Darnall Well Being has a long history of offering support to, and building trust with, the Slovak Roma community.
Between August 2019 and June 2024, we received funding from Sheffield City Council or the Home Office to provide support to people applying for EU Settled Status. Throughout the project, we had between one and five part-time workers working on it. During the period that the project ran for, we provided help related to EUSS to 8,161 people, submitting 1,713 applications for settled status.
Our work on the project was recognised by Colin Havard at Sheffield City Council, who said:
It is an amazing amount of work over many years. The raw figures don’t do the team justice, really, because I think the stories of the people you have helped are even more powerful. Over 1,700 people and their families are better off as a result of your support and the care with which you delivered that.
Rough maths says that you have helped on average nearly 7 people per week to submit an application, i.e. a person every single day!! And you supported 6 people every working day for 5 years. That’s a stunning amount of people. Be very proud of this. Sheffield owes you a mighty thank you.
Colin Havard, Sheffield City Council, June 2024
Lucie Ward, our Community Development Worker, has been involved throughout the EUSS work and has put together a number of videos and guides to help you manage your own EU settled status:
https://en-gb.padlet.com/dwbadmin/euss-self-help-y733h7x13bnr3tn8
You can also find information in Czech about EU settled status and about Darnall Well Being’s activities and support on our dedicated Facebook page.
In Autumn 2025, we are pleased to offer a Roma Slovak Pain Support Group, specifically for the Roma Slovak community, in collaboration with Chronic Pain Nurse Specialist, Lorna Nicholson. This friendly support group will offer a rolling programme, with each session focused around a theme, including goal setting, pain education, movement, diet and sleep, stress and emotions, medication. The group starts in October and will then meet every 2 weeks.
Lucie has been working with the Slovak Roma community in Darnall and Tinsley for a number of years. You can read more about her experiences supporting people during the EU Settled Status project here, thanks to this interview with the3million: