The Cambridgeshire branch of the Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM), which is based in St Ives, has received a donation of £1000 from Barratt Homes, a local home-building company. 

CALM is a national mental health charity focused on leading a movement against suicide. They provide support services such as a helpline and a webchat and organise various campaigns and events.

After the death of a local resident in the Cambridgeshire town which affected many people, local representatives coordinated with CALM to make St Ives the first CALMtown in the country, with the charity operating on a community basis.

Barratt Homes previously sponsored CALMtown when they hosted their ‘Meet the Street’ campaign in February 2020, where 25 streets opened their houses for people to chat with their neighbours. ‘Meet the Street’ has been running since Christmas 2018.

CALMtown and Barratt Holmes have also collaborated on a tea and coffee afternoon, hoping to inspire other streets to get involved with the campaign.

Since events such as ‘Meet the Street’ cannot currently run during the COVID-19 pandemic, CALMtown has instead launched a ‘Together in January’ campaign, placing posters in shops and hanging up Christmas lights.

Matt Finch stated that this latest initiative was a way “to keep January bright and to remind residents that help is available”. He felt that Barratt Homes’s donation “really came at an important time” due to the increased unhappiness caused by the pandemic.

The charity will also use the donation to purchase three “friendship benches”. These will have the CALMtown logo on them with the idea that “if you sit on one, someone will sit beside you so you know you are never alone”.

The managing director of Barratt Homes Northamptonshire, Andrew Swindell, said he was “so pleased to be able to support CALMtown and the fantastic work they are doing”. He added that, as a leading local company, he felt it was important for Barratt Homes to “support local charities and organisations who help the communities near our developments”.

This is especially relevant as mental health continues to be a major national concern in light of the Covid-19 crisis. A recent Telegraph article reported on the concerns of the World Health Organisation about the effects of social isolation and quarantine on mental wellbeing, calling increasing unhappiness a “parallel pandemic”.