Assisted Employment

Tender description

The Dearne Area sits in the East of the Borough of Barnsley and is part of the Dearne Valley link which brings Barnsley together with Doncaster to the North and Rotherham to the South. The Dearne Area Council consists of Highgate, Thurnscoe, Goldthorpe and Bolton on Dearne wards. The area covers 16 sq. km with a population of 22,841. Although employment rates have improved across the borough and the gap is closing with national averages, employment in the Dearne remains the highest across the Borough. A consultation exercise conducted by Turning Point in 2015 found that some of the barriers to work include travel and transport costs, lack of affordable childcare, long term health conditions, lack of confidence and low skills. Therefore the role of the incoming provider would be to tackle some of these barriers by stronger coordination and bringing together organisations to assist the individual in moving forward.