Volunteering with us
Volunteers are absolutely vital to the services we deliver; last year alone around 1,200 volunteers contributed over 420,000 hours of their time to our service users. Volunteers bring a range of skills and experience that complement the work we do with our service users including, in some cases, personal experience of the challenges of living with substance misuse or coping with a loved one’s misuse.
There are opportunities for volunteers across the organisation, including on the Board of Trustees and working alongside staff in projects.
All our volunteers receive training and are supported to deliver their roles, which can include:
- Administrators
- Art therapists
- Nurses
- Counsellors
- Gardeners
- Peer mentors - people who use their personal experience of recovery to support others
- Social work students
How you can make a difference
Many of the people and offenders we support have faced serious challenges in their lives, including physical and emotional abuse, poverty and deprivation and mental health problems, to name just a few. They are amongst the most vulnerable and marginalised people in our communities, which is why your contribution is so important.
When you join one of our services you’ll be working in a friendly, close knit team who truly value your work. You’ll also be joining a team who are deeply passionate about what they do: our service users continue to face negative stigma every day – by joining us you’ll be joining the fight to end that stigma for good.
“Our volunteers and peer mentors are making an extraordinarily valuable contribution, and are a wonderful example of how an individual can make a tangible difference to the lives of those less fortunate than themselves. I never cease to be amazed by the readiness of people to reach out and help others, motivated only by a desire to do something positive and meaningful for someone else.”
David Biddle, Chief Executive
Support we offer you
As you’re giving your time for free, it’s really important to us that you have access to training and resources that support your career development and personal wellbeing.
All volunteers will receive an in-house training package delivered by our dedicated volunteer coordinators. However, we also offer all our volunteers access to the same high quality training as our staff, which through our partners now includes access to hundreds of classroom and e-learning courses on a range of subjects such as finance, marketing, IT and recovery services.
We also offer staff and volunteers benefits like free membership to Headspace, a meditation and mindfulness website and app, helping to support better mental health.
A warm welcome for everyone
At CRI we’re passionate about diversity and creating an inclusive environment where everyone feels welcome and valued. Key to achieving this is an engaged, inspired workforce that genuinely reflects the diverse communities we support. We therefore strongly welcome applications from all sections of the community in particular those that are BME, LGBT or that have a disability, as well as those with previous experience of the challenges our service users face, like substance misuse and homelessness.
