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Island charity could close if no funding secured

Fri, 20 Nov 2020

An invaluable Island service, which offers counselling, advice and education to anyone affected by addiction, faces closure unless it can secure critical funding.

Motiv8 provides a lifeline service for thousands of young people in the Isle of Man, offering free, non-judgemental, confidential one-to-one support for locals aged 18 years and under who seek help for their own, or someone else’s, drug use, alcohol use, gambling or e-gaming problems.

A rise in demand for its services in recent years has continued in 2020, particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic with an average 1,050 appointments attended each month, an increase of more than 50%.

Now its future is under threat, prompting Motiv8 to launch a funding appeal.

Charity chief executive, Thea Ozenturk, explained: ‘I am proud to say that our staff have gone and continue to go above and beyond to help those in need of our services. At any one time we have up to 100 young people accessing those and the demand has continually increased. Even during lockdown, we developed innovative ways to work with service users to maintain vital support.

‘On the financial side, each year we must raise at least £150,000 to fund our work with children, young people and families. Sadly, we are simply not going to reach that amount this year and we will have to close if we are unable to secure funding.

‘That would leave the Island without a support service for young people dealing with drug issues, alcohol and hidden harm which can happen alongside substance misuse and, ultimately, can lead to generational cycles of misuse – cycles we are trying to break with early intervention.’

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