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Criminal Justice Peer Support Worker
Northamptonshire Healthcare Foundation Trust View all jobs
Posted 3 day(s) ago
Reference: 270-TH349-MH-A
Job summary
Do you have personal experience of mental distress, health or social vulnerability, and involvement with the Criminal Justice System? Have you achieved stability in your recovery and want to use your experience to support others?
Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust is expanding its Peer Support Service within the RECONNECT team. This role will involve supporting individuals accessing both RECONNECT and Liaison & Diversion services, helping them improve health outcomes, engage with services, and work towards recovery goals.
Using your lived experience, you will build trusting relationships, offer encouragement and practical support, promote hope and recovery, and help individuals navigate health, social care, housing, and community services.
The successful candidate will have lived experience of mental health challenges or vulnerability, alongside personal experience of being remanded or sentenced within a custodial setting and have demonstrated a sustained period of stability within the community.
You will work collaboratively with multidisciplinary teams and partner agencies, promoting person-centred, recovery-focused support while maintaining professional boundaries and accurate records.
Please note: Applicants must clearly demonstrate both aspects of lived experience within their application. Appointment is subject to DBS checks and applicants must not be on the adult or child barred lists.
Main duties of the job
Support service users directly including one to one or in small groups.
Support service users with their integration into the community.
Initiate, establish and maintain relationships with service users in a variety of settings (including, homes, NHFT sites and in the community)
Share and discuss common experiences with service users in an appropriate manner.
Work under the direction and leadership of registered professionals, undertaking duties using a recovery focus
Support people with their emotional, personal, and physical needs.
Develop a trusting and mutually beneficial rapport with service users
Act as a coach and mentor to service users by providing information about support and services available to them within NHFT and the local community.
Develop links across other organisations that support service users.
About us
NHFT is an NHS Community and Mental Health Foundation Trust, providing physical, mental health and specialty services in hospital settings and in the community. We provide over 200 services across the county - as well as some specialist services in bordering and nearby counties. We work together with our partners to ensure that everyone who comes through our doors receives compassionate, person-centred care, regardless of their background or circumstances.
NHFT promotes a culture of learning, to improve the care and safety of our patients and colleagues. We have achieved our 'outstanding' rating by encouraging opportunity, innovation, development and growth across our workforce.
At NHFT we believe that work should be rewarded in every sense which is why we are proud to an accredited living wage employer.
We aim to support financial wellbeing and create an environment where are people feel valued and able to thrive.
Details
Date posted
30 September 2026
Pay scheme
Agenda for change
Band
Band 3
Salary
£25,760 to £27,476 a year pa pro rata
Contract
Permanent
Working pattern
Full-time, Part-time
Reference number
270-TH349-MH-A
Job locations
Campbell House
Campbell Square
Northampton
NN1 3EB
United Kingdom
Job description
Job responsibilities
It is recognized that people in prison are vulnerable and experience avoidable differences in health and wellbeing. Support to engage with health services can provide an opportunity to connect with people who have not previously accessed routine health services to thereby improve health outcomes following release.
Leaving prison is a time of change when provision of health services necessarily transfers from one team to another, increasing the risk that any benefits achieved improving health outcomes within prison may be disrupted. It may also be a time when health needs are increased, for example the stress of living in the community after a period of being in prison may produce mental health problems. The Reconnect service is a national initiative that aims to ensure that the transfer to community health services is effective and comprehensive, and that people are supported to access all the services that they need after release. These may be services which were accessed while in prison and/or services they only needed once they are released.
The core purpose of Reconnect is to identify people who are less likely to engage with health services, identify their needs well in advance of release (where possible) and to offer them the level of support required to effectively ensure that they receive the help they need. This may be related to any health vulnerability, including mental health, physical health, substance misuse, neurodiversity or learning disability.
Peer support worker is a key role within the RECONNECT service and is an opportunity for someone who has lived experience of the criminal justice system to provide one to one support to people in the early days of leaving prison who also have an additional health vulnerability. Peer Support Workers collaborate with the clinical staff, other practitioners, and support workers to assist in improving the wellbeing of service users who use NHFT services.
The Reconnect service is based at Campbell House and covers the county of Northamptonshire and the three local prisons (HMP Five Wells, HMP Rye Hill and HMP Onley).
Job description
Job responsibilities
It is recognized that people in prison are vulnerable and experience avoidable differences in health and wellbeing. Support to engage with health services can provide an opportunity to connect with people who have not previously accessed routine health services to thereby improve health outcomes following release.
Leaving prison is a time of change when provision of health services necessarily transfers from one team to another, increasing the risk that any benefits achieved improving health outcomes within prison may be disrupted. It may also be a time when health needs are increased, for example the stress of living in the community after a period of being in prison may produce mental health problems. The Reconnect service is a national initiative that aims to ensure that the transfer to community health services is effective and comprehensive, and that people are supported to access all the services that they need after release. These may be services which were accessed while in prison and/or services they only needed once they are released.
The core purpose of Reconnect is to identify people who are less likely to engage with health services, identify their needs well in advance of release (where possible) and to offer them the level of support required to effectively ensure that they receive the help they need. This may be related to any health vulnerability, including mental health, physical health, substance misuse, neurodiversity or learning disability.
Peer support worker is a key role within the RECONNECT service and is an opportunity for someone who has lived experience of the criminal justice system to provide one to one support to people in the early days of leaving prison who also have an additional health vulnerability. Peer Support Workers collaborate with the clinical staff, other practitioners, and support workers to assist in improving the wellbeing of service users who use NHFT services.
The Reconnect service is based at Campbell House and covers the county of Northamptonshire and the three local prisons (HMP Five Wells, HMP Rye Hill and HMP Onley).
Person Specification
skills and experience
Essential
- Clearly evidences lived experience of the criminal justice system, including having spent time in prison yourself either on remand or sentenced, and you are able to use your own experience to support and empower others
- Willingness to use own experiences to support others.
- Able to fulfill the requirement to commute across the whole of Northamptonshire
Desirable
- Previous experience of working with vulnerable people (paid/voluntary)
- Previous experience of working with communities
Qualifications
Essential
- Willingness to undertake peer support worker qualification
Desirable
- Holds peer support worker qualification
Person Specification
skills and experience
Essential
- Clearly evidences lived experience of the criminal justice system, including having spent time in prison yourself either on remand or sentenced, and you are able to use your own experience to support and empower others
- Willingness to use own experiences to support others.
- Able to fulfill the requirement to commute across the whole of Northamptonshire
Desirable
- Previous experience of working with vulnerable people (paid/voluntary)
- Previous experience of working with communities
Qualifications
Essential
- Willingness to undertake peer support worker qualification
Desirable
- Holds peer support worker qualification
Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Employer details
Employer name
Northamptonshire Healthcare Foundation Trust
Address
Campbell House
Campbell Square
Northampton
NN1 3EB
United Kingdom
Employer's website
https://www.nhft.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)
Employer details
Employer name
Northamptonshire Healthcare Foundation Trust
Address
Campbell House
Campbell Square
Northampton
NN1 3EB
United Kingdom
Employer's website
https://www.nhft.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)