Funding shortfall sees Cavan counselling service close

Sean McMahon

There is widespread shock and distress in the Cavan region this week with the definitive news that the widely used Cavan Family Resource Centre will no longer provide counselling and psychotherapy services.

The centre's management committee made the decision - "with deep regret" - to withdraw the provision due to lack of funding. The decision comes against a background of "a big increase in demand" for their services.
The centre, which is based at St Clare's Church, says that some of its clients had been referred to them by Cavan General Hospital's psychiatric department.

Despite the withdrawal of the counselling services the centre is still very much open. 

The Board of Cavan Family Resource Centre (CFRC) issued a detailed statement to The Anglo-Celt this week, to further clarify their decision and the implications.
“It is with deep regret that the Board of the Cavan Family Resource Centre (CFRC) has decided to withdraw from the provision of low cost counselling and psychotherapy services to the people of County Cavan. This professional service, provided on a charitable basis, has been working with vulnerable families, children, adolescents and adults for over two decades,” read the statement.  
The statement revealed that the decision resulted from insufficient funding to support the services offered by the CFRC. It outlined that many of the funding streams which sustained services, have been wound down in recent years and are no longer available. The board and management team at the CFRC stress they made every effort to secure new and additional sources of funding this year, but was unsuccessful.
 

Demand 

“There was also a big increase in demand for services over the past few years and this placed considerable extra financial strain on the organisation. Regrettably this means that the provision of counselling and psychotherapy services is no longer sustainable.
“The closure of these services will be an enormous loss to our whole community, not only to those in distress and those who self-referred, but also to the many GPs, Cavan General Hospital Psychiatric Department and the Children and Adult Mental Health Services (CAMHS), who referred their patients to the CFRC for counselling and psychotherapy,” continued the statement.
All of the therapists associated with CFRC were highly qualified and accredited with the IACP, IAHIP, BACP and PSI. The sudden closure of the service has resulted in distress for both the clients currently availing of the service and the therapist group delivering the service over the past 20 years.
The centre continues to operate providing other services such as support for children affected by bereavement through the Rainbow Group, and 14 new volunteers are currently being trained. The family mediation service which has been going for 10 years with the help of professionally trained volunteers is still providing a superb service and they also provide neighbourhood mediation. There were 1,100 appointments for counselling in the past year and in the region of 12,000 families have been helped in the past 20 years.
 

Support

Anyone in distress is advised to contact their GP, doc-on-call (telephone 1850 777 911) or the Samaritans (telephone 116 123) as soon as possible in order to access help. Alternatively those wishing to access counselling privately are advised that they can contact the Irish Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy at www.iacp.ie  or the IAHIP (Irish Association of Humanistic and Integrative Psychotherapy) on www.iahip.ie  for a list of counsellors in their area.