Men's Action Network back providing in-person support for men and families in Derry

Men's Action Network - Mental Health Charity (MAN) is back providing in-person support for men and families in Derry.

The charity is now based in the Leafair Well-being Centre in the Shantallow area of the city, following the closure of its Patrick Street premises due to the cessation of its funding in April 2025.

MAN is pleased to be back providing support for men and families within Leafair Wellbeing Centre as of today.

We remain committed to promoting mental health, well-being and community connection.

028 7137 7777
admin@man-ni.org#Derry #Wellbeing pic.twitter.com/7H20h96rK9

— Men's Action Network - Mental Health Charity (@MAN_IN_DERRY) October 13, 2025

Speaking to The Derry News, Michael Lynch, MAN’s voluntary co-ordinator, explained the organisation had subsequently lost all of its staff.

“However, we had a small reserve and using that we were able to keep going until September 2024. After that, we concentrated on keeping our phoneline open, manned by a number of our volunteers right through until the end of August 2025,” said Mr Lynch.

“In that time, we received almost 500 phone calls and, with conversations, we supported callers as best we could,” he added. “If we couldn’t help, we re-directed callers, signposted other services. Our councillors, naturally, had to move on but they offered us a number of hours. When MAN was at its height, we were seeing about 2,000 men a year. 

“So, we held on. We had a discussion. We asked ourselves, ‘Can we open again or not open again?’ We applied for funding all over the place but were unsuccessful.

“That being said, we did receive a lot of extremely supportive letters, even from government ministers and councillors, about the wonderful work we had done, unfortunately, we received no funding. 

“All the time we were discussing whether we were going to re-open and what we could do in the meantime, a lot of people were contacting us and saying, ‘We need you. We need MAN up and running again’ but we still had to find money and support. 

Many thanks to Kayla and her family for running the 'Men's Minds Matter' event in The Cosh last weekend and also their very generous donation to our charity. pic.twitter.com/tjFZT6UmlJ

— Men's Action Network - Mental Health Charity (@MAN_IN_DERRY) October 10, 2025

“We were very fortunate recently that one of our supporters, Kayla, and her family ran a ‘Men’s Minds Matter’ event in the Cosh Bar recently and made a very generous donation to MAN,” said Michael Lynch, who added MAN would very much welcome any other fundraisers to enable it to keep keep the doors open.

“The last thing we want to do is for MAN to close down again,” said Mr Lynch.

“Thankfully, we recently got a bit of good news funding wise. We have received a grant from the NI Housing Executive as part of its homeless strategy. This will take us up to March 2026,” he added.

“This will focus on male victims of domestic abuse and also, maybe, men who have exited prison. We are really trying to give a space where they can get a sense of where they are at and what they might be struggling with.

“W have a range of things we can offer, from support to counselling, and again, linking in with other people. The idea is to, hopefully, keep them in a stable environment. 

“For the last 20 years we have been arguing the Government needed to have a Male Health Strategy.  A very simple thing it could include would be us genderised data because we don’t have the resources to collate such statistics but this would enable us to make the case for funding for different elements of the strategy. But, we have been told, repeatedly, there is no Male Health Policy therefore there is no requirement to do this, which means no funding,” said Mr Lynch.

He added: “it is true, the only times we fund men’s work is when we are in trouble or causing trouble - killing ourselves or dying young because of late diagnoses. 

“That is why MAN is participating in the ‘The Invisible Man: Men’s Health - Look at the State of It’ in Stormont on Monday, November 10, from 9.15am until 12.30pm.

“The aim of the event is to highlight the need for a policy framework in Northern Ireland to improve the health of men.

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The report, which was completed nine years ago, on September 28, 2016, stated: “Urgent remedial action is required to make safe asbestos identified on this site.”

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“The key messages are that the health of men and boys in Northern Ireland is unnecessarily poor, but much can be done to improve it - especially by adopting a strategic health promotion model. Men’s health is not supported by any specific policy, strategy or action plan here, therefore it remains under the radar, and is not an area which is underpinned or driven by statutory improvement targets,” said Mr Lynch.

'The Invisible Man' - Join us on 10 Nov. to discuss men's health and wellbeing.

Long Gallery - Stormont - 0945-1230

Booking Essential: https://t.co/api30CZQEt pic.twitter.com/7AgEmjRMY3

— Men's Action Network - Mental Health Charity (@MAN_IN_DERRY) October 13, 2025

Michael Lynch also pointed out that men “need to take responsibility for many areas of their own health, but also need encouragement, appropriate support service and opportunities to do this”.

“Men’s health is not just an issue for individual men. Health can be determined by other factors outside of a man’s personal control such as genetics, environment, income, education, job, availability of an access to services.

“Tackling this will require new thinking and a cross-departmental approach.”