There have been many opportunities and changes for us, one of these being that we had to move from our premises at the University of Essex and relocate to our new bigger facility in Prittlewell. This caused a level of disruption and financial concern for us but by investing in this move we have now been able to increase the number of services we can provide and further raise community awareness and capacity around suicide and suicide intervention provision. The new space provides us with an area for additional activities to take place and it was designed and decorated by those benefiting from our work, which further brought them together as friends. This peer support approach was also endorsed by the successful delivery of free mental health first aid and suicide first aid qualification courses for those clients that wished to learn more about how to support themselves and others. We look forward to delivering more of these throughout 2026. Of course, the number of lives we save can be measured only by those that are still here with us, but we have seen a decrease in the number of suicides in Southend overall and we know that we have been a strong contributor of support towards that decrease and hopefully its continuation. We are also now providing external training and have plans to provide not just one-to-one support but wider training on a range of mental health issues around the community to support resilience across Southend. 2025 will be an important year for Friends For Lives and the whole team is looking forward to the challenge ahead as we move vulnerable people from danger and fear to safety and hope. We are continuing to make funding applications that we hope will find favour due to the great work we are doing, and via additional external training which we will look to deliver we are hoping that this can also provide additional financial support. We are entering 2026 with plans to provide not just one-to-one support but wider training on mental health across the community to support resilience across Southend. 2026 will be an important year for Friends For Lives and the whole team is looking forward to the challenge ahead as we move vulnerable people from danger and fear to safety and hope.

Friend for Lives C.I.C.'s stakeholders are those who access our activities and our wider community, local NHS services, public health, companies and other members of the local voluntary sector in the geographical area we work. Our directors are members of our local community and have varying lived experiences of working in mental health, the voluntary sector, of suicide, the NHS and public health. This provides them with valuable insight as well as connections and strong relationships with those stakeholders. Conversations and regular feedback gathered in one to one sessions as well as online surveys and recognized mental health assessments are used to determine whether our visitors are benefiting from our service. This also provides learning and feedback for adapting our future offering. Our the directors have been networking more, locally to raise awareness of the work of Friends for Lives C.I.C. to gather feedback from local NHS and public health stakeholders. Our regular meetings with them have enabled them to provide input into our activities.

During the financial year the total remuneration paid to the directors of the company was £30,060. This remuneration was paid exclusively to [two directors for their day-to-day operational management and project delivery roles.

No transfer of assets other than for full consideration