A POLITICAL activist has launched a campaign to improve mental health services and to bring people of all parties together to help others.

Tory Party member Drusilla Summers, 33, from Eastcott, recently set up Conservatives for Mental Health and is keen to do as much as she possibly can to find answers to difficult questions.

Explaining how she got the idea in the first place, Drusilla said: “I thought about it in December 2016 while looking for ways to get more involved in mental health campaigning.

“For the whole of my adult life I have suffered with anxiety and panic attacks and I tried to understand why it was happening.

“I found that the more I spoke to others about it, the more I realised I wasn’t alone – and that really helped.”

It’s these experiences she wants to harness and turn into something positive by using them to help others suffering from similar afflictions.

Drusilla stressed just how important mental health issues are, especially when local services at Sandalwood Court are under threat of closure.

Earlier this year, the Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership (AWP) revealed plans to close the Stratton suite, meaning that, in a crisis, seriously ill patients would be taken out of the area to the Green Lane Hospital in Devizes.

Drusilla’s campaign has already had the support of South Swindon MP Robert Buckland and the former secretary of state for education and MP for Loughborough Nicky Morgan, who contributed a piece to Drusilla’s website about Conservative mental health policy.

Mr Buckland said: “Having campaigned on mental health issues for a number of years, I am a strong supporter of Dru’s work in highlighting this important issue and the need to remove the stigma that has surrounded mental health for too long.”

The 33-year-old campaigner hopes soon to be in a position to challenge and critique policy and “to see what can be done to improve services for people affected by mental health issues”.

She said: “I want to work with other parties and try to influence policy. This is not just for Conservatives, I want everybody concerned about mental health issues to get involved.

“As a society we have taken great strides when it comes to being able to talk about mental health more openly, but things still don’t go far enough – we can definitely do more.”

Speaking about the challenge ahead, she said: “It is going to be a lot of work, but it will be worth it.”

To find out more, log on to www.conservativesformentalhealth.co.uk and follow them on Twitter with @ConservativeMH.