A successful first veterans lunch

Published On: August 26, 2025By Gemma Bailey

Recently we came together for our first veterans support lunch at one of our community hubs. The lunch, run by our Support Team, brought together veterans across all disciplines to swap stories over a delicious lunch and to find out what support is available to them.

Many of our residents and staff are veterans so the Support Team identified that this group could benefit from some signposting to the specialist support they may require.

More than half of Army veterans in England have experienced mental or physical health issues since leaving the Armed Forces, a survey carried out in 2024 suggested. The survey of 4,910 veterans, commissioned jointly by the Royal College of GPs (RCGP) and the Office for Veterans’ Affairs (OVA), found that 55% have experienced a mental or physical health issue potentially related to their service since returning to civilian life. Source: here.

In addition, a recent YouGov survey on perception of support available to veterans in the UK showed that 57% of veterans did not know where to go to access support. Source: here.

Andrea Tear, Housing Support Team Manager, organised the veterans lunch and said:

“When I was a Street Outreach Worker earlier in my career, I met lots of veterans who couldn’t access any help because there were no support services for them at that time. I remember one veteran in particular whose marriage had broken down, he was an alcoholic, he’d lost his home and then became an addict. He died from his addiction issue and his story really stayed with me. In addition, my son has served in the army for nearly 22 years so I have an understanding of military life and the difficulties that can be presented as a result.

I lead the Support Team at NPH and have identified veterans amongst our residents. They are a special group of people and sometimes need specialist support because of the experiences they’ve had whilst serving. Some of the support available is new and lots of veterans don’t know about it so my team can help signpost them to the right services.”

Having identified that veterans could benefit from signposting to specialist support services Andrea organised the veterans lunch and invited specialist support organisations along. Resident veterans, local Councillors who are veterans and staff member veterans came together to enjoy a delicious lunch and share their experiences. The organisations who came to the lunch to chat to attendees were:

Armed Forces Covenant Northamptonshire
Defence Medical Welfare Services
OpCOURAGE
Walking with the wounded
DWP armed forces champions

Having so many specialist support agencies in one place was fantastic and attendees enjoyed chatting to them about the support available.

Resident attendee Peter said:

“I was an artillery man and did 8 tours of Northern Ireland. This event has been really useful. I didn’t know any of this support was available. I’ve chatted about mental health and talked about getting my hearing issues checked over – I worked with big guns which has really affected my hearing and didn’t realise specialist health checks were available to me for free.

It’s been nice to share my experiences with other veterans. PTSD wasn’t really known about when I left the forces but I’m so glad it’s being talked about now”

Tony from Defence Medical Welfare Services said:

“We love coming to events like this. We support veterans, those in the armed forces and their families with physical and mental health issues and it’s great to let everyone know about the support that is available”

Paul from OpCOURAGE said:

“OpCOURAGE is a great service available for mental health support for veterans so please use us. I’d like to say to veterans that it is OK to ask for help and we can signpost to lots of support – you don’t need to put on a brave face. Please do contact us and we will help you”

We hope to hold more veterans lunches and that they will form part of our extensive programme of events going forward, please keep an eye out here on our website and on our social media channels for the date of the next event.

Find support here

Find out more about the support available to veterans or those serving in the armed forces here:

Armed Forces Covenant Northamptonshire

The Armed Forces Covenant Northamptonshire provides information and advice on support available within the county for the Armed Forces community and their families.

www.afcnorthamptonshire.co.uk

Email: convenant.ncc@westnorthants.gov.uk

Phone 07741 684647

OpCOURAGE

The Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing Service

www.opcouragemidlands.nhs.uk/

Email mevs.mhm@nhs.net

Phone 0300 323 0137

Defence Medical Welfare Service

Providing a medical welfare service supporting physical, mental health and wellbeing services.

www.dmws.org.uk

Email: tchambers@dmws.org.uk