Join the discussion: Loneliness and the Armed Forces Community

October 18, 2022

Sign up today to our webinar: Loneliness and the Armed Forces Community

October saw the Trust launch Tackling Armed Forces Loneliness: An Evaluation of the Trust’s Tackling Loneliness Programme in collaboration with:

• Neighbourly Lab, 
• Campaign to End Loneliness 
• The King’s Centre for Military Health Research (KCMHR), King’s College London,

This in-depth evaluation explores the success of our Tackling Loneliness programme, including identification of best practices. It also explores loneliness and its effect of the Armed Forces community.

Join the discussion

We’re keen for the learning and successes detailed in the evaluation to be widely shared and so we’re delighted to invite those working, or with an interest, in this space, to attend our webinar: Loneliness and the Armed Forces Community, on Tuesday 15^th November 2022, 10am to 11am.

The Tackling Loneliness programme

In 2020, the Trust ran a consultation with the Armed Forces community to discover how important it was for us to focus on reducing social isolation and improving integration and engagement with provision.

90% of respondents said we should focus on social isolation in our future grant making.

From this, we developed the Tackling Loneliness programme, with focus on specific groups within the Forces community, including LGBTQ+ communities, veterans living in remote areas, female veterans, people from BAME communities and veteran carers.

We awarded 60 projects a share of £4 million to help:

• build stronger social networks and friendships
• improve access to local activities and provision
• build emotional resilience to overcome the causes of loneliness
• empower Forces communities to become more independent.

Making a positive difference

The Tackling Loneliness evaluation report explores the outcomes of this funding – what works, what lessons can be learned, and the many ways funding was used to make a positive difference.

The evaluation found multiple examples of services reaching out, supporting people and creating engaging activities that are meaningful and interesting.

Meet the speakers

During our online webinar, you’ll hear from three organisations who each received a grant of £70,000 to tackle loneliness amongst their beneficiaries in the Armed Forces community.

Fighting with Pride have worked hard to build trust amongst the LGBTQ+ veteran community, overcoming reticence to engage in services, particularly when connecting with broader community organisations. Mutual support and building strong networks has been central to their work. Join us to hear more about how they are identifying and including those most hard to reach.

RAF Brize Norton/Carterton Families Centre have been supporting serving families facing separation, isolation and those who are, or perceive themselves to be, single parent households. Their Tea Time Club has become a lifeline for many, being cited as a key asset of RAF Brize Norton’s deployment support, which is considered an example of best practice. At our webinar, you’ll hear more about the specific needs of this community and how the Tackling Loneliness funding has helped.

Brooke House has co-developed their model making club into a more general social hub. The attendees have become very close and value greatly the peer support these social occasions deliver. While an activities co-ordinator was present at the outset of the project, the group have become more self-sufficient as time has gone on, leaving a legacy of sustainability. Learn more about their sustainability success during our webinar.

Exploring the findings of the evaluation

We’re delighted to have our joint evaluators – Neighbourly Lab, Campaign to End Loneliness and King’s Centre for Military Health Research – joining us for the webinar to talk about the evaluation. Plus, we’ll share details of a useful toolkit developed with the learning from the programme, which organisations can use within their own networks and projects to help their beneficiaries overcome loneliness.

Loneliness and the Armed Forces Community

This free, hour-long webinar will feature:

• An introduction from our Chief Executive, Anna Wright
• The experience of loneliness in the Armed Forces community
• The background and ethos of the Tackling Loneliness programme
• Key findings from the evaluation
• A chance to hear from three Tackling Loneliness projects working with specific groups within the Forces community
• How you can use this learning in your own organisation/work
• Q&A with panelists

Next steps

Read the evaluation report

Read the Tackling Armed Forces Loneliness Evaluation Report here and check out our Knowledge Network for an Impact Gallery (featuring quotes and interesting snippets from the funded projects) and the Tackling Loneliness Toolkit.