Lambeth Suicide Prevention Strategy 2025-2030

• Lambeth Website has been updated to more prominently show information on mental health crisis support. 

• The Jen Group were commissioned to deliver bespoke half-day suicide prevention courses for people who work or volunteer in the London Borough of Lambeth. Over 200 residents attended the training. Feedback has been very positive, and attendees reported having increased confidence in having a conversation with someone who might be thinking about suicide.

• Papyrus UK were commissioned to deliver suicide prevention training tailored to those working with children and young people. Five sessions have been delivered so far. While feedback on these sessions has been positive, attendance has been low, with around 8 attendees per session.

• The Mental Health Promotion Team at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust have delivered “Raising Awareness of Mental Health and How to Help” half-day training sessions for Lambeth residents, frontline staff, volunteers and local businesses. Over 120 people attended the training. 

• STORM delivered a whole day suicide prevention training to a total of 27 attendees in front line roles at Lambeth Council.

• The Listening Place provide ongoing support sessions to those at-risk of suicide, based on active listening and befriending: building trust and a supportive relationship. Between January 2022 to April 2024, they received 2183 referrals of residents from the London Borough of Lambeth, of which 1402 engaged with the service, attending at least one appointment. Funding from Lambeth Public Health contributed to the provision of additional capacity for this service.

• Several organisations have been trained and awarded by the Pride in Practice programme.

• The Lambeth Living Well Alliance has shared signposting and training materials with local communities. This also includes raising awareness of Mental Health training available from South London and Maudsley NHS Trust.
• South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust continued the roll-out of NHS 111*2 to provide urgent mental health support

• The public health team have promoted the services provided by Cruse Bereavement services and led webinars.
• Cruse Bereavement Services hosted a “Suicide – How the community can help” conference in December 2023 to encourage participants to have confidence to talk with people who had expressed suicidal thoughts. There were two speakers, 15 representatives from various organisations as well as a similar number of Bereavement Volunteers. Cruse Bereavement Services are looking to repeat the event in 2025.
• Since April 2022, the South East London Suicide Bereavement Service has supported 48 Lambeth residents affected by suicide

• Between March 2022 and June 2024, Lambeth Cruse supported 28 clients bereaved by suicide. Funding from Lambeth Public Health contributed to the provision of additional capacity for this service.

• The Black Men’s Consortium delivered an International Men’s Day Event in 2023, which included sharing of services to support black and brown men (and those around them) around emotional, physical and mental health issues. 

• The Love Your Mind campaign aimed to support those whose mental wellbeing was affected by the cost-of-living crisis. The campaign involved sharing posters with local community spaces which highlighted the Five Ways to Wellbeing as well as links and QR codes to resources.
• The Black River Counselling service delivered by South East London Mind has provided free, culturally specific, short-term counselling for Black people by Black counsellors and psychotherapists. The service recognises that historically the Black community has not accessed preventative services, especially talking therapies. Black River Counselling has assisted 515 clients since April 2022.

• Oliver McGowan training was promoted to those working with people with autism. This work has been incorporated into the Lambeth All Age Autism Strategy.

• The World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) and #ZeroSuicideLDN communications toolkit developed by Thrive LDN has been shared with the Lambeth Comms team

• Lambeth Council comms team continue to ensure that suicide is treated sensibly and appropriately.

• The public health team now have access the Thrive LDN dataset and quarterly updates are provided to the Suicide Prevention Partnership. 

Delivery:

• Lambeth Council worked collaboratively with colleagues from the SE London ICS as part of a broader initiative to improve the self-harm pathway both in terms of improved data collection and improved experience of care. The current status of this workstream at South-East London level is unclear.