New Partnership Project for Armed Forces Community

We’re thrilled to have partnered with NHS Somerset and Ark at Egwood to expand the service and support we offer to the armed forces community.

In 2018, we were proud to launch ‘Victory House’, our dedicated service for veterans who were facing homelessness. This project was introduced as we recognised a rise in veterans within our supported accommodation. Not only this, but we discovered through feedback and research that having a dedicated accommodation service for this client group would be much more suitable for their support needs and would enable us to specialise our support. Since launching, it has been a great help to many veterans and the support network the residents of Victory House create between themselves is of substantial benefit.

5 years later, our work with this community continues to be recognised and applauded, and thanks to that, we were approached by Teri Underwood, the Armed Forces Project Manager for NHS Somerset.

Having recently signed the Armed Forces Covenant, NHS Somerset were dedicated to increasing the support for the armed forces community in the county, and Teri had been searching for voluntary organisations to get involved.

Working with NHS Somerset and Ark at Egwood, two new roles have been introduced in order to launch armed forces hubs to provide key support to the community and those in need. One hub and Armed Forces worker is based at Ark at Egwood, an intergenerational, therapeutic land-based day service in South Somerset. The second role and hub are with us, at Victory House, providing support to the residents of Victory House, whilst also supporting the wider community. A key area of support is  to provide information and signposting to help our armed forces community to navigate the system and find the services and help they need.

We were delighted to officially launch the two new hubs during March at an event held at Ark. We were joined by Deputy Lieutenant Brigadier Toomey, representing HM’s Lord Lieutenant of Somerset and Shelagh Meldrum Chief Nursing Officer at NHS Somerset. Also, in attendance were serving personnel from RNAS Yeovilton, 40 Commando, a number of veterans, charities and other agencies who work with the Armed Forces.
  

There is still plenty of work to be done to get this project off the ground, as we only started 2 months a go! However we’re making great progress, making lots of new connections, and looking forward to what’s to come!

If you are interested in finding out more about our work with the Armed Forces Community, please contact: [email protected]