Q: What do we want to say?

This year (2010), we want people to realise that they are responsible for stigma and discrimination.  We all have small prejudices, and behave in ways that could inadvertently be hurtful to people with mental health problems.  Before we can stop stigma and discrimination, we need to get people to realise that they’re the ones that are prejudiced.  But we want to get people to feel this for themselves – we’re not pointing the finger or lecturing, as we know this won’t work. 

Q: What do we want people to do?

The call to action across all activity is:
Pledge to end mental health prejudice at www.time-to-change.org.uk
We are asking people to pledge to support the campaign by committing to take action in their own lives to help end prejudice.  This could be keeping in touch with a friend who has mental health problems, supporting a family member, or, for someone with mental health problems themselves, it could be speaking out more about their own experiences. 

People will be able to make their pledge on the website from 19 April 2009, by uploading their photo to our mosaic of faces and telling us what action they’re going to take.  Pledgers who don’t want to use their photo can choose an alternative image instead – the main thing is the pledge they make!  But you don’t have to be online to pledge – we are also distributing pledge postcards locally and through cinemas, and these will be available to order online if you want to distribute them in your area.

Q: Who is the campaign aimed at?

As with last year, the campaign is aimed at people who know someone with a mental health problem, be it a family member, friend, neighbour, or colleague (though we are not targeting carers). In terms of attitude we are targeting ‘subconscious stigmatisers’ – people who don’t recognise that discrimination happens because of mental health problems, or that their actions might be contributing to this. This group generally have low levels of knowledge about mental health problems, and high levels of fear. We want to get these people to realise that their actions and attitudes contribute to stigma and discrimination, and give them the tools and knowledge they need to be able to support friends and family.

Q: Why are you advertising on the London Underground and not in other areas?

Most of our activity – The Mirror partnership, cinema advertising, and online – is national and will reach people all across England.  Unfortunately, we don’t have a big enough budget to allow us to run advertising on public transport all across England.  We have chosen to advertise on the London Underground because we know that by advertising in London we can reach a large number of people, including a large BME audience as well as key opinion formers and influencers.  We do work with other organisations to run local campaigns in other parts of England throughout the year, and aim to have a good national spread of activity overall.  If you’re interested in running advertising in your local area, contact us.

Q: What’s happening locally?

Organisations across England are getting involved and running activities as part of the campaign. Organisations involved include Rethink services and groups, local Mind associations, NHS Trusts, PCTs, councils, universities and local charities and groups – but we encourage anyone and everyone to get on board!  After all, mental health problems affect people in all areas of life.

You can find out what’s going on in your area by checking out the online map.  If there’s nothing happening near you, why not think about setting up something yourself, or contacting your local Trust or PCT to see if they have any plans? If you would like to run your own activity, our toolkit, and ‘campaign in a box’, full of tips, materials and resources will be available from 1 April.

Q: How are people with mental health problems involved?

It’s important that people with experience of mental health problems are involved in every aspect of our work. The strategy behind Time to Change was based on extensive consultation with people with mental health problems and carers, and the programme is guided by a Lived Experience Advisory Panel of 12 service users and carers. We also consulted service users and carers in the planning of the anti-stigma campaign, to help us identify who we should target with the campaign and what its messages should be.  You can see the results of this in our ‘Stigma Shout’ report.

Through the campaign itself, we try to get as many real people’s voices heard as possible.  We know that ‘social contact’ between people with and without experience of mental health problems is a really effective way of breaking down negative attitudes, so through our advertising and PR activity we try to recreate this sense of social contact by featuring people with direct experience of mental health problems telling their stories.  It’s also vital that the star of our ‘Schizo: The Movie’ trailer is nor an actor but Stuart, who has a diagnosis of schizophrenia and volunteered to appear in the film.

We also encourage organisations who are running activities in their own communities to involve people with mental health problems in their events and campaigns.

Q: Is the campaign being evaluated?

We are working with the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London to evaluate the campaign. We are doing this through online interviews before, during and after the campaign. As part of the Time to Change evaluation, the annual National Public Attitudes to Mental Illness survey, conducted by the Department of Health, will also be repeated annually between 2008 and 2011 to allow us to accurately assess changes in attitudes over time.  As well as this we are analysing press cuttings to see if the way in which mental health is portrayed in the media improves, and carrying out surveys with people with mental health problems to find out whether their experiences of discrimination improve over the course of the campaign.  All of this information, taken together, will help us to see what impact we are having and also to compare how well different activities perform – so that we can learn from this to make our future work even more effective.

Q: How can my organisation support the campaign?

• Organise an activity to tie in with our national campaigning - to help you get started, check out our new online toolkit.
• Order our brand new ‘campaign in a box’ – a kit containing all the resources you need to run local activity including a DVD, T-shirts, banner, postcards, leaflets, posters, stickers, and balloons.  There is a ‘Basic’ box which is available free of charge, and a ‘Premium’ box for those who want to do that little bit extra, for which there is a nominal charge of £50.  The box will be available to order from the website from 1 April 2010.
• Run a Time to Get Moving event to engage your local community in the campaign, bringing people together to get physically active for better mental wellbeing and breaking down stigma around mental health. We will support you all the way; download our Time to Get Moving event planner, call our expert event line for advice and get free event resources. Click here for details of all the support you can receive.
• Order free Time to Change materials such as postcards, leaflets and posters to hand out to your networks or display in public places in your community.
• Make a pledge – can your organisation sign the pledge?  How about asking all staff to make a pledge?  Or, you could encourage your networks, volunteers, or service users to pledge by passing on the link or distributing pledge postcards, which you can order online from 6 April.  The online pledge will be live from Monday 19 April at www.time-to-change.org.uk.
• Sign up on our website to receive our newsletter and all the latest updates and involvement opportunities from Time to Change.
• We are on Facebook, Youtube and Twitter, support us online and link to us from your organisation’s website.
• If you would like to advertise in your area or add your organisation’s logo to materials we are happy to share our artwork and work with your organisation to run a campaign.  Contact us on campaign@time-to-change.org.uk. 

Q: Is there anything I can do personally?

• From Monday 19 April 2010, go online to pledge your support at www.time-to-change.org.uk – and encourage your family and friends to do the same! 
• Order a personal action pack, you will be sent a selection of materials and ideas on how to get started.
• Sign up on our website to receive our newsletter and all the latest updates and involvement opportunities from Time to Change.

Q: Who is running the campaign?

The campaign is being run by Rethink, as a partner in Time to Change. Time to Change is a partnership of organisations that have come together to combat the stigma and discrimination that exists around mental health. The partners are Mind and Rethink (Mental Health Media have now merged to become part of Mind). The Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College, London is our evaluation partner.

Q: Who is funding the campaign?

The campaign is being funded by the Big Lottery Fund and Comic Relief.  Overall, the Time to Change programme is funded with £16m from the Big Lottery Fund as part of its wellbeing programme, and £4m from Comic Relief.

Q: Will there be further activity?

Yes, we are planning more advertising and PR activity for September 2010.  We’ll be able to let you know more about this as plans progress.  We’re also encouraging organisations to run activity to engage local communities throughout the year, using our materials and resources.  And don’t forget Time to Get Moving, in October 2010 – a week of fun physical activity events that bring people together to combat stigma.  Get Moving Week takes place 9-17 October, but if you want to run an event before then, you can! 

I’ve got another question...

If you’ve got any further questions then please do get in touch with the campaign team. Our contact details are:

Katrina Emerson, 020 7840 3142 or e-mail the campaign team.