverpool Salary £24,937 - £26,598 Per annum Salary period Yearly Closing 25/08/2025 23:59
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Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust celebrates diversity and promotes equal opportunities; we are committed to challenging and eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination and advancing and promoting equality of opportunity in the provision of services and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect.
We take positive action to support disadvantaged groups and also particularly encourage applications from ethnically diverse, disabled and LGBTQIA+ people that are under-represented in our workforce. Furthermore we welcome applications from reservists and ex-armed forces personnel as we recognise the benefits of the values, skills, training and experience that they bring to their work with us. We encourage all applicants to share their equality information with us.
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Job overview
Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust is the health provider for the delivery of an Integrated Mental Health Team (IMHT) at HMP Altcourse. The service is designed to support the holistic mental health needs of our client group in partnership with our Physical Health providers and Sodexo colleagues.
HMP Altcourse is a Category B, male only, local prison, in the Liverpool area.
The service aims to provide individual and group-based interventions based on the holistic needs of the population. These interventions will be individualised and trauma informed, alongside comprehensive risk assessment and management.
Core aims of the service are to improve mental and psychological wellbeing via a range of interventions, build the development of independent core skills, reduce risk, and advocate for mental health within the wider prison system.
The post holder will be joining a dedicated team of clinical staff from a range of backgrounds and experience. Team members have high levels of skill, passion and enthusiasm (and humour!) and are committed to ensuring the on-going successful development of the service and the opportunities it provides for our population.
Main duties of the job
We are now recruiting an Occupational Therapy Assistant to join our team. The successful candidate will work under the direct supervision of a qualified Occupational Therapist, to help deliver group and individual based intervention based on the holistic needs of the client.
Occupational Therapists use activity as a therapeutic tool to enhance engagement in meaningful and purposeful activity, develop skills and improve health and well-being.
The post holder should have an interest in working with people whom have mental health related needs, and complex clinical and risk presentations within a prison setting.
Within the IMHT, we prioritise the development of our staff team and have proven that we value and nurture diverse clinical interests. We are committed to creating an empowered staff team. We strive to be reflective and support of each other which is vital given the challenges this work can entail.
Working for our organisation
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.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Please refer to the job description and person specification for full details of the main responsibilities.
Person specification
Qualifications
* Good standard of education.
* Willingness to work towards NVQ level 3.
* NVQ level 3 or equivalent / higher qualification relevant to post.
Knowledge and Experience
* Experience of working in a care setting / equivalent.
* Experience of working individuals with Mental Health needs.
Values
* Accountability
* Responsive to service users
* Engaging leadership style
* Transparency and honesty
* Discreet
Skills
* Able to communicate effectively.
* Ability to work as a member of a team.
* Knowledge of the value of therapeutic activities.
* Ability to utilise positive empathy.
* Ability to work on own initiative under the supervision of a qualified therapist.
* Professional attitude.
* Good interpersonal skills.
* When fully competent knowledge and skills equate to level 3 NVQ
* Good understanding of issues of confidentiality.
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Please ensure you check the email account from which you apply for all correspondence. All information regarding your application will come from apps.trac.jobs not NHS Jobs.
Only those applicants who demonstrate clearly how they meet our person specification will be shortlisted for interview.
As a Disability Confident Employer, we offer a guaranteed interview scheme for applicants who consider themselves to be disabled who meet the minimum (essential) criteria for the role in the person specification. If you would like your application to be considered under the Trust’s guaranteed interview scheme you can indicate this in the personal information section of your online application form.
Should you require a reasonable adjustment to our recruitment process please email recruitment@merseycare.nhs.uk to ensure that measures can be put in place to support you.
We reserve the right to close any vacancies from further applications when we have received a minimum number of applications from which to make a shortlist. Please ensure you apply without delay if you wish to be considered for this role.
The Trust expects all post holders who require an enhanced DBS for their role subscribe to the DBS Update Service. You will be required to enrol for this service for a fee of £16 per year and maintain registration. Trans applicants who require a DBS check and do not want to reveal details of their previous identity can contact the DBS Sensitive Applications Team (01516761452 or email sensitive@dbs.gsi.gov.uk ) with their application number once they have completed their DBS application form. The team can prevent any previous identity showing on the DBS Certificate, unless the applicant has a conviction under their previous details in which case this will need to be disclosed.
Applicants requiring sponsorship may wish to determine the likelihood of obtaining sponsorship for this position by assessing themselves against the criteria on the gov.uk website - https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Please be advised that the use of Artificial Intelligence on applications is monitored and if you choose to use this, you must declare this on your application form.
Please note: new entrants to the NHS will commence on the first pay point of the relevant band.
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Employer certification / accreditation badges
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
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