Become a Corporate Supporter

Advocacy Support Cymru (ASC) is the largest provider of Independent Mental Health Advocacy in South Wales. When someone is suffering from mental illness, they often find they are unable to get their voice heard or make their wishes and feelings known, resulting in a feeling of being a passenger in their recovery and a sense of helplessness.

Independent Advocates offer these people help and support, empowering them to have a say in their treatment and the things that affect their lives. Advocates offer the means to get their needs and views across to health professionals, services and organisations making decisions about them.

ASC is also a provider of suicide prevention and intervention training and support across South Wales. Through our training, we aim to create suicide-safer communities and empower more people in businesses, organisations and in the community to equip themselves with the skills to intervene and save a life from suicide.

As mental illness becomes increasingly prevalent in our communities, particularly following the effects of prolonged isolation, anxiety and uncertainty as a result of the pandemic, we are experiencing high demand for our advocacy services. More and more people need the support of an advocate to help empower them to stand up for their rights and to have a say in their treatment and care.

Whilst our statutory funding has remained unchanged for many years, demand for the service far outweighs our capacity to support people who desperately need an advocate. We are inviting businesses to support our advocacy services to ensure we continue to provide high quality, independent advocacy to all those who need us. Your support could help us ensure we have the resources to provide advocacy to everyone and empower them to speak out for their rights.

How you can help

  • Every £10 you donate can provide one-hour of advocacy support to an individual in need. The person may be hospitalised and alone, wanting to go home and feeling helpless. Our Advocates can support this person to help them understand the options available and empower them to fight for their voice to be heard in decisions.
  • £20 can fund an Advocate’s presence at a tribunal hearing to determine where an elderly person with dementia should live. Our Advocates can ascertain their wishes and act in the best interests of the person to fight for the best outcome possible, treating the person with dignity and respect.

Fundraising

There are a number of ways your business and your employees could fundraise for ASC:

  • Create a fundraising event such as a coffee morning, run, trek or charity dinner to raise donations and sponsorship.
  • A one-off donation will provide a much-needed boost to support our services.
  • Sales fundraising: you could pledge to donate a % of sales to ASC. You can promote to your customers how you’ll be donating (for example £10 for every new customer or 5% of sales) and donate money once the campaign ends.
  • Customer fundraising: you can ask your customers to support ASC and help raise awareness of our mental health support services. We can supply QR codes or text to donate options for you to include on invoices or leaflets, as well as help set up a Just Giving page to encourage your customers to donate to ASC.

Volunteering

  • Become a Terracycle drop off point. ASC raises vital funds for our service through the Terracycle Recycling Scheme. Local businesses volunteer to collect recyclable waste, such as crisp packets, chocolate wrappers and more from employees and locals. This is dropped off to our office where it’s sorted and sent off to raise money to fund our advocacy services.
    To Note: We will no longer be accepting crisp packets and wrappers after 14th November 2024. Terracycle is closing the scheme.

    Thank you to all who have used the facility and helped raised funds for the charity.

  • Become a Trustee. We’re looking for Trustees to join our Board to help shape the future of ASC and ensure we are the best we can be. We’re looking for trustees with expertise in finance and business management, as well as individuals who may have experience of mental health illness and can help advocate positive change to mental health provision in South Wales and beyond. If you’d like to become a Trustee, there’s further information on this website: https://www.ascymru.org.uk/about/vacancies

Awareness Raising

Raise awareness of our services across your networks and in your local community. We can present advocacy awareness sessions at your place of work, to increase awareness of how independent advocacy can help someone with mental illness and signpost them to support available. We could also host suicide awareness or intervention workshops to empower your colleagues or people within the local community to feel confident in preventing a suicide.

For more information contact Roger Bassett-Jones, Marketing & Fundraising Manager E. rbassett-jones@ascymru.org.uk