They're ready to help with a listening ear

Bev Holden of the Fleetwood Listening Post.

A group of Fleetwood residents are offering a 'listening ear' to give people the chance to off-load things or just have a well needed chat.

The Listening Post was first set up as an idea stemming from the recent Mental Health Awareness Week and has since taken off to become a more regular occurrence.

Volunteers meet up on Fleetwood sea front, close to the Beach Kiosk, for informal chats, and they post meeting times on their Listening Post page on Facebook.

The group now has some nine volunteers aged between 17 and 72 and they even have their own special black and white tops so they can be clearly recognised.

The three Listeners on Fleetwood seafront are (from left) Natalie Horabin Jo sharp and Jon Coles.

Bev Holden, a 47 year old mum-of-two, helped set it up.

Bev, a business woman who offers leadership skills to corporate clients, said: “The idea is to offer a kind of listening ear, where people will listen with compassion and without judgement.

“We are not professionals and we do not offer solutions or advice on any problems, we just listen. If people have serious problems we advise them on where they might get help.

“People sometimes find it hard to discuss certain things with their family or close friends and in our group we have people from varied backgrounds - local mums, people with an army background, business people.”

Bev said the group had received help from local businesses.

For more information, visit the groups’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/ListeningPostFleetwood/