Wellbeing: Manchester charity The Proud Trust calls on retail professionals to support LGBT+ youth

The Proud Trust is an LGBT+ organisation that supports LGBT+ young people through youth groups, peer support, mentoring programs and the Proud Connections chat service. The three main aims of the charity include: creating a better support network for LGBT+ youth groups and young people, keeping young LGBT+ people on other people’s agendas so that schools, colleges, governments and other organisations considered and addressed LGBT+ needs and providing opportunities to bring young people together through regional events, such as Pride Youth Games peer educator training and conferences.

The Manchester-based project, a leading LGBT+ charity, is enlisting the help of supermarket and shop assistants to support young people who identify as LGBT+ now that the UK is fully reopened. The UK’s largest LGBT+ youth charity is asking those in the retail industry to help highlight the support available for LGBT+ young people and the adults who support them, spreading the word about its new LGBT+ digital support service Proud Connections.

Proud Connections is a digital support hub where visitors can live chat with trained youth workers and find out more about LGBT+ lives, including how, as a trusted adult, they can support a young LGBT+ person.

Ashley Hind, Help Services manager at The Proud Trust, has said “Through the launch of Proud Connections, we’re really hoping that people from all walks of life will become more aware of the difficulties that some LGBT+ young people might be experiencing right now and share information on what to do if somebody does reach out.”

The project is supported by BBC Children in Need’s £10 million funding programme, A Million & Me, which focuses on supporting children’s mental health.