Hampshire County Council has joined forces with Kent County Council and a number of European voluntary and community organisations to secure around £300,000 of funding for Hampshire – to test new ways of supporting men of all ages with their mental health.
Councillor Patricia Stallard, Hampshire County Council’s Executive Member for Public Health and the Authority’s Mental Health Wellbeing Champion, said “Hampshire has been at the forefront of developing innovative ways of supporting people to improve their mental wellbeing.
“This is an exciting opportunity for us to test a wide range of community-based approaches to support people experiencing social isolation, and associated mental health issues. Through the programme we hope to support men in particular to connect better with their local communities and improve their physical health and mental wellbeing.”
The partner co-operation programme, known as Step by Step (SBS), will use the funding to invest in more than 90 projects across the partners’ geographical areas over the next four years, of which some 40 are expected to be in Hampshire. While the majority of the projects will be aimed primarily at men, as on average men are 20 percent less likely than women to seek support for mental health issues, women will also be included.
The projects will be based on the successful Men’s Sheds initiative, identifying opportunities to work with local community-based groups to tackle loneliness and improve social connections and friendship building. This supports men to deal with mental health challenges more easily and remain independent.
The projects could reach up to 6,000 men in total and will be fully evaluated. The partner organisations will share their experiences with each other to ensure all the geographical areas involved have the opportunity to learn about what works well. They will then be able to use this learning to help develop new successful initiatives in their own areas.
Funding for the programme has been secured from the European Union and the European Regional Development Fund.
For more information on this project visit the County Council’s Public Health web pages
