Helplines
Our helplines are available for anyone in the UK who is LGBT+ and has experienced domestic abuse or hate crime.
We support young people who are experiencing or worried about abuse:
- at home or from their families and communities
- from friends and other young people, whether at school, online or in other ways
- from boyfriends, girlfriends, partners or people they are in a relationship or having sex with
- from older adults, whether LGBT+ or non-LGBT+
- from neighbours and members of the public
We work with young people who:
- want a space to talk about what’s happening and think through their options
- need help and those who don’t know what to do about their situation
- are not sure if what is happening is abuse
- are homeless or might be homeless because of what’s happening
Our young people’s service is confidential, friendly and effective in helping young people be safe and well.
We actively include all lesbian, gay, bi, pan, queer, ace, aro, trans, non-binary, genderqueer, gender fluid and intersex young people. We work with young people who aren’t sure about their identity. Over half of the LGBT+ young people we work with are young people of colour, who face multiple forms of marginalisation due to their identity.
If you live outside London, we will try to link you in with a suitable service if you need specific help for your situation but you are welcome to talk to us to get advice and think about your options.
Refer yourself to our services
You can fill out our online form and someone will be in touch. Make sure you tell us your date of birth on the form.
If someone at home is abusing you and you want to speak with someone, you can call the National LGBT+ Domestic Abuse Helpline on 0800 999 5428. If you need extra help, the Helpline will put you in touch with one of our staff to work with you.
What we offer and how we work
Here is an idea of what we do but you don’t need to know what you want before you contact us. Just get in touch – we’ll work out the rest with you.
Advocacy and Casework
Advocacy means we take actions on your behalf to try to make your situation better. Our advocates will risk assess your situation and then work out a plan to try to make things better for you.
We can liaise with the police, Children’s/Adult’s Services, mental health services, GPs, sexual health, gender identity clinics, school/college/university etc.
We know how the systems work and we can take part in multi-agency meetings when professionals get together to help. We can act as your voice and in your best interests in these meetings.
We can also help to get things sorted out in your life, like housing, benefits, education and work. We might work with partner organisations on these issues, so you get the help and support you need.
We can also help you network with other LGBT+ young people and help you access youth groups, networks and activities that suit you.
Advice
You may want some advice about your situation. You may want to know about your options, what help is out there, and what might happen next if you report to the police or tell someone else about what is happening.
We will also try to answer your questions honestly and clearly. You can ask us about anything about being LGBT+. If we don’t know, we’ll try to find out and if we are not the best people to answer that question, we will help you access the people who are.
Our advocates can give you information and advice. Our job is to empower you to make the choices that are right for you. We can explain how other agencies work and what your rights are.
We also give information about abuse and advice about safety. We can help you make a personal safety plan, as well as giving advice about how to leave an abusive situation safely. We have ways of making sure communication is safe.
Emotional Support
It is great to be LGBT+ but coming out isn’t easy and being an LGBT+ young person facing abuse makes it extra tough. We are here to listen. We are here to support you.
Our service offers emotional support to LGBT+ young people going through difficult times. We believe life can be safe and happy and you can thrive as a human being. We are here to help you get to your better future.
Sexual Violence
We have a specialist advocate who works with LGBT+ children and young people who have experienced sexual violence or exploitation, called a CHISVA.
The CHISVA knows how the criminal justice system works, so can help if you want to know about reporting to the police or there is a police investigation happening. They can support you at appointments and at court.
Parents and Partners
For some LGBT+ young people, it is parents, partners and/or friends who are the people being abusive. In this situation, will not talk to those people about working with you. We create a safe space for you and we will not let abusive people into that space.
For other LGBT+ young people, parents, partners, and/or friends are helpful and supportive. In this case, with your permission, we can offer information and advice to the people around you who are trying to help. Sometimes they might not know how to help and we can give advice.
Confidentiality
Our young people’s service is independent and confidential. This means we won’t tell anyone outside of Galop about what’s happening, unless there is a safeguarding issue.
Our job is to try to make your life safer. Quite often, the people and agencies around you do not realise how difficult things can be for LGBT+ young people. Our advocates are very good at making sure your situation is understood properly by other agencies who have responsibilities to help. This means that advocacy work often involves a lot of liaison with other agencies.
When you come into our service, we will ask you to fill out a consent form, which tells you all about confidentiality and when we might need to speak to an external agency on your behalf. Our aim is to work with you on your support and advocacy plan, so contact with external agencies is agreed.
What if I’m not out?
Coming out is a process and you may not be out to anyone else, or only to some people. If other people find out about your sexuality or gender identity, it might make life much more difficult for you. We understand this and we know how worried young people can feel about it.
We will talk with you about what name and pronouns you want us to use in our confidential work with you. We support you to be who you know yourself to be and will respect this in our one-to-one contact with you.
If you need us to use a different name and pronouns when we contact someone else on your behalf, we can do this. We understand how complicated and worrying this can be for LGBT+ young people, so your advocate will talk it through with you.
Safeguarding
There is one situation when we might have to break our confidentiality agreement and that is when we think you are at immediate risk of harm or your situation is life-threatening. We have a duty under legislation to disclose information to prevent harm and save lives, for example if you are threatened by someone else or if you are feeling suicidal.
If you are aged 13 to 17, you are legally defined as a child in UK law. Safeguarding of children is very important, so we will always respond to safeguarding concerns about an LGBT+ child.
We take safeguarding seriously because we want LGBT+ young people to be free from abuse and harm. We know that young people often keep quiet about a situation for a long time and that things can change quickly, so sometimes we have to act fast to make sure you’re OK. We always take action because we believe it is in your best interests.
We are also required to speak to another agency if you tell us about a crime you have committed or about another child or young person who is at risk of abuse.
We have a procedure for safeguarding at Galop. Your advocate will always speak to the Designated Safeguarding Office for Galop as a whole. We aim to come up with a plan to help you and we will do our best to include you in this, so you feel empowered.
