The REME Mental Health Strategy

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Maintain, Inspect, Repair and Recover: The REME Mental Health Strategy

Scribe: WO1 (CASM) Daniel McNeill

Just last year alone, more REME personnel and veterans died by their own hand on British soil than lost their lives during 14 years of our involvement in the Afghanistan conflict. As I reflect on my time as Colonel REME, our main focus must be on the mental resilience of all members of our REME Family. Most cases of illness and anxiety across the Corps today are no longer connected to deployment issues or combat stress; we must accept that stress is part of our everyday lives. The REME Mental Health Plan “Lifting the Decks” seeks to provide a framework of training and support, that works alongside the Army’s OPSMART, to target the internal battles with depression, anxiety, stress and suicide; battles that are, too often, fought and lost alone. Each member of the REME Family matters and plays a vital role as we evolve and adapt to improve our awareness. Talk to each other, help each other, and support the REME Mental Health Plan.

Col Andy Rogers ADC

After 10 months in post, I can say that the amount of Mental Health (MH) support the team has leant into is a concern. Most notably, but not exclusively, amongst our junior soldier cohort and veterans. In December 2020, the Corps Colonel asked me to look at how the Corps could better support the Optimising Performance via Stress Management And Resilience Training (OPSMART) programme and deliver a supporting Mental Health plan. Our ‘ten-point plan’ was born from real-time feedback when every single feed into the RHQ Command Group indicated a rise in susceptibility to MH problems during COVID. It is worth observing that levels of MH issues across the Army are actually somewhat comparable to wider UK society for any doubters. 1 in 8 of our people in 2020 presented themselves to a MH professional. 1 in 4 will likely suffer from poor MH during their lifetime. For me, this is a sobering combat indicator. Speaking to some of those who have shared their own experiences with me, it’s clear that the stigma surrounding a MH issue has undoubtedly prevented them in the past from coming forward.

The intent of our ‘ten-point plan’ is to support the Army’s OPSMART programme whilst bolstering the impact across the Corps. This will be achieved through focused Corps communications, unit MH Champions, an annual MH & Wellbeing Conference, additional funding streams, respite programmes, ‘Healthy Body = Healthy Mind’ promotions, lived experience articles and more. The REME Mental Health Plan has been titled ‘Lifting the Decks’, an analogy that I think our REME family can relate to. Simply put, it links the need to get inside the decks of a vehicle to the need to get inside our own heads. The correlation is the need to get to the root cause of a problem to solve it. Aimed at all Regular and Reserve REME personnel, it takes the Battlefield Maintenance Functions familiar to us all to re-enforce the stratagem. The tenets of Maintain, Inspect, Repair and Recover will be used to highlight that our troops need to work on maintaining good MH, inspect themselves and their colleagues and - if required - get the help they need to repair and recover. If ‘Lifting the Decks’ is our strapline, the four tenets will become our campaign model.

If you are in a Command position and reading this, I would implore you to look at the Mental Health plan on the RHQ REME SharePoint page. There might just be something that could help you or your team. The link to our homepage was sent to every REME Commanding Officer, OC Workshop, Organisation Head, RSM, ASM and SSM on 10 May 21.

I write this article just days after visiting the family of a former REME Soldier who chose to take his own life. A member of our REME family thought that he had nowhere to turn. Mental Health is a real issue that we need to embrace. Let’s get after this now, as a team.

SLEEP WELL

You may not be aware that poor sleep directly relates to worrying and in turn worrying results in poor sleep. Try to set aside a reasonable time for your mind to rest before bed; you will feel refreshed after a full night sleep.

CARE FOR OTHERS

Your friends are some of the most important people in your life. We are social beings and helping out friends can be one of the most rewarding things you’ll ever do!

It is completely normal to feel overwhelmed with stress and negative thoughts in life and work, ask for help from friends & family, colleagues, or line managers. We are all one team!