Young Minds warns of potential dangers of mentoring

Mentoring can unwittingly harm the young people it is trying to support, according to a mental health charity.

In a report published today, Young Minds calls for rigorous standards to be applied when designing mentoring programmes for vulnerable young people, saying it may be being used as a cheap solution.

Young Minds chief executive Barbara Herts said: “A broken or disfunctional mentoring relationship can lead to feelings of mistrust, abandonment and isolation in an already troubled young person.”