The Jordan Legacy

The Jordan Legacy was founded by Steve Phillip after losing his son, Jordan, to suicide in December 2019, aged 34.

From the outset, the focus was on preventing suicides - preventing other people like Jordan feeling they had no other option and preventing other families having to experience the enduring pain of suicide loss.

Our mission and vision have since been refined as being to help us move towards a ‘Zero Suicide Society’. We defined this in January 2023 as "a society that is willing and able to do all it can to prevent all preventable suicides" and to take the practical actions necessary to get the suicide numbers in the UK on a long-term downward trend, towards zero.

And as most suicides are preventable, our short-to-medium-term goal must be to prevent most suicides!

To fulfil its mission & vision, The Jordan Legacy (led or facilitated, as appropriate, by Steve Phillip and Paul Vittles):

  • delivers talks, presentations and workshops
  • designs and delivers conferences (including the Hope for Life Conference in Harrogate)
  • runs panel discussions and other events
  • facilitates peer support sessions, eg for those who've completed mental health or suicide prevention training
  • publish articles and papers (including a response to the Government's low ambition National Suicide Prevention Strategy)
  • publishes posts on LinkedIn and social media to educate and be a catalyst for change
  • engages in advocacy and campaigning (including regular meetings with government and major charities)
  • carries out and publishes research, including The Jordan Legacy/MEL Research Survey which is carried out twice a year among a nationally representative sample of 1500 UK residents aged 16+ asking about mental health, suicide and suicide prevention
  • comments on published research
  • provides a platform for diverse lived/living experience voices, including through Jordan's Space, a fortnightly radio show dedicated to suicide prevention
  • provide resources to those working in suicide prevention and those who might be struggling
  • works in collaborative partnership with people and organisations sharing its mission and vision
  • develops breakthrough ideas for suicide prevention
  • publishes strategies and practical action plans to get the suicide numbers down, towards zero.

 

In 2023, The Jordan Legacy carried out an action research project with primary research, as well as collating all action learning over the previous three years, including interviews with people working in suicide prevention, those with lived/living experiences of suicide, and some fresh eyes on the topic, and published a groundbreaking report 'Moving Towards a Zero Suicide Society':

https://thejordanlegacy.com/moving-towards-a-zero-suicide-society-edition-2-of-the-report/

Our focus is now on delivering this practical vision and transformational change programme.

Collaboration is in our DNA!

We know that our 'Zero Suicide Society Transformation Programme' can only be delivered via collaborative partnerships with other people and organisations working in suicide prevention, underpinned by listening to and learning from 'lived experience'.

Equally, we know that competition within 'the suicide prevention sector' (conscious and sub-conscious) is one of the key barriers to progress in getting the numbers of suicides on a downward trend, towards zero.

There are clear synergies with what the Zero Suicide Alliance (ZSA) exists to achieve and we want to realise those synergies and deliver on shared goals and visions.

The Jordan Legacy will do all it can to directly deliver and facilitate via advocacy, campaigning & collaborative partnerships a 'Zero Suicide Society' ("a society that is willing and able to do all it can to prevent all preventable suicides") and to get the UK suicide numbers on a long-term downward tend, towards zero.

We will do all we can, and we will ask government to do all it can for the necessary systems change & transformational shift we need to get the suicide numbers down, towards zero.

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