War veterans to receive £80,000 health funding

MILITARY veterans and their families will share an award of £80,000 to help them cope with the transition to civilian life.

• Housing minister Keith Brown announced that war veterans and families to be recipients of services to assist in adapting to post-military career

• Of the award, Brown said: “Our veterans have served our country and it is right and fitting that we support them when they retire from active service.”

• A total of 11 schemes to be rolled out across Scotland

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The funding was announced by housing minister Keith Brown, a former Marine who served in the Falklands, to support 11 schemes across Scotland.

Shares range from £2,499 for Gardening Leave in Dundee, which offers horticultural therapy, to £10,000 for Health in Mind, which helps families cope with veterans affected by mental illness.

Mr Brown announced the funds at the Thistle Foundation, in Craigmillar, Edinburgh, which received £10,000 for its lifestyle management course.

He said: “Our veterans have served our country and it is right and fitting that we support them when they retire from active service.

“Programmes like the lifestyle management course provide a crucial service helping people readjust to their new lives.

“The professionalism, dedication and continued assistance is second to none at Thistle Foundation and through donations and funding from the Scottish Government Scottish

Veterans Fund, I am delighted that their work will continue to support Scottish veterans.”

Veteran Alex Lamont, who served in Northern Ireland and the Gulf War, has already completed the course and said: “I don’t know where I’d be without Thistle Foundation.

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“There are a lot of former service personnel out there needing help and I just hope more of them can get to hear about this course because it’s changed my life.”

Diana Noel-Paton, chief executive of the charity, said: “We started as a charity supporting wounded soldiers after World War II, so it’s fantastic that our current work with veterans not only gives us a chance to link back to our roots, but also is being recognised as relevant and much-needed.”

The charity was founded in 1944 by Sir Francis and Lady Isabella Tudsbery in memory of their son Robin Tudsbery, a lieutenant in the Royal Horse Guards (Blues), who died in the last days of the Second World War. The award was given four days before the anniversary of his death.