Agenda item

Rehana Sidat (Founder/CEO -Jamila’s Legacy) will give a presentation on the work and remit of the local non-profit organisation, Jamila’s Legacy, which support and educate communities and organisations in mental health and well-being.

Rehana Sidat (Founder/CEO -Jamila’s Legacy) gave a presentation on the work and remit of the local non-profit organisation, Jamila’s Legacy, which supported and educated communities and organisations in mental health and wellbeing.

During the presentation it was noted that:-

·         Jamila’s Legacy was a non-profit organisation that offered advice, advocacy, support, a listening service, self-care activities and training to individuals interested in maintaining their own mental health well-being and supporting others.

·         Jamila’s Legacy had been bringing people together to increase mental health awareness and deepen understanding since 2015.

·         It had been working at a community and grassroots level, engaging with ethnic minority communities, and had developed an understanding of their needs, barriers and challenges. It was good that schools were talking about mental health but it was not enough.  During a recent presentation most people when asked talked about mental illness and not mental health.  Mental health was not just about diagnosis it was also about being mentally well and healthy as well

·         Stigma and shame around mental health still existed and in some

·         ethnic minority communities there could be additional barriers and challenges to opening up or seeking help due to family and community expectations and/or some cultural norms and beliefs.

·         In the City there were higher levels of poor mental health than the national average reported in 2018.  Locally people were on the CAMHS waiting for 18 months to 2 years or were waiting a year for an appointment with a counsellor.

·         The number of people with long-term mental health problems was significantly higher than the average across England.

·         Mental health disorders in children and young people were also higher than England’s average.

·         Greater energy was needed to be put into prevention, rather than waiting until people reach crisis point.  Education was provided so people could take control and know what they needed to do

·         The project’s vision was to normalise mental health conversations and create a society where people with mental health problems were accepted, valued and felt they belonged.

·         The mission was to educate, build confidence and empower people with mental health problems so that they were well informed of their rights and choices, were able to maintain their own mental wellbeing and become confident self-advocates.

·         The project had been set up with nothing and no building etc but had support and knowledge.  Cafes and the University gave free space and cafés gave free drinks to people who came.  Volunteers received no payments or travel expenses, and they offered support and help for nothing.  The project collaborated with public, voluntary and business sector organisations.  The Women’s Mental Health Wellbeing project funded by the national lottery, the Mental Wellbeing offer was provided by John Lewis and men from ethnic minority groups were encouraged to come forward in safe environment because of the cultural stigma on mental health.

·         The project had supported 1,200 people last year but there was infrastructure to support the small number of people involved.  There also used to be a lot of support groups for parents but they were not there any more.

Members of the Board commented that:-

·         Physical and mental health were both equally important.

·         Cathy thanks and well done – how many people do you help in build resilience do you have resilience support

·         It was a powerful example of what communities could do for themselves and the presentation was both encouraging for the support provided and concerning on the impact upon those providing support.  The Council’s financial system would not allow a small payment to a single organisation, and it was felt that the structures and management needed to change to help in these instances.

·         Social care had looked at the ethnicity of people who accessed the service and it was immediately clear that the people in the system did not reflect the composition of the community.  The difference started at the point people approached the service but once people were engaged with the service the proportions remain static.  It was considered that the communities were not hard to reach groups, but the system needed to change on how it responded to these groups.

·         Attending a memorial event at Crown Hills had been incredibly powerful for the help it had given to people who had lost a great deal in the in the pandemic.  These organisations had resonance in the community and they had links to groups the Council did not have.  It was felt that there was a need to create an associate network involving UHL, LPT and public health to support projects such as this where there was fragile structures at the top and where they were doing very good work.

·         The project was a great example of making a difference and it does it on its own.  There were challenges to relate to this and other small organisations and initiatives would come out the new strategy and then hopefully there would be a structure of support for them.  The was a need to consider providing small amounts of funds at a greater risk for a good cause and to think about how a to build network of people to trust and people know where to go.

The Chair thanked  everyone for their contributions and supported an holistic approach to physical and emotional health.  The Chair supported the idea of an associate network and asked officers and Board members to look at that and start to think what it could look like and share information with the Board.  Offciers were asked to look at school nursing as it currently focus on secondary schools and the project worked with primary schools and these should be joined up involving Heath for Care and Healthy Teams and suggested that LPT looked at the school nursing provision.  The issue of providing finances to a small organisation for a small payment should be reviewed to see how the Council could engage with such organisations and provide them a resource.

RESOLVED:-            That Rehana be thanks for her very useful and provoking presentation highlighting the work and achievements of the project and Board Members consider the issues raised in the meeting and by the Chair above.