The project has dealt with 1,272 separate enquiries from community members requiring dedicated one-to-one advocacy and casework. Below is an outline of the issues that were raised by migrants contacting MEAD.

Total No. of Enquiries in 2011 year: Education 73; Employment 157; Financial Wellbeing 411; Physical & Mental Health 268; Social Community Participation 360; Volunteering 3; (follow up actions) 654; Grand Total 1926. MEAD had an external evaluation completed in 2013. Their findings indicated that: "The main ethnic groups using MEAD services are Polish, Chinese and South Asian. Whilst there is great diversity within these ethnic groups, it is possible to make some generalisations. Polish people in and around Perth are mostly younger (this excludes the smaller group of older people from an earlier migration) and are most interested in issues around employment. At the same time, many Polish people have strong views on their experience of the NHS, often relating to children and babies. In contrast, Perth has many older Chinese people who have been in Scotland for decades but who continue to encounter a language barrier and for whom the NHS may be the most important public service. Younger Chinese people in Perth have grown up in Scotland and do not have the language and other barriers that remain such an issue for people of older generations". (MEAD, 2013,p1)

MEAD directly benefits migrant communities by both advocating on their behalf and providing services but also by employing and skilling up local migrants. This promotes and enables a greater level of integration within the local community.

MEAD identified that language was one of the largest barriers to accessing services and integration in the local area. To overcome this barrier the service increased their voluntary numbers of translators, skilled migrants as community translators and increased English language courses. Another issue that was identified was access to health provisions in the local area and in response to this unmet need MEAD established 4 rural outreach programmes designed to address the need for health provisions in rural areas. Mead responds as issues are reported from the local migrant communities. It skills up migrants as volunteers which is designed to increase employability and also increase community integration with incoming migrants.

• MEAD has established four rural outreach surgeries, these were set up in response to a need identified by initial scoping in the community.
• "MEAD Project continues to bridge the language and communication gap between minority ethnic communities and service providers. In 2011/12, 100% of Chinese, 87% of Eastern European and 29% of South Asian communities required language support from MEAD team to communicate; these figures are very much in line with last year’s figures which offered a baseline measure, highlighting the ongoing need for a local interpreting & translation service."

MEAD Evaluation Report (2013) Available at: https://www.pkavs.org.uk/media/uploads/Files/MEADevaluationreportfinal… P

erth and Kinross Intelligence Report. (2012) Minority Ethnic Access Development Team (MEAD). Available at: https://www.pkavs.org.uk/media/uploads/Files/MEAD%20Community%20Intelli…

MEAD is a joint initiative between the local charity PKAVS, Perth & Kinross Council and the Community Health Partnership in collaboration with local Minority Ethnic Communities and MECOPP (the National Development Programme funded by the Scottish Government Equalities Unit).