It all adds up - PLUS Perth's work around prevention and wellbeing

PLUS is a member-led mental health charity and social movement in Perth and Kinross. This spotlight focuses on PLUS’s contribution to prevention and positive wellbeing.

PLUS works on the founding principle that every single person is valuable and assists people in making better lives for themselves, providing the scaffolding for people to begin building a future for themselves upon.

Many of the approximately 400 members of PLUS have experience of mental distress. There is also a Friends of PLUS membership scheme for anyone who agrees with PLUS’s values and principles. The organisation has four staff and fourteen volunteers, and receives funding from a range of local and national sources.

Projects are identified by members, who decide on the most important priorities aligned to PLUS’s vision and mission. One of the main reasons people get in touch with PLUS is to gain a sense of belonging and to find purpose after experiencing a hopeless period in their lives, often brought on by periods of mental distress. Many say they want to give back and help others who are in a similar situation that they once found themselves in.

Examples of projects include:

• Ropemakers Heritage Project, where members have led on the development of a heritage project focused on ropemaking workshops and historical walks.

• Horners Plot, a market garden in the centre of Perth. This is PLUS’s flagship project, offering peace and tranquillity next to the busy South Street.

• A Poetry Group, an enjoyable weekly appreciation of poetry which has been running for many years, and offers time to slow down.

• Artvantage, an art group which emerged several years ago when PLUS members got together and did art. Artvantage have an impressive track record of exhibitions, installations and making art accessible to everyone.

• Loon Braes, a PLUS nature garden on the outskirts of Blairgowrie. Vibrant with flora and fauna it is set in the beautiful Scottish countryside. Volunteers learn about plants, birds and other creatures that visit the garden, and the area has a relaxed community feel to it.

PLUS members taking part in the ROPEMAKERS HERITAGE PROJECT

By focusing on shared membership – being part of a ‘club’ – as opposed to providing a ‘service’ PLUS is growing a movement of people that agree with the same principles, that want to do the same things that they are are actively pursuing. There’s a sense of shared purpose.

Members therefore support each other similar to how it would be in any other close knit club. In PLUS founder andManager, Susan Scott’s words:

“If you've got a group of people that all are of the same purpose, they’ll help each other. They won't go “oh you're nothing to do with me. You're having a hard day. Well, just get on with it yourself.” They’ll rally round because that's what human do when they're part of the same club.”

Artvantage haS an impressive track record of exhibitions, installations and making art accessible to everyone

PLUS works for positive change for all citizens in Perth & Kinross, such as improving mental health and social services, ensuring people are equipped with the knowledge and information they need for good mental wellbeing, offering training to tackle stigma and prejudice and undertaking grass roots community regeneration projects.

The key to tertiary prevention, for PLUS, is valuing people as being able to contribute and take control of their own recovery.

“You're looking at people from a different lens. You're looking for people who have talents and who have abilities, gifts, and who can give something back. It was always the main thing was that people would come and they would say ‘I want to give something back’”

Horners Plot, a market garden in the centre of Perth, is PLUS’s flagship project, offering peace and tranquillity next to the busy South Street.

These case studies were developed as part of a joint statement on prevention from Edinburgh Community Health Forum, Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE), Scottish Community Development Centre, and Voluntary Health Scotland. They show what preventative approaches by the third and community sector look like in action.

Find out more on the PLUS website

PLUS perth offers a range of groups and activities such as a poetry group in which members can unwind in a relaxed environment