News
South Yorkshire Sexual Violence Conference
Our team attended the South Yorkshire Sexual Violence Conference at New York Stadium. It was a powerful and important event bringing together professionals and organisations committed to supporting survivors of sexual violence.
Our CEO, Kerry, delivered a presentation about the work of Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service and the impact of sexual abuse, highlighting the importance of accessible, compassionate support for survivors. We were also incredibly moved by our trustee Alexa, who bravely shared her personal experience of using our service. Her honesty and strength were a powerful reminder of why this work matters so much.
Our Operations Manager Becky and Counsellor Cerys also hosted a stall during the event, speaking with attendees and sharing information about the support we provide.
Thank you to everyone who stopped by to talk with us and to the organisers for creating such an important space for learning, connection and awareness. Together we can continue working towards better support for survivors across South Yorkshire.
Kilvinder Vigurs & Kathryn Whittington Visit
Rotherham Golf Club: Charity of the Year
4 Marathons Challenge!
We’d like to express huge gratitude to James for taking on this amazing challenge to raise money for Rothacs and First Step.
“I want to be clear that I am personally covering all of the costs associated with the marathons, so every penny raised will go directly to the charities.
The first is First Steps in Leicester, which provides specialist support for male survivors of childhood sexual abuse. The second is Rothacs, a local charity supporting victims of abuse in my community. The amount raised for each charity would cover the cost of an extended course of counselling delivered by fully trained professionals.
The support these organisations offer can help someone move from feeling alone and defined by what happened to them, to feeling supported, heard, and able to move forward as a survivor. I’ve included links below if you’d like to learn more about the vital work they do — and, if you’re able, I’d be incredibly grateful for your support.”
If you’d like to find out more, or make a donation, please visit https://www.justgiving.com/team/james-howat-4-nations
Three Peaks Fundraiser
Reclaim the Night 2025
Our team were proud to join Reclaim the Night in Rotherham last week. Standing together with our community, we raised our voices for safety, and an end to gender-based violence. Thank you to everyone who showed up, spoke out, and lit up the night with solidarity.
Barnsley & Rotherham Business Awards 2025
We are thrilled to share that our CEO Kerry and Operations Manager Becky attended the BR Chamber Business Awards at Magna, and we were awarded Highly Commended for the Charity of the Year award!
A huge thank you to the Chamber for a fantastic evening, and congratulations to all the inspiring winners and finalists.
New CEO
A warm welcome to the new Chief Executive Officer of Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service, Kerry Jones Kensah.
Kerry, pictured below, has a wealth of experience from working globally in many organisations as Director of Programmes to more recently in health and social care leadership roles in charities. Most recently she was the CEO for an unpaid carer organisation in Sheffield.
She will head up the Rothacs team alongside Executive Clinical Lead Gaynor Smith.
Kerry said she was very much enjoying her new role. “The work ROTHACS does to deliver ongoing therapeutic support to people who have suffered abuse makes an enormous difference to their lives.
“It has an excellent reputation and I am delighted to join such an established and well respected organisation with an incredibly dedicated team of staff. I welcome the challenge to work together with the staff and partners to increase our income to meet the needs of the people of Rotherham.”
Welcoming Kerry, the chair of ROTHACS, Dr Anne Cooper, said an important part of the job would be to attract more funding so that our charity can continue with its vital work.
“We are very grateful for the support of our statutory and charitable funders but to secure the future of the organisation going forward and develop the service we need to reach out to other bodies who can assist us.”
National Lottery funding
We are celebrating a major funding award from the National Lottery! It amounts to £364,418 over the next three years and will enable us to continue our vital work!
Rothacs began supporting the community in 2005, becoming a charity in 2017. We are entirely reliant on statutory and charitable funders.
We also receive support from Rotherham Borough Council, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust.
In addition we provide the Independent Sexual Violence Advocate Service for Rotherham funded by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority.
Welcoming the news, the chair of the board of trustees of Rothacs, Dr Anne Cooper, said: “This is the third time we have received a National Lottery grant and we are extremely grateful for the ongoing support from the National Lottery Community Fund without which we would struggle to continue to provide this much needed service in the current financial climate.”
Patron of Rothacs, Rotherham MP, Sarah Champion, added: “Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service provides an invaluable service to desperately vulnerable people in the most challenging of circumstances. It is no exaggeration to say their work is both life changing and indeed life saving.
“Their dedicated team have worked tirelessly, providing support, advice and counselling to victims and survivors of abuse. Their contribution to the community has truly been outstanding.”
The funding is from the National Lottery Community Fund, which distributes money raised by National Lottery players for good causes and is the largest community funder in the UK.
Happily Never After
One of our lovely ISVAs (Independent Sexual Violence Advocates) Becky starred in a play with her daughter at the Sheffield Library Theatre.
Roads Drop In
Rotherham Alcohol And Drug Service (Provided By We are with you) will now be holding monthly drop-in sessions at Rothacs for both our ISVA and counselling clients. Each session is on the last Monday of each month.
Brand new service
We are delighted to announce an extension to Recovery at Rothacs, our online package providing support before counselling begins.
From Surviving to Thriving is aimed at helping clients move on successfully with their lives after completing therapy.
Both courses were specially designed by Emily Jacob, a survivor of sexual violence, to help fellow survivors.
There are five modules in the new course, each available as a video, audio file or transcript with a downloadable workbook to make notes.
Executive Clinical Lead at Rothacs, Gaynor Smith (as pictured below), said: “We know that many of our clients really value the Recovery at Rothacs programme which provides them with some tools and techniques to help them make the most of their therapy when it starts.
“From Surviving to Thriving does the same at the other end of therapy and helps ensure that recovery is maintained.”
There is more information about the course and who would benefit from it on our Services page.
Rothacs open day
We hosted an Open Day to give other services the opportunity to see our building, meet our team of staff and find out more about our organisation. We’d like to thank everyone who attended, it was lovely to see you all!
The event was organised by Ben and Hannah, medical students from the University of Sheffield’s School of Medicine & Population Health. They’ve visited us as their community placement, and we’d like to express huge gratitude to them both for their incredible work with us over the past four weeks.
ISVA awards
Some of our ISVA (Independent Sexual Violence Advocates) from the South Yorkshire Sexual Violence Partnership, commissioned by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combines Authority, attended a National Crime Agency event that recognised all that has gone into Operation Stovewood. Operation Stovewood, led by the National Crime Agency, began in 2014. It’s role is to investigate allegations of CSE that took place between 1997 and 2013 in the Rotherham borough.
This event discussed the history of the operation and where it is currently. They also commended those who have worked very hard for the investigation and the success of multiagency working.Our ISVA Manager and two of our ISVAs, Katie, Becky and Carina have been granted awards for their outstanding contributions to the operation and supporting those involved. Their commitment does not go unnoticed, and we would like to congratulate our brilliant staff for all their hard work!
TRC Freshers Fair
We attended TRC’s Freshers Fair! We’d like to thank the college for inviting us, and thank our brilliant staff Karren, Tina and Becky who attended.
Rotherham Show
Rotherham Show was amazing! It was great to speak to other services, ex-clients, potential service users, and our amazing MP Sarah Champion! We’d like to thank our brilliant staff Jo, Katie, Becky, Sue, James and Manisha for representing our service in the community.
Thank you for having us and visiting our stall, we hope to see you next year!
Client Survey 2023
At Rothacs, we implement regular client satisfaction surveys to make sure we are providing the best possible service. Here are the results of responses throughout 2023:
Development Day
Recently, we hosted our bi-annual Development Day, which entails guest speakers, delivery of training and fun activities. This time, we highlighted the importance of wellbeing to our staff and discussed helpful strategies and resources we can offer. Due to the theme of staff wellbeing, we reached out to various companies and requested donations of self-care products for our hard-working team. We would like to express huge gratitude to Lush Meadowhall and Baylis & Harding for being so generous and donating self-care products to us.
Congratulations!
Congratulations to our hard-working counselling team on achieving service accreditation from the prestigious British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP).
Rothacs is now one of only two services in South Yorkshire to have been awarded this status.
The BACP is the leading membership organisation for counselling professions in the UK and its aim is to set the global gold standard for best practice in the field.
The two-year campaign to achieve service accreditation for Rothacs has been led by Executive Clinical Lead Gaynor Smith and Senior Counsellor Sue Coldwell.
It involved a review of all aspects of the counselling service, including management and administration, health and safety, equality and diversity, promotion and community liaison, evaluation and feedback.
In the final phase of the process, BACP accreditors visited Rothacs to meet and talk to staff.
Said Sue: “After this meeting they said they were impressed with our application and commented on the warmth, care, mutual support and sense of community evident within the Rothacs team which they felt must also be experienced by our clients.
“Having this accreditation is recognition that we provide an accountable, ethical and responsive service that is safe, secure and professionally managed for our clients, staff, volunteers and funders.
“It’s a testament to the high standard of work being done every day by all of our Rothacs team.”
RMBC grant
A grant from Rotherham Borough Council has provided a lifeline for Rothacs to continue its support for hundreds of survivors of sexual abuse who live or work in Rotherham. The Council stepped in to bridge the gap after Rothacs lost out on a Ministry of Justice grant. RMBC have awarded us £170,000 to cover the period up to March 2025, which means we have already been able to reinstate counselling hours back to previous levels.
Chair of Rothacs Trustees, Dr Anne Cooper, said: “Much as we would like to think that this would be an NHS provided service, we are completely reliant on grants and charitable funding, so we are very grateful to Rotherham Council for this funding which will enable us to carry on helping the people who need and rely on the service we provide.”
Louise Smalley Walk
Last year we were the recipient of Louise Smalley’s 2023 Walk. We’d like to express huge gratitude to our team for a superb presentation and to LSW for selecting our service.
Our CEO, Executive Clinical Lead and ISVA manager took part in this 40 mile walk along with approximately 80 other people. The walk raised £15,601.82, and we would like to express our deepest gratitude to all those involved in the Louise Smalley Challenge Walk and raising this outstanding amount of money! Thank you to all those involved, including the voters, walkers organisers and all those that sponsored us. This donation will make a long lasting difference to the environment and equipment needed to provide our service.
Skydive fundraiser!
A generous member of our community is very kindly doing a charity skydive to fundraise for our organisation. If you would like to learn about her story and/or support her fundraiser, please visit Just Giving here.
Counsellors congratulations!
We would like to congratulate Laura Flann and Cerys Herriott who both recently qualified as counsellors from Academy Space in Sheffield. We are proud to announce that they have both been successful in gaining some paid work as Bank Counsellors within our team.
CHISVA congratulations!
We are proud to announce that one of our ISVAs, Carina Hartley, has now completed the Lime Culture CHISVA training, and she is looking forward to supporting our children and young people alongside CHISVA Andrea Trigg.
No Means No Festival
In the Summer, Mexborough Imperial Music Venus hosted the No Means No Festival. We are honoured that we were chosen to be the recipient of this event, and we appreciate everyone who has supported, been a part of and/or attended the festival. The festival raised £2080, and we are incredibly grateful to receive this generous donation.
ISVA congratulations!
We are proud to announce that two of our ISVAs, Shelley Powell and Shauna Mitchell, have completed the Survivors Trust male ISVA training, which helps the service respond to male survivors of sexual abuse.
See what our clients say about us...
"My ISVA was absolutely amazing, even when I had illnesses to deal with we managed to rearrange things easily and she was able to offer me support over the phone or messages instead to suit my needs. She fully understood and respected my mental health and my neurodiversity, and customised the help to suit me. "
"It is the first service that I have been where I have begun to feel confident that I can be myself, and not had to trim myself to fit in. I can be honest and am not judged...."
"My ISVA was an angel. She was very professional, yet so warm, caring and understanding. I couldn’t have begun to improve my life without her."
Charity update...
Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service became a charity in October 2017, this means we rely on external funding and donations.
If you ever need to contact us...
Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service,
38 Moorgate Road,
Rotherham, S60 2AG
01709 835482
info@rothacs.org.uk
Rotherham Golf Club: Charity of the Year
Three Peaks Fundraiser
Reclaim the Night 2025
Our team were proud to join Reclaim the Night in Rotherham last week. Standing together with our community, we raised our voices for safety, and an end to gender-based violence. Thank you to everyone who showed up, spoke out, and lit up the night with solidarity.
Barnsley & Rotherham Business Awards 2025
We are thrilled to share that our CEO Kerry and Operations Manager Becky attended the BR Chamber Business Awards at Magna, and we were awarded Highly Commended for the Charity of the Year award!
A huge thank you to the Chamber for a fantastic evening, and congratulations to all the inspiring winners and finalists.
New CEO
A warm welcome to the new Chief Executive Officer of Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service, Kerry Jones Kensah.
Kerry, pictured below, has a wealth of experience from working globally in many organisations as Director of Programmes to more recently in health and social care leadership roles in charities. Most recently she was the CEO for an unpaid carer organisation in Sheffield.
She will head up the Rothacs team alongside Executive Clinical Lead Gaynor Smith.
Kerry said she was very much enjoying her new role. “The work ROTHACS does to deliver ongoing therapeutic support to people who have suffered abuse makes an enormous difference to their lives.
“It has an excellent reputation and I am delighted to join such an established and well respected organisation with an incredibly dedicated team of staff. I welcome the challenge to work together with the staff and partners to increase our income to meet the needs of the people of Rotherham.”
Welcoming Kerry, the chair of ROTHACS, Dr Anne Cooper, said an important part of the job would be to attract more funding so that our charity can continue with its vital work.
“We are very grateful for the support of our statutory and charitable funders but to secure the future of the organisation going forward and develop the service we need to reach out to other bodies who can assist us.”
National Lottery funding
We are celebrating a major funding award from the National Lottery! It amounts to £364,418 over the next three years and will enable us to continue our vital work!
Rothacs began supporting the community in 2005, becoming a charity in 2017. We are entirely reliant on statutory and charitable funders.
We also receive support from Rotherham Borough Council, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust.
In addition we provide the Independent Sexual Violence Advocate Service for Rotherham funded by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority.
Welcoming the news, the chair of the board of trustees of Rothacs, Dr Anne Cooper, said: “This is the third time we have received a National Lottery grant and we are extremely grateful for the ongoing support from the National Lottery Community Fund without which we would struggle to continue to provide this much needed service in the current financial climate.”
Patron of Rothacs, Rotherham MP, Sarah Champion, added: “Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service provides an invaluable service to desperately vulnerable people in the most challenging of circumstances. It is no exaggeration to say their work is both life changing and indeed life saving.
“Their dedicated team have worked tirelessly, providing support, advice and counselling to victims and survivors of abuse. Their contribution to the community has truly been outstanding.”
The funding is from the National Lottery Community Fund, which distributes money raised by National Lottery players for good causes and is the largest community funder in the UK.
Happily Never After
One of our lovely ISVAs (Independent Sexual Violence Advocates) Becky starred in a play with her daughter at the Sheffield Library Theatre.
Roads Drop In
Rotherham Alcohol And Drug Service (Provided By We are with you) will now be holding monthly drop-in sessions at Rothacs for both our ISVA and counselling clients. Each session is on the last Monday of each month.
Brand new service
We are delighted to announce an extension to Recovery at Rothacs, our online package providing support before counselling begins.
From Surviving to Thriving is aimed at helping clients move on successfully with their lives after completing therapy.
Both courses were specially designed by Emily Jacob, a survivor of sexual violence, to help fellow survivors.
There are five modules in the new course, each available as a video, audio file or transcript with a downloadable workbook to make notes.
Executive Clinical Lead at Rothacs, Gaynor Smith (as pictured below), said: “We know that many of our clients really value the Recovery at Rothacs programme which provides them with some tools and techniques to help them make the most of their therapy when it starts.
“From Surviving to Thriving does the same at the other end of therapy and helps ensure that recovery is maintained.”
There is more information about the course and who would benefit from it on our Services page.
Rothacs open day
We hosted an Open Day to give other services the opportunity to see our building, meet our team of staff and find out more about our organisation. We’d like to thank everyone who attended, it was lovely to see you all!
The event was organised by Ben and Hannah, medical students from the University of Sheffield’s School of Medicine & Population Health. They’ve visited us as their community placement, and we’d like to express huge gratitude to them both for their incredible work with us over the past four weeks.
ISVA awards
Some of our ISVA (Independent Sexual Violence Advocates) from the South Yorkshire Sexual Violence Partnership, commissioned by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combines Authority, attended a National Crime Agency event that recognised all that has gone into Operation Stovewood. Operation Stovewood, led by the National Crime Agency, began in 2014. It’s role is to investigate allegations of CSE that took place between 1997 and 2013 in the Rotherham borough.
This event discussed the history of the operation and where it is currently. They also commended those who have worked very hard for the investigation and the success of multiagency working.Our ISVA Manager and two of our ISVAs, Katie, Becky and Carina have been granted awards for their outstanding contributions to the operation and supporting those involved. Their commitment does not go unnoticed, and we would like to congratulate our brilliant staff for all their hard work!
TRC Freshers Fair
We attended TRC’s Freshers Fair! We’d like to thank the college for inviting us, and thank our brilliant staff Karren, Tina and Becky who attended.
Rotherham Show
Rotherham Show was amazing! It was great to speak to other services, ex-clients, potential service users, and our amazing MP Sarah Champion! We’d like to thank our brilliant staff Jo, Katie, Becky, Sue, James and Manisha for representing our service in the community.
Thank you for having us and visiting our stall, we hope to see you next year!
Client Survey 2023
At Rothacs, we implement regular client satisfaction surveys to make sure we are providing the best possible service. Here are the results of responses throughout 2023:
Development Day
Recently, we hosted our bi-annual Development Day, which entails guest speakers, delivery of training and fun activities. This time, we highlighted the importance of wellbeing to our staff and discussed helpful strategies and resources we can offer. Due to the theme of staff wellbeing, we reached out to various companies and requested donations of self-care products for our hard-working team. We would like to express huge gratitude to Lush Meadowhall and Baylis & Harding for being so generous and donating self-care products to us.
Congratulations!
Congratulations to our hard-working counselling team on achieving service accreditation from the prestigious British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP).
Rothacs is now one of only two services in South Yorkshire to have been awarded this status.
The BACP is the leading membership organisation for counselling professions in the UK and its aim is to set the global gold standard for best practice in the field.
The two-year campaign to achieve service accreditation for Rothacs has been led by Executive Clinical Lead Gaynor Smith and Senior Counsellor Sue Coldwell.
It involved a review of all aspects of the counselling service, including management and administration, health and safety, equality and diversity, promotion and community liaison, evaluation and feedback.
In the final phase of the process, BACP accreditors visited Rothacs to meet and talk to staff.
Said Sue: “After this meeting they said they were impressed with our application and commented on the warmth, care, mutual support and sense of community evident within the Rothacs team which they felt must also be experienced by our clients.
“Having this accreditation is recognition that we provide an accountable, ethical and responsive service that is safe, secure and professionally managed for our clients, staff, volunteers and funders.
“It’s a testament to the high standard of work being done every day by all of our Rothacs team.”
RMBC grant
A grant from Rotherham Borough Council has provided a lifeline for Rothacs to continue its support for hundreds of survivors of sexual abuse who live or work in Rotherham. The Council stepped in to bridge the gap after Rothacs lost out on a Ministry of Justice grant. RMBC have awarded us £170,000 to cover the period up to March 2025, which means we have already been able to reinstate counselling hours back to previous levels.
Chair of Rothacs Trustees, Dr Anne Cooper, said: “Much as we would like to think that this would be an NHS provided service, we are completely reliant on grants and charitable funding, so we are very grateful to Rotherham Council for this funding which will enable us to carry on helping the people who need and rely on the service we provide.”
Louise Smalley Walk
Last year we were the recipient of Louise Smalley’s 2023 Walk. We’d like to express huge gratitude to our team for a superb presentation and to LSW for selecting our service.
Our CEO, Executive Clinical Lead and ISVA manager took part in this 40 mile walk along with approximately 80 other people. The walk raised £15,601.82, and we would like to express our deepest gratitude to all those involved in the Louise Smalley Challenge Walk and raising this outstanding amount of money! Thank you to all those involved, including the voters, walkers organisers and all those that sponsored us. This donation will make a long lasting difference to the environment and equipment needed to provide our service.
Skydive fundraiser!
A generous member of our community is very kindly doing a charity skydive to fundraise for our organisation. If you would like to learn about her story and/or support her fundraiser, please visit Just Giving here.
Counsellors congratulations!
We would like to congratulate Laura Flann and Cerys Herriott who both recently qualified as counsellors from Academy Space in Sheffield. We are proud to announce that they have both been successful in gaining some paid work as Bank Counsellors within our team.
CHISVA congratulations!
We are proud to announce that one of our ISVAs, Carina Hartley, has now completed the Lime Culture CHISVA training, and she is looking forward to supporting our children and young people alongside CHISVA Andrea Trigg.
No Means No Festival
In the Summer, Mexborough Imperial Music Venus hosted the No Means No Festival. We are honoured that we were chosen to be the recipient of this event, and we appreciate everyone who has supported, been a part of and/or attended the festival. The festival raised £2080, and we are incredibly grateful to receive this generous donation.
ISVA congratulations!
We are proud to announce that two of our ISVAs, Shelley Powell and Shauna Mitchell, have completed the Survivors Trust male ISVA training, which helps the service respond to male survivors of sexual abuse.
See what our clients say about us...
"My ISVA was absolutely amazing, even when I had illnesses to deal with we managed to rearrange things easily and she was able to offer me support over the phone or messages instead to suit my needs. She fully understood and respected my mental health and my neurodiversity, and customised the help to suit me. "
"It is the first service that I have been where I have begun to feel confident that I can be myself, and not had to trim myself to fit in. I can be honest and am not judged...."
"My ISVA was an angel. She was very professional, yet so warm, caring and understanding. I couldn’t have begun to improve my life without her."
Charity update...
Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service became a charity in October 2017, this means we rely on external funding and donations.
If you ever need to contact us...
Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service,
38 Moorgate Road,
Rotherham, S60 2AG
01709 835482
info@rothacs.org.uk
Rotherham Abuse Counselling Service
Specialist counselling service for men, women and young people who have experienced, rape, sexual and domestic abuse including childhood sexual exploitation.
38 Moorgate Road, Rotherham, S60 2AG
Telephone: 01709 835482
CIO Charity Registration Number: 1175142
