Clwyd West MS and Chair of the Senedd Cross Party Group on the Armed Forces and Cadets has made fresh calls for peer mentoring support for veterans to be available across the whole of Wales.

Darren is concerned that accessing such support is currently a postcode lottery, and in the Senedd earlier this year said ensuring peer mentors are accessible to veterans throughout Wales will save money in the long-term.

In a meeting of the Welsh Parliament this week, he raised the need for more peer mentors again. 

Questioning the First Minister, he said: 

“Veterans' NHS Wales is a service that we're very proud to have here in Wales, but, as a Cross-party Group on the Armed Forces and Cadets, we've been looking at the service and whether there's anything that can be done to improve it. 

“One of the improvements that's been suggested to us is the need to embed peer mentors within those services across the whole of Wales. At the moment, there's an inconsistent approach to the use of peer mentors directly by the NHS, and that, I believe, means that some people get a better service than others in some parts of the country, which obviously none of us want to be the case.

“From speaking with Dr Neil Kitchener, who is responsible for leading that service, he reckons that addition funding of £500k would be sufficient to make sure that a gold-standard service, with peer mentors, could be available in every part of Wales. Given the fact that next year marks the eightieth anniversary of the end of the second world war, I feel that it would be an appropriate time to place that investment into service. Is that something that the Welsh Government will consider?” 

 First Minister of Wales, Eluned Morgan MS,  

“I'm very proud of the fact that we give significant support to veterans in Wales, in particular mental health support - £920,000, which is not an insignificant amount of money. I'm not aware of the peer mentoring, so I'll go away and look at that and see how that would work and how effective it is.” 

Speaking afterwards, Mr Isherwood added: 

“Investing in peer mentors would be really worthwhile as we know that veterans who do suffer from things like Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder have a significant impact on public services and can be a significant user of public services in other ways. It would save money in the long-term.”