Charity status for Veterans Respite Centre in Newport

It has been a long 15 months for the people behind the Veteran's Respite Centre, but they say the hard work has paid off.

The effort started as a protest against cuts at Combat Stress in Audley Court, Newport, but grew into a campaign of hundreds of people.

Now they will reopen part of Audley Court as a respite centre for veterans with PTSD, offering help, rest and activities for those who need it.

Pete Neale, the CEO of the VRC, said getting charity status would completely change the way they work.

"By getting a charity number it opens up a lot of doors in the way of funding," he said.

"Now we can raise funds and people can raise funds for us, and they will actually have the charity number on their buckets.

"It makes you look more legit to people. In this day a lot of people are suspicious of donating. when you've got that charity number you've gone through the process, and it's not an easy process. Fifteen months of hard work has paid off."

He said getting charity status was a good reflection on everybody who had been involved in the campaign, as well as on supporters in Newport.

"It must be nice for them to see that everything they've been backing has paid off," he said.

"We want to put something back into Newport. If it's litter picking or helping with social events, anything really. We want to give something back to Newport as a thank you and to continue that relationship of veterans at Audley Court and the people of Newport.

"Thank you to all the supports from Newport for bearing with us over the last 15 months. I wanted to do everything by the book."

Pete said that it was good news, but that he and his volunteers still had a lot of work to do.

He expects the respite centre to open its doors in 2019.

"Combat Stress wanted reassurance we would become a charity," he said. "They didn't want to put in anything legally binding until we were a charity, because otherwise we're just some group.

"We've now got to go back to Combat Stress with our business plan and all our documents and then we'll go forward from there. It will definitely be this year.

"We've had comments from 2,000 to 3,000 veterans – we want to give people what they want. This will be a place run by veterans for veterans.

"It's a bit surreal at the moment. To me it's about when we're open. When that first veteran leaves with a smile on their face. That's when we know we've done something right. Nobody can judge how it's going to go until after the first week and the feedback we get. I'm positive in the group around us and the volunteers we've got so far that we will provide the service we said we would."

Nearly 40 members of staff were made redundant across Combat Stress in 2017, leading to a change in services.

Veterans led by Pete Neale marched through Newport twice in protest to the cuts, which would seen respite care cancelled at Audley Court.

The charity’s chief executive Sue Freeth said cuts had to be made to its services else it risked closing down entirely.

“We do need to get back in the black, because if we don’t then we won’t be sustainable,” she said. “That would be terrible.”