In February, we hosted a series of listening sessions as part of the South London Listens initiative. Our aims were to enable people in the Merton community to share how the Covid-19 pandemic has affected their mental wellbeing, and have their voices and stories shape future services.

As a community hub for Merton, we worked alongside the local NHS, local authorities, and charity Citizens UK who all made the decision to listen to communities across South London to put people before programs and prevent a mental health crisis.

Throughout this project, we connected with members of our charity, and people across South London, and enjoyed listening to individual voices and stories as people shared their experiences from the past year. Whilst we didn’t get the chance to listen to as many people as we hoped, we will continue to be a community hub and charity that listen to our community, and play an active role in building back better in Merton.

To date, the South London Listens campaign has seen local community groups (like us,) mental health trusts, and local authorities listen to over 5,000 people in South London to support and protect mental health locally. If you haven’t managed to share your views and want to get involved, you can still do so in the following survey which will take approximately 10 minutes. Click here to begin.

On a final note, keep visiting Wimblecomm for community news, events, and positive stories concerning Merton. We are still listening, and we always welcome people to get involved in our charity as we work together to keep connecting people, places, and passions across Merton.

Wimblecomm #ConnectingMerton #MertonTogether

Written by Genevieve Etienne-Farrell