ST HELENS community groups have joined forces at a town centre space to offer a wide-ranging support system for local people – focusing on mental health and wellbeing.

Wonderland Community Centre, on Reflection Court, is a multi-purpose space that offers support with mental health, guidance with official documents, as well as wellbeing activities and after-school kids clubs.

The centre also operates a café and foodbank initiative for those in need.

Linking up with local groups No Duff and Ever-Evolving, Wonderland is now in the process of furthering its support remit - and quickly becoming a community hub that helps the people of St Helens in a range of different ways.

No Duff is a support network that offers services to ex-military and emergency service workers, while Ever-Evolving is an adult social day care provision for people with learning difficulties.

Stephen Baines, who runs Wonderland, said the idea for the centre came after struggling to find any local support for his own mental health.

St Helens Star: Stephen with Sean Tickle, 20, who works at Wonderland's cafe and foodbankStephen with Sean Tickle, 20, who works at Wonderland's cafe and foodbank

Based in Prescot, Stephen explained: “I’ve suffered, and still suffer with anxiety and depression, and I couldn’t get any help from anywhere.”

“I decided then I wanted to open a centre, and everything that comes into the centre now is helping with mental health.”

Despite the difficulties of keeping the company afloat during the pandemic, Stephen recognised the detrimental effects lockdown was having on mental health and perceived the expansion of the centre as a necessity moving forward.

Stephen said: “When we went into lockdown it was like hang on a minute, there’s people struggling. We need to make [the centre] bigger than what it is.”

Recognising the collective impact the pandemic was creating in the community, partnerships with other local groups began to emerge to “tie all this [work] together”.

St Helens Star: Wonderland Community Centre is located at Reflection Court, near St Helens town centreWonderland Community Centre is located at Reflection Court, near St Helens town centre

No Duff, ran by military veteran and ex-prison and police offer Dean Owen, is a support network for people who have served in the military or the emergency services and suffer with mental health problems such as anxiety, depression and PTSD.

No Duff – which derives from a military communications term meaning ‘This is Not a Drill’ - operate a “multi-organisational approach” out of the Wonderland space.

This means the small team can provide a 24-hour-helpline for those in need, along with counselling, guidance with claims, benefits or housing, and basic support from other ex-service members who have been similar positions and understand their experience.

Highlighting the need for a service provision like this, Dean, from Sutton Heath, explained there has been huge numbers of ex-service members coming to their doors since their inception in 2019 – supporting 126 people since August 2020 alone.

While the pandemic may have created - or accentuated - mental health problems for people across the country, Dean takes comfort in the fact that personal problems are now being talked about publicly and more frequently, which spurs on more people to seek help.

He explained: “The more [mental health] is brought into the public, the more we’re going to talk about it and be more aware of what’s actually out there to help.”

Another partnership that has blossomed in the Wonderland space is with Ever-Evolving - an open day care provision for young adults with additional needs.

St Helens Star: One of the children's play areas inside WonderlandOne of the children's play areas inside Wonderland

Aware of a lack of local support for this group of people, Marie Cunliffe created the organisation as a “vibrant” network where young adults could be with their peers, connect with the community, and have the same opportunities as their able-bodied counterparts.

Approaching full capacity at their Thatto Heath hub, the Wonderland site will be used as an “extra space where we can connect to the community”.

Despite only opening in April, Marie explained: “We’re close to full capacity, but we want to expand, we don’t want to say no to anybody.

“We’ve had amazing feedback from service users and parents, so I was put in touch with Stephen to help me out.”

The community space at Wonderland enables Ever-Evolving to both increase their number of service users and their services - which includes counselling, employability guidance, and activities ranging from sports to performing arts.

Passionate about their local area and helping those in the community, Stephen, Dean and Marie are thrilled to have a central, multi-purpose space that offers a vital service to local people.

Developing and sharing contacts through their collaboration, the organisations are building the fundamentals of a wide-ranging support network – able to provide accessible pathways for people to find the right assistance.

Despite their growing network, however, Stephen assures people that they are all family run, and take an informal approach as ordinary people who have been through similar experiences.

He explains: “There is no waiting list here, that’s the good thing because we’ve all been in that situation where you have to wait for six weeks [to get professional help].”

Wonderland is open from 9am - 9pm and their services are open for anybody in the community, even "if it's just a cup of tea and a talk".

Stephen added: “To anyone that walks through that door, I can turn around say that we’ve been there and there is now light at the end of the tunnel.”