Community power podcast Series 3 Episode 1: Community catalyst - The legacy of Ewanrigg’s We Will campaign for children’s mental health

Episode 1: Community catalyst – the legacy of Ewanrigg’s We Will campaign 

Chris Allen

Hello and welcome to a brand new series of the community power podcast, which is brought to you in partnership with Local Trust. My name is Chris Allen, and in this series of podcasts, we’re going to be showing some incredible projects, focusing in particular on what happens when you give local people the power, the resources and the assets to make a difference to their neighbourhoods. With me is the producer for our third series. That’s Kirsten Sinclair, so Kirsten, where are we off to at the start of our series? 

Kirsten Sinclair

Thank you. Chris, yes. Well, this is a special episode we recorded at our last and final Big Local Connects conference in the autumn of last year. And we spoke with Rebecca and Reece from Ewanrigg Big Local, which is situated along the coast from Maryport, Cumbria, and we chatted about their impactful and powerful campaign We Will — breaking down the stigma around mental health. 

Chris Allen

Indeed. And first of all, I began by asking Rebecca about her role in the partnership. 

Rebecca

Hiya, so yeah, I’m chair of Ewanrigg Local Trust currently, and have been for the past, I’d say, 12 months. Reece, you are… 

Reece

And yeah, thank you, Rebecca. I’m a member of the partnership myself, and we’ve been doing it for quite a while now, haven’t we? 

Rebecca

Yeah. So all together, we have been doing campaigning for over 10 years. 

Chris Allen

Now I’m gonna, I’m gonna jump in here. Now you are, you know, people listening will probably think oh they’ve got a younger voice than I have, most definitely. I’m gonna ask you both, how old are you both? 

Rebecca

I’m 21, yeah. 

Reece

I’m freshly 22 [my] birthday [was] just a fortnight ago. 

Chris Allen

Oh right happy birthday for that. Now I’m thinking about Big Local [which] started 11 years ago. 

Rebecca

Yeah.

Chris Allen

So 10 and 11 was your age? And it’s important to put that in perspective for people who are listening to this, because it’s been a long programme, and we’re getting near the end of it now, and we’ve got people who were children when it started, and grown ups when it finishes. What’s your career in Rebecca? 

Rebecca

My career is in mental health nursing, and I’m currently in my final year. Yeah. 

Chris Allen

Right. And you’re loving it? 

Rebecca

Love it, love it. Best thing I ever did. 

Chris Allen

And Reece you like the media I believe? You’re working in the media. 

Reece

That’s true. Yeah, I’ve just graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston, and I’ve got a first class degree filmmaking now. 

Chris Allen

Well done. Get that one in there. 

Reece

You know, I have to, if there’s anyone out there listening that would like someone in production management, just let me know I’m happy to help. 

Chris Allen

And also, to be fair, you know both of you, immersed in your community, [have] given to your community as well. So again, that says something about people when they’re going to give to their community as well. Now, up in Cumbria, up in Ewanrigg, you’ve had this We Will campaign. Your grandma’s got a new name for it? 

Reece

Yeah, the Will i am campaign. 

Chris Allen

Yeah, the Will i am campaign or the We Will campaign up in Ewanrigg. Tell us a little bit about that, Rebecca. It ties a lot in with your career, really? 

Rebecca

Yeah. So We Will is a campaign that is campaigning for mental health, for more funding around Cumbria and the services. So it’s about 15 of us. I would say ages between – at the time when it was at its peak – 15 and 19 and I would say we’re more 17 to 23 now I would say, something like that. 

Reece

Ewanrigg Local Trust came to us because it had a gap in their funding, and they wanted young people to fill it. And we noticed as young people, like, a lack in provision for mental health services and young people, and we wanted to reduce the stigma around it. And we thought, what better way to reach out to young people with mental health issues than young people like ourselves? 

Chris Allen

100% but it won’t always happen that way. Does it? 

Reece

No, certainly not. But like, throughout the whole campaign, like, not only have we been, like spreading our message, like having the courage to talk, having the courage to listen, we’ve also been learning things ourselves as well. So, like, it’s a very like, empowering campaign for all of us, really. 

Rebecca

Yeah.

Chris Allen

That’s all said incredibly naturally there, you know, [a] mental health campaign we did, but actually, for many, many years, mental health had a big stigma around it didn’t it? And people wouldn’t talk about it. As a mental health nurse you must see some changes as well in the way that people now are open to saying, ​“Yeah, everybody has mental health issues at times, let’s not hide it.” 

Rebecca

Oh, yeah, definitely, especially in the media, there’s a lot more now speaking about mental health. And if you see, like, even celebrities coming out and say, ​“Oh, I’ve struggled with mental health in the past, and currently am”. Ten years ago, that would never have happened. So it is nice to see that change, and the stigma kind of shrinking. I don’t think it’ll ever fully shrink. There’ll always be that sort of stigma around it, but there’s definitely a massive, massive improvement that I’ve seen. 

Chris Allen

Yeah, I mean in your work, Rebecca, again, do you see a difference between younger people and older people? Again, younger people are more willing to say, ​“Hey, it’s okay, that’ll be okay”. 

Rebecca 

Oh, yeah, definitely. So because I’m still at university, I’m still in my final year, I’ve had a wide range [of] different placements, ranging from CAMS (Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality) to inpatient adults and even like older people and mental health. And it’s just, you can see the wide range of people talking about it, but you can tell the kind of generation people have grown up in, depending on how much they want to talk. But even then, I do feel like that’s changing. You do see a lot of the older generation starting to talk out a lot more now. 

Chris Allen

And Reece perhaps lads need to talk more as well? We know that three quarters of people taking their own lives are men. So therefore it’s something that men and particularly young people, male young people are particularly vulnerable to. 

Reece

Yeah, absolutely, like we’ve done years and years of research, and we found, like the best way to spread our message was through filmmaking. And I believe our very first film that we made was called ​‘Boy’, and it was about a boy’s struggle with mental health, trying to reach out with his dad, trying to have that communication between father and son. And that was really successful. Like that was spread all over wasn’t it. 

Chris Allen

Is it still out there? Can people watch it? 

Reece

Yeah that’s the beauty of filmmaking. You can’t get rid of it can you? 

Chris Allen

The good and the bad [They laugh.] So is it on YouTube or somewhere like that? 

Reece

Yeah, it’s on our website, www.thecentrewestcumbria.com. And on there, you’ll find all of the resources that we’ve made, and you can contact our team and everything. And all of our films are on there. We have ​‘Boy’, ​‘Just listen’… 

Rebecca

We’ve got loads of animations, and we did film a lot of, like, short clips during lockdown for, like, to get pushed out, for people who obviously struggled during lockdown. I’m pretty sure they’re all on there as well. And actually, ​‘Boy’ got shared onto the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s Instagram, after we had met them in Keswick. We gave them one of our USB sticks with our films on and they put it on their Instagram. 

Chris Allen

How about that? 

Reece

Yeah, that was fun. 

Rebecca

That was brilliant. 

Chris Allen

Great. What we’ll do is we’ll put the links in our show notes for the podcast as well, so people can just click on there. That’ll be really easy. And are there many other young people involved in Ewanrigg Big Local? 

Reece

During the time when We Will was at its biggest there was a big chunk of us that were doing stuff, but we went our separate ways, with like university, things like that. 

Chris Allen

Life kicks in. 

Reece

Yeah, but there’s still echoes of our campaign found everywhere, like we went to Liverpool, went to Manchester. But we take all that stuff with us and we spread it even further. So even though the We Will campaign came to an end, we mainly focus on The Centre now, like there’s still, a legacy lives on. 

Chris Allen

You mentioned that, not just being involved, but actually being on the board as well. Rebecca you’re the chair. You don’t look like the kind of people who love sitting in meetings around tables, you know. You do things different up in Ewanrigg? 

Rebecca

Yeah, we make it fun, we make it really fun. 

Reece

Yeah, it’s very informal. Rather than just a meeting, it feels more of a mothers’ meeting than just a meeting. A chin wagging session. 

Chris Allen

Yeah and then you just write it down and say, ​“Hey, we made a decision.” 

Rebecca

I wish it was that simple. I really wish it was. 

Chris Allen

I’m serious here. I’m not trying to be flippant here, because actually, many people in Big Local areas would say, ​“oh yeah I should be involved” they don’t want to be on committees. Don’t want to be on boards, they don’t want to sit in boring meetings. So if you’ve got a clue as to how you can get people together, make decisions, work together, then tell us how you do it. 

Rebecca

It is about making it fun as well, as I keep saying. No one wants to sit in their spare time and sit in a boring meeting for hours. But if you have that, that feeling, you get the friendships through the people you be on the committee with, then it makes it all worth it. 

Reece 

Like, when we first started, we were just children that lived on the estates, but like, by doing this sort of stuff, we’ve been invited to all these different opportunities, getting to meet all these cool people, like, here at Connects [Local Trust’s annual conference bringing Big Locals together], and you just, like, learn a lot about yourself. And you get to, like, meet new people [with] like similar interests. And it really shapes you as a person, which is quite fun. 

Chris Allen

Right. Now we said earlier about, you know, you basically grew up during the course of Big Local. You know, you were the Big Local generation, you could say. What kind of changes have you seen around you? Have you seen anything particular that stands out to you that you’ve seen growing up? 

Reece 

That’s a really good question. 

Rebecca

There’s a lot less isolation. So with The Centre, we do quite a few different clubs. So we have coffee and crack on a Tuesday, which is, it’s three course meal or two course meals, sorry. Two pounds fifty for your dinner. And it’s a lot of like, especially the older generation that are, like, stuck at home and don’t have anything to do. It’s something to come and see all their mates, just something nice like that. And it happens every Thursday. We’ve got different things. We’ve got bingo, chess club that’s very popular at the moment. Just all sorts of different things. So yeah, isolation has definitely been one of them things that we wanted to focus on. Because, again, as a mental health nurse, I do know that isolation is one of the biggest depressors in the world, and so we wanted to tackle that. 

Reece

We do a lot for the elderly. We do, like, computer clubs and like stroke speech therapy clubs. And then we also cater to, like, the younger children as well, doing like, cook and play all these activities. We’re very close to Keswick, where there’s a nice theatre by the lake. We organise trips to that and like, there’s a lot of people that have lived on our estate, but like, never leave the estate. So it’s just doing certain things to empower them and like, bring out the best in them. Holding the door open for them to get all these different opportunities, like, because it’s right there on the doorstep, they just need to utilise it. 

Chris Allen

And again we go back to the mental health, really important stuff here. And do you think this is stuff that’s going to continue, going to be a part of your legacy as a programme as well? You’ve changed the way community is? 

Rebecca

Yeah, 100%. It’s definitely changed the way that our community is. So we get quite a few people, still to this day, coming up to us being like, you’ve made such a difference. Even just with the videos. We’ve showed them in all the schools around Cumbria and yeah, brought a few tears to everyone’s eyes with our films, but yeah, it definitely has changed the community. 

Chris Allen

Well, as you say your films are out there forever. You know, that’s one part of your legacy as well. I’m thinking more about the way people feel about Ewanrigg. Do they think, ​“hey, it’s a better place to live than it used to be”? 

Reece

I think it has a community that is very close knit, and hosting all these different events, people gather around and develop friendships and everything. I think people are aware that things might be coming to an end soon, but they don’t want us to go anywhere. There’s still, we have a trust and a reputation now, more so than ever. And our attendance rates have gone up quite a lot. 

Chris Allen

Because the money’s coming to end. But you know, hopefully the initiative, all that you’ve been doing, doesn’t come to an end. That’s the important thing here. If people want it to stay, it can stay. And I believe you’ve also been trying to influence the central powers in this country as well Rebecca? 

Rebecca 

Oh yes. So we’ve been to Parliament quite a few times to talk about different issues that we’ve faced. So I say about three, four years ago now, we got invited down to Parliament for a talk about funding in Cumbria, trying to get coops on funding, which we did eventually manage to do. And we were talking to the Minister of Mental Health and the Vice Minister of Mental Health. 

Reece 

Yeah, but we were just there yesterday weren’t we, celebrating the launch of the report of [the All-Party Parliamentary Group for] ​‘left behind’ neighbourhoods. 

Chris Allen

That’s interesting, because, let’s face it, Cumbria is a long way from London. 

Rebecca

Oh yeah.

Reece 

That’s why I think that the community themselves need to hold the purse strings, because they’re [to] know better than anyone else what they need. 

Chris Allen

Thank you. It’s been an inspiration to chat to you and to listen to you and to think, you know, you were only 10 and 11 when it’s all started. I don’t think I had so much grey hair then, but, you know, the way Big Local goes. But it sounds as well, you’ve got a real legacy to leave behind in terms of the change of attitude, certainly the change in the way mental health is seen, the stigma being removed as well, and particularly with young people taking the lead. So thank you. 

Rebecca

Thank you for having us. 

Chris Allen

That was Reece from Ewanrigg Big Local. Before that, we heard from Rebecca, who is the chair of the partnership. With me is our producer, Kirsten. What an incredible pair of young people. 

Kirsten Sinclair

Yeah, as you said earlier, Chris, these two are part of the Big Local generation, and it’s fantastic to learn about the impact of the We Will campaign and how they have made an impact on tackling social isolation and bringing people together from every generation. 

Chris Allen

And I’ve had the chance to have a look at some of the films that we’re talking about there, and they’re very, very moving and powerful. And the information is in the show notes, isn’t it? 

Kirsten Sinclair

Yes, we will put everything in the show notes, which will include a link to The Centre West Cumbria’s website so you can watch We Will’s film ​‘Boy’ for yourself. 

Chris Allen

Thanks, Kirsten, indeed, and yes, we look forward to you joining us next time on the community power podcast, brought to you by Local Trust, discovering what happens when you give local people the money, the power and the assets to make a difference in their neighbourhoods.