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The Charity was officially launched in February 2002 by the Mayor of Elmbridge,
Councillor Wyn Heaseman.
However, our history goes back to 1998 during a research project that was being
undertaken by a group of trainee counsellors at Brooklands College in Weybridge.
Research showed that at any one time, one in six adults experience a mental health
problem – more than will suffer from cancer or heart disease – and many of these
suffer from more common problems such as anxiety or depression yet there were no
low cost counselling facilities within the whole of the North Surrey Area.
As many of the trainees were looking for placements the idea of meeting two needs;
those needing counselling and those needing counselling hours to qualify for their
professional development, was born. Once qualified, three of the counsellors decided
to take the idea further by calling a public meeting to draw attention to the statistics.
From this meeting a steering group was formed that included health professionals,
local business and local clergy.
The original steering group obtained charitable status in 1999, and the group members
became the first Trustees of the new Charity. Further work followed to develop the
policies and procedures to run the new organisation. In 2001a grant from the National
Association of Hospital and Community of Friends enabled us to appoint our first
Co-ordinator and Administrator, and St Peter’s Church in Hersham offered us an office
from which to operate.
In 2002 the Charity recruited its first four volunteer counsellors. We now have
20 volunteer counsellors and receive over 40 referrals a month from health professionals
and from individuals who self-refer for counselling.
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