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2024-09-30-accounts

TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT & ACCOUNTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30TH SEPTEMBER 2024

The Talk About Trust, Pavilion in the Park, St John Way, Poundbury, Dorchester DT1 2FG England and Wales charity number: 1186202 Scotland charity number: SCO50360

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SECTION 1

Trustees Annual Report

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THE TALK ABOUT TRUST (Changed from the Alcohol Education Trust In January 2024)

REFERENCE AND ADMINSTRATIVE DETAILS OF THE CHARITY, ITS TRUSTEES AND ADVISERS

TRUSTEES

Victoria McDonaugh MA (Hons) PGCE (Chair) David Cox Stephen Foster Richard Mangnall JP FCILA FInst.D Andrew Morse BSc Hons Keith Newton ACA Jackie Sonner BA (Hons) PGCE Dr Lara Jayne Wear MB BS BSc DCH (SA) MRCGP Alison Winsborough BMus PGCE

CHIEF EXECUTIVE

Helena Conibear

CHARITY REGISTERED NUMBER

1186202 England & Wales SC050360 Scotland

BANKERS

The Co-Operative Bank Business Direct PO Box 250 Skelmersdale WN8 6WT

INDEPENDENT EXAMINER

S J Hough FCA Edwards and Keeping Limited Chartered Accountants Unity Chambers 34 High East Street Dorchester Dorset DT1 1HA

REGISTERED OFFICE

Pavilion in the Park St John Way Poundbury Dorchester Dorset DT1 2FG

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THE TALK ABOUT TRUST (Changed from the Alcohol Education Trust In January 2024)

TRUSTEES’ REPORT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

The trustees submit their annual report and financial statements of the Talk About Trust for the year ended 30 September 2024.

The trustees have adopted the provisions of the Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) “Accounting and Reporting by Charities” in preparing the annual report and financial statements of the charity.

PUBLIC BENEFIT

The trustees confirm that to the best of their ability they have consistently complied with their duty to have due regard to the guidance on the public benefit published by the Commission in exercising their powers or duties.

with the Charity Commission for England & Wales on the same date (Reg. No. 1186202) and the Scottish Charity Regulator on 31 July 2020 (SC050360). In January 2024, the charity changed its name to the Talk About Trust and is now governed by a new constitution dated 5th February 2024.

Historical Annual Reports and Accounts have been removed by the Charities Commission from their website but remain available to view at talkabouttrust.org/about/policiestrustee-reports-funding/

TRUSTEE APPOINTMENT

Trustees are appointed by the management committee and serve a period of three years at which time they resign by rotation and can offer themselves for re-election.

STRUCTURE, GOVERNANCE AND MANAGEMENT

GOVERNING DOCUMENT

The Alcohol Education Trust was originally a ‘Trust’ governed by a Constitution drawn up on 18 October 2010 and registered with the Charity Commission for England & Wales on 2 November 2010 (Reg. No. 1138775) and the Scottish Charity Regulator on 21 June 2018 (Reg No. SC048482). With effect from 1st April 2020, the Alcohol Education Trust changed its legal status from a ‘Trust’ to a ‘Charitable Incorporated Organisation’ (CIO) and it became governed by a constitution dated 6th November 2019 and registered

THE MANAGEMENT TEAM & TRUSTEES

The board of trustees meets 4-5 times a year. The Chief Executive runs the charity with support from one full time employee and five part-time employees (Northern Manager, the London & South East Manager and sessional support, the Schools Coordinator and the Finance & Governance Manager and Assistant), and five other part-time selfemployed staff. Five people are based regionally in different parts of the UK ensuring schools have local support for training and parent sessions.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST TEAM

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Trustees
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Helena Conibear Founder and CEO

Kathryn Karen Soraya Arnott-Gent Perryman Williams Northern Midlands, South London and Manager & West Manager South-East Manager

Sophie Alisa Julie Whitcombe Christie Sutton London and Scotland Finance and South-East Manager Governance Regional Manager Trainer & Youth Outreach Manager

Kate Alison Hooper Rees Schools Web Manager Coordinator and Publishing

Lucy Kerry Naomi Roberts Smith Jones Digital Community Finance and Engagement Engagement Governance Manager Manager Assistant

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TRUSTEES

VICTORIA MCDONAUGH, CHAIR OF TRUSTEES

Victoria was Head of History and Head of Year with a responsibility for PSHE in a large comprehensive in Cricklewood, London. She was a governor of Bryanston School and was High Sheriff of Dorset in 2009/10.

DAVID COX, FUNDRAISING & MARKETING

David retired as the Chief Executive of The Benevolent charity (now named The Drinks Trust) at the end of 2018, a role he took up in April 2013. The Drinks Trust supports current and past employees of the UK drinks trade with practical, emotional and financial help when faced with a variety of difficult circumstances, including serious illness, disability, issues with stress or depression, with debt or any family crisis such as a seriously ill partner or child. David has built a deep understanding of issues concerning alcohol and the importance of early intervention and alcohol education. David is a Liveryman of three City Livery Companies and brings a wealth of skills to The TALK ABOUT Trust in governance, fund raising and management.

JACKIE SONNER, SAFEGUARDING & POLICY

Jackie recently retired as Deputy Head teacher at a large Primary Federation in Weymouth. Her responsibilities included staff recruitment and training, curriculum design and implementation and safeguarding. As the Designated Safeguarding lead Jackie witnessed the devastating impact on children and their families where there is misuse of alcohol and other substances, and worked with a range of professionals from Health, Social Care and other agencies to provide considered and effective early intervention. In previous roles in 2 other Dorset schools Jackie gained additional expertise in PSHE and Early Years education. As such, she observed the effects of adult role models and peer pressure on even the youngest children in school and understands the need for high quality education in all aspects of PSHE from the start. Since retiring, Jackie has sought to maintain links with education and become involved in her local community volunteering at a local Dorchester school and at the PIPs holiday club for local children and is a school governor with link responsibilities for safeguarding.

KEITH NEWTON, FINANCE AND PIP DIRECTOR

Keith is a member of the Australian Institute of Chartered Accountants. In a career of 33 years at Accenture he worked as a global management consultant specialising in strategic and technology consulting for large scale private and public sector organisations working in Sydney, Chicago, Seoul and Hong Kong. He is a company director, an investor, and advisor to a number of UK and international businesses and charities. He is currently Chairman of the West Country Branch of the Britain-Australia Society (BAS); a Director of the National BritainAustralia Society; a trustee of the BAS Education Trust – BASET; and an advisor to the board of an English public school having previously served as a Member of the Board and Chairmen of the Finance and General Purpose committee. He serves as a charity trustee with a specialty in finance.

ALISON WINSBOROUGH, RESOURCES, FRAMEWORK AND IMPLEMENTATION

Alison has strong experience of delivering PSE, previously as Head of PSE and Citizenship at the Sir John Colfox School and currently as Head of Citizenship and Head of Sixth Form at the Isle of Portland Aldridge Community Academy.

Alison has worked with an abundance of outside agencies such as AA, SSCT, Safer partnerships, healthcare professionals, Ansbury and other local stakeholders. She is currently Designated Safeguarding Lead for the 6th form and part of the Academy’s Safeguarding Team. She has 3 young children.

DR LARA JAYNE WEAR, MEDICAL CONTENT AND SAFEGUARDING

Trained at Imperial College London including a BSc in Physiology, qualifying in 2007. Lara moved on to hospital rotations at Frimley Park, Surrey and Brighton, Sussex. She lectured in Anatomy at Brighton Medical School before moving to Cape Town where she specialised in Paediatrics and gained the Diploma in Child Health in 2011. Lara decided to pursue her career in General Practice from this point and enrolled in the Wessex GP training programme which brought her to Dorchester, Dorset in 2012. She completed her GP specialist training in 2015 and has been working as a GP in Dorset since this time, becoming a GP Partner at The Prince of Wales Surgery, Poundbury in 2019.

RICHARD MANGNALL

Richard lives in Dorset but spent most of his professional life in London where he is a Freeman of the City. He practised for over 40 years as a Chartered Loss Adjuster, dealing with a variety of insurance losses including fine art, movie production, advertising and contingency. He is a Fellow and Past President of the Chartered Institute of Loss Adjusters.

In parallel with this, he sat on the Westminster Bench (then located at Bow Street & Horseferry Road) latterly becoming Bench Chair for 4 years. He is a past Trustee of the Inner London Magistrates’ Courts Poor Box Charity which assists offenders with rehabilitation. On leaving London, he sat on the Guildford Bench and then, upon moving to Shropshire, on the Telford Bench. He is currently a member of the Dorset PCC’s Panel monitoring out of court disposals by Dorset Police. In this latter capacity and during his time on the Bench he has been all too well aware of the part played by alcohol in offending, particularly among young people, and the need for rehabilitating outcomes.

STEPHEN FOSTER, LEGAL

Stephen is Head of the Divorce and Family partner team at Stewarts Law. In the Legal 500 2016, Stephen is recommended for his “pragmatism and gravitas” and his reputation as “a strong leader who can manage any situation or individual and steer things to a successful outcome”. Chambers describes him as “a great lateral thinker” and Stephen is named as one of the top 10 high asset family lawyers in Spear’s Family Law Index.

ANDREW MORSE, PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND PIPS DIRECTOR

Andrew recently retired from the Royal Navy after 35 years as an officer in the Fleet Air Arm flying and instructing on the Lynx helicopter and simulators before transferring into Programme/Project/Requirements Management in 2004. He brings a range of skills to the TALK ABOUT Trust including project development and management, an understanding of evaluation, training, support and infrastructure, plus time, budget and cost management skills. Andy continues to work part-time as a Reservist in the field of procurement and programme management for the Wildcat helicopter. Having served in the RN and as a father of two, he has an excellent understanding of the need for life skills education to ensure young people are able to make more informed responsible choices about alcohol.

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Vicky McDonaugh, Chair of Trustees

In September 2010 the AET, as it was then called, celebrated becoming a charity. In 2025 we celebrate the TALK ABOUT Trust’s 15th birthday. I have been lucky enough to watch the charity grow since its inception. It has been a privilege to work with our founder and CEO, Helena, whose vision and energy, with her amazing team has brought such success to our

work in improving young peoples’ knowledge, skills and resilience to drug and alcohol related harm.

By her vision, I mean in particular the building of PIPS. Not just as an office and income stream for the charity but as a much loved community hub for residents of Poundbury. We moved in January 2021 and PiP Café and community hub now produces some 20% of the funds we need to support children and young people to make safer choices day to day across the country.

As young people’s use of substances changed to less alcohol and more problematic cannabis use and the advent of vaping, we saw that the charity needed to expand its work beyond alcohol to reflect the challenges that children are facing. The change in name reflects the fact that we now include cannabis, vaping, ketamine, NOS, MDMA, county lines, drink spiking, consent and vulnerability as well as safety round alcohol in our remit. Our new TALK ABOUT Trust website went live in February 2024 and has had 80,000 users.

In June 2025, The TALK ABOUT Trust will host the 5th Alcohol and Drugs Education Conference at Bournemouth University with an array of eminent specialist speakers. These events as well as our day to day training have been hugely successful as seen by the high levels of audience satisfaction on evaluation showing professional rating levels of 9/10 for our training and resources.

Over the last 15 years we have expanded our work to cover all regions of England and Scotland thanks to our dedicated and highly experienced regionally based trainers, you can explore some of their outreach over the year which is key to the successful delivery of our programmes.

2024 saw two wonderful endorsements of The TALK ABOUT Trust’s work. We won the TEACH SECONDARY AWARD for best free secondary school resource and Helena was awarded a much deserved honorary Doctorate from Bournemouth University for 15 years of dedication to producing evidenced outcomes for early intervention and prevention work in alcohol and drugs education.

Victoria McDonaugh MA PGCE Chair

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST THEORY OF CHANGE

SERVICE USERS

ACTIVITIES

SHORT TERM OUTCOMES

LONG TERM OUTCOMES

MISSION

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CHARITABLE OBJECTIVES

To advance education for the benefit of the public concerning the issues of alcohol and substance use of young people (age 11 and upwards) in the UK and their safety around alcohol and other substances, in such ways as the trustees decide, and including through the development and delivery of holistic, life skill and evidence-based approaches and diversionary resources and activities that build resilience, reduce underage drinking and substance use and alcohol and drug related harms amongst such young people (age 11 and upwards).

OUR IMPACT & REACH 2023/24

6,000+

teachers and youth professionals were trained and supported via 346 workshops, conferences and familiarisation sessions. In 2023/24 10,311 teachers and professionals received our bi -termly updates & advice.

500,000 +

Allowing one year group per school, we estimate that over 500,000 children in over 2,100 settings used Talk About Alcohol games, films, activities and lesson plans this year.

20,800 +

Young adults (16 – 25 year olds) in 416 settings such as Foyers, YMCA, and Princes Trust have been provided with workshops and resources on alcohol and cannabis, higher harms, county lines, consent.

Scotland

As well as supporting children in schools,

youth clubs and sports clubs across Scotland, we have trained 162 staff from 5 partnership charities and an additional 623 professionals from 28 organisations that provide training, support and education for young adults across the country.

18,000 +

110,000 + active users on our youth facing websites talkaboutalcohol.com and life-stuff.org, and our resource site for teachers and youth professionals, talkabouttrust.org. There were 27,000 users of talk about alcohol and 13,000 visits to safer nights out and drink spiking on life-stuff.org

vulnerable children and children with additional learning needs were supported in 170 new and via existing settings such as special schools, children’s homes and pupil referral units through activity packs tailored for young people at higher risk of alcohol-related harms.

960 +

schools, youth clubs, sports clubs special schools, children’s homes and charities received Talk About Trust resources during the 2023/24 year.

DELIVERING AN EVIDENCED-BASED PROGRAMME THAT REDUCES ALCOHOL-RELATED HARM NATIONWIDE FOR LESS THAN £1 A CHILD

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OUR VISION

WHO WE ARE

The TALK ABOUT Trust work is built around three pillars: supporting young people, their parents and carers and the professionals who work with them:

Early intervention and prevention approaches for children and young people

Ensuring we equip young people with the knowledge and life skills to make safer choices before any potential problems begin. This primary goal has been enhanced with targeted work for children most vulnerable to alcohol and drug misuse, plus harm reduction approaches for older teenagers and young adults including support on cannabis and vaping.

Supporting teachers and youth professionals with everything they need to deliver effective and engaging alcohol and other substance education (training and resources) Evidence shows that trusted adults who know the children well are best equipped to deliver health education. The TALK ABOUT Trust therefore provides workshops, training, online and face-toface support and resources for teachers, youth workers, health professionals and those working day-to-day with 8 - 25 year-olds of all abilities and backgrounds. This is both an affordable and sustainable model as those trained are then confident and equipped to use positive life skill approaches and can cascade their learning to others.

Empower parents and carers

Parents and carers are the key suppliers of alcohol to young people (70%) and play an essential part in setting boundaries and being good role models. These ‘tough love’ skills delay the age that young people drink or use other substances and the amount that they drink or experiment. The TALK ABOUT Trust therefore facilitates workshops and seminars and has a dedicated web area for parents and carers, with advice varying from the law, the physical and mental effects of early alcohol use to hosting parties.

WHAT WE DO

Intervene early

We aim to reach children before they begin drinking or experimenting with vaping or drugs and help them work out why it makes sense to wait until they are older (if they choose to drink) and how early and heavy drinking or substance use increases their risk of injury, accidents, health harms, grooming, exploitation and assault and makes them more vulnerable to others. We use evidenced approaches to build young people’s knowledge, resilience and life skills, helping them make more responsible, informed choices as they encounter alcohol and other substances. A new key focus is working with younger children to raise awareness of vaping.

Harm reduction

As young adults begin to navigate the world of parties, pubs, clubs, festivals and independence, we equip them with the knowledge, awareness and strategies needed to stay safer around alcohol and other substances such as cannabis and vaping. We have specific programmes addressing drink spiking and safer nights out as well as how alcohol and substance use affects consent and increases other vulnerabilities.

Train the workforce

We train teachers and professionals to deliver evidence-based, interactive and enjoyable alcohol and drug awareness to children and young people of different abilities and backgrounds in a variety of settings. This includes schools, special schools, pupil referral units, alternative education, sports and youth clubs, school nurses, the police and youth justice teams.

Improve learning and life chances

Our interactive activity-based and award-winning Talk About Alcohol programme for schools with additional elements for SEN settings is proven to improve knowledge and significantly delay the age that teenagers choose to drink whole drinks, so reducing harms and improving health outcomes. We have also applied our knowledge and resilience approaches to vaping, cannabis, ketamine and other substance education for all abilities and youth settings. We focus our support in regions where alcohol and drug related

harms are highest and have targeted approaches for those most vulnerable to alcohol and drug misuse, such as care experienced children and victims of childhood trauma.

Sustainable, affordable legacy

The teachers and youth professionals that we equip with the knowledge, skills and resources to support young people ongoing around alcohol, cannabis and vaping become our ambassadors and cascade their learning to others. This means our programmes cost under £1 per young person. We continue to mentor those we train with new and updated resources, provide professional development and ongoing phone/email support via our highly experienced and regionally based staff.

Strengthen role models and boundary setting

We build parental confidence, knowledge and skills to talk and support their children around alcohol, vaping, cannabis and other illicit substances. We encourage parents and carers to be good role models, to set and stick to boundaries, to monitor their children and to understand the risks associated with underage drinking and experimentation, particularly in unsupervised settings.

Provide diversionary activities

We encourage and facilitate diversionary activities for young people that build community cohesion and so help reduce anti-social behaviour, crime and the onset of drinking and substance use.

Provide engaging evidenced based information, workshops and online resources for young people

Lecturing, scare mongering and ‘just say no ‘ messages are proven to be ineffective in changing young peoples’ attitudes and behaviours to alcohol and drug use.

The TALK ABOUT Trust uses highly evaluated discussion-based activities, rehearsal strategies and interactive approaches with young people in a variety of settings both face to face and online that build young people’s decision-making skills, resilience and ability to resist peer pressure and so make informed, safer choices. young people’s decision-making skills, resilience and ability to resist peer pressure and so make informed, safer choices.

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MISSION

To keep young people safe around alcohol and drugs, improve life chances and reduce negative risk taking. We support teachers, parents, carers, community leaders and those under 25.

OUR GOALS

CORE OBJECTIVES

SUPPORT CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE

SUPPORT SCHOOLS AND ORGANISATIONS

EMPOWER PARENTS AND CARERS

ENHANCE COMMUNITY COHESION

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WHY ARE WE NEEDED?

CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE

The problems

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Our solutions

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SCHOOLS AND YOUTH PROFESSIONALS

The problems

Our solutions

COMMUNITIES AND FAMILIES

The problems

Our solutions

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REFLECTIONS ON THE YEAR

PROBLEM SUBSTANCES REPORTED BY CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE

Helena Conibear, Founder and CEO

2023/2024 has been a momentous year for our charity, first of all with our change of name from The Alcohol Education Trust to The TALK ABOUT Trust in February. Our landmark programme and young people facing learning hub has always been ‘Talk About Alcohol’, so this was a natural step for us as we talk to children, parents, teachers

and other professionals about vaping, cannabis, spiking, county lines, NOS, risk of addiction and other topics day to day. The name ‘Talk About’ gives us the flexibility to respond to the ever changing priorities of the young people we work to protect across the UK, more recently around SNUS and nicotine pouches, understanding nitazines, illicit vapes and vape spiking, for example.

VULNERABILITIES AMONG CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE STARTING TREATMENT

TALK ABOUT DRUGS, ALCOHOL AND NICOTINE EDUCATION (DANE) – encouraging indications that our new programme discourages experimentation and use among young people

Source: Children and young people’s substance misuse treatment statistics 2023 to 2024

Since June 2023 we have been piloting and trailing ‘talk about drugs alcohol and nicotine Education’ across Dorset, informed by focus groups of Year 9 and Year 11 students and their teachers. This suite of resources covers five chapters on influences and choices, which explores classes of different drugs, their effects, the law and who influences our choices, followed by three specific chapters on alcohol, vaping and other nicotine

products, cannabis with a closing chapter on ‘where’s the harm?, ‘ looking at the effect of individual drug use on county lines, modern day slavery, crime, intimidation, sexual exploitation, community, self and others.

The content is informed by the substances of experimentation used by young people (vaping, tobacco, alcohol, cannabis, cannabis edibles, NOS and to much lesser degrees MDMA and Ketamine). The substances for which some 14,300 under 18s needed treatment (23/24) are overwhelmingly cannabis (87%), followed by alcohol (39%) and then nicotine. By far the biggest risk for needing treatment is early onset of use, followed by using more than one substance together – so of course, as a charity, this is what we prioritise.

Celebration of TALK ABOUT Trust launch February 2024 at our community hub and café, Pavilion in the Park, with keynotes given by Colin Weston JP, then High Sheriff of Dorset, Vicky McDonaugh DL, Chair of Trustees, and Helena Conibear, CEO and Founder

We are very grateful to The Dorset Police and Crime Commissioner David Sidwick, who is joint national lead for Drugs and Alcohol at the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners who has made this work possible and to the academics and MSc students from Bournemouth University and UCL Institute of Behaviour change who have evaluated the pilot and informed the subsequent revisions so expertly.

Quantative results - all pupils

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Dr Chloe Casey, Bournemouth University; Tasha Board, Head of School, Chesil Cove; Alison Winsborough, Head of School, Church Ope; David Sidwick, Dorset Police & Crime Commissioner; Helena Conibear & Karen Perryman TALK ABOUT Trust; & pupils from Talk About DANE pilot school, The Atlantic Academy

A MOVE INTO PRIMARY SCHOOLS FOR THE FIRST TIME

Those of you who have followed our charity since our founding in 2010 will know that we started supporting pupils aged 11- 16 in school settings to make safer more informed choices around alcohol, using engaging games, discussion based learning, films and activities. We then understood how children with additional learning needs or young people not in education or in alternative education were at higher risk of alcohol related harms and so introduced our programmes for SEN and a targeted programme covering cannabis and alcohol for more vulnerable 16 – 25 year olds.

We have now, tragically been asked to meet the need of children at Primary level using vapes, many of which are illicit often containing highly dangerous ingredients - one in six vapes confiscated in schools has been found to contain spice – a highly addictive form of synthetic cannabis. Dealers use colourful and fruit flavoured vapes to lure children as young as 8 into county lines too. We have hosted two round table with Primary Head Teachers in 2024 to map their needs and thanks to funding from the Local Alliance Groups and Dorset Heath Trust will have a suite of games and activities that will raise awareness of risks and build resilience in an engaging and interactive way for Years 4 and Year 6 in 2025.

SPIKING REMAINS A KEY ISSUE - WORKING CLOSELY WITH UNIVERSITIES AND FE COLLEGES TO KEEP THEIR STUDENTS SAFER

With over 6,500 cases of reported drink spiking in 2022/2023 (NPCC), up from 5,000 in the previous year, for the third year, we have supported students with ‘report and support’ advice cards, posters, stands at fresher fairs, talks and online advice via life-stuff.org and on TikTok in over 90 Universities and Colleges during 2024.

Our drink spiking campaign has included in depth work across North Yorkshire with the support of The North Yorks. Police and Crime Commissioner and very importantly with University nursing staff, welfare officers and sexual health nurses. Emergency department and Minor Injury Unit nurses and staff are often the first point of contact for the victims of drink, vape and needle spiking. We have developed an SMS messaging service for them to use signposting to advice and information for victims or witnesses on how to report the crime and receive support. It is very pleasing to see that campaigning is leading to a standalone law on spiking and investment in better drink testing and blood/ urine testing technology by the Home Office who hosted a very productive round table of all stakeholders this year. The Police have also run targeted campaigns at key times such as over Christmas and New Year and during Freshers.

CPD QUALITY ASSURANCE

Another big step for us this year was joining The CPD Standards Office. This enables professionals attending our training to obtain formal certification and CPD credits – one awarded for each hour of training. The first course to be accredited is our 16+ training on alcohol, vaping and cannabis for professionals with 3 points.

This will be followed by our KS3 Drug, alcohol and nicotine education for teachers again with 3 points awarded. To find out more, please email kathyrn@talkabouttrust.org

THE DRUG EDUCATION FORUM

A small group of drug and alcohol specialists including ourselves founded the Drug Education Forum in 2024. A simple online format provides guest expert speakers and knowledge share on emerging research, specific substances, trends and promising education programmes every quarter, we

have welcomed Professor Fiona Measham, Professor Adam Winstock and Professor Harry Sumnall as keynotes to date. With between 150 – 200 attendees per 2 hour session, this gives practitioners the opportunity to upskill and meet each other in a cost effective way. You can learn more by visiting drugeducationforum.org.uk/

THE CONTRIBUTION OF OUR OFFICE, COMMUNITY HUB AND CAFE

Our café and community hub is approaching its fourth Birthday in March 2025, we can’t quite believe that! Not only does Pavilion in the Park provide holiday clubs, team hang out days, after school art, family fun days, a book swap, Summer music in the park, digital help, senior social coffee mornings and creative clay workshops free of charge for the local community, our wonderful building also hosts a weekly chess club, a deaf group, a home schooling group, a rock choir, the Park Run, The Junior Park run and so much more! A huge added benefit is how Debbie, Laura, Jess, Jenna and the team provide a substantial contribution to the core needs of The TALK ABOUT Trust Each Year, we are so glad we moved from a garden garage after 10 years!

Training all society and club welfare officers and key staff at Gloucester University over 2 days

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NEW TRUSTEES, AMBASSADORS AND ADVISORS

We are so lucky to have such committed and talented Trustees at The TALK ABOUT Trust. Vicky McDonaugh, our Chair has been a Trustee since we were established as a charity in 2010 and we have the expertise of a Medic, experienced Primary and Secondary school teachers (acting and retired), a lawyer, an accountant, former charity CEO’s, procurement and insurance. Their skills inform and help direct our work and ensure that we reflect our mission and are financially secure. You can read about our Trustees and staff here.

Another way that we ensure our work is current and informed is through our network of advisors and ambassadors. It has been a great pleasure to appoint Naomi Howell – Steven as our ambassador with a lead of LGBTQ+, Teighler on cannabis and psychology, Rhiannon Eaves on spiking and an anonymous ambassador on problematic alcohol use in young adults. Not forgetting the wonderful young people who take part in our focus groups and trial our resources of course!

OUR PROFESSIONAL COMMITTED STAFF

As CEO and founder, I can truly say that the incredible outreach that we manage, supporting children, teachers, professionals in some 1,100 settings across England and Scotland this year, would not be possible without our wonderful team. Kathryn Arnott-Gent has brought her enthusiasm and knowledge to children and professionals across the North for the last decade, Karen Perryman, now approaching her 60th Birthday works tirelessly to inform, inspire and encourage good practice across the Midlands and South West, I seriously don’t know where we could be without Julie Sutton’s financial, governance and HR wizardry or Alison Rees’s amazing web and design skills or Kate Hooper’s managing everyone’s requests, monitoring our impact and so much more!

It’s been wonderful to welcome two more to our dream team this year, Ailsa Christie, who has a wealth of knowledge regarding children with additional learning needs (ASN) although trained as a secondary teacher has joined us to look after Scotland, and Sophie Whitcombe, the youngest member of our team, bringing a fresh outlook and ideas as a secondary school teacher. Sophie is working alongside the fantastic and experienced Soraya Williams across London and the South East. It never fails to astound me as we reach the end of each year how many children, young people and professionals we have helped, upskilled, supported and provided the life skills needed to make safer more informed choices to – it is so rewarding for us all.

RECOGNITION FOR OUR WORK

We always ensure that our programmes are piloted, trialled and evaluated so that we can understand if they are increasing the knowledge and reducing the inclination to experiment or use illicit substances among young people. It is always heartening to receive recognition for this work however, so we were thrilled to win the Teach Secondary award for best free resource in 2024 as well as highly commended for our SEN resources.

The most wonderful recognition of all of our hard work in preventative and harm reduction education, was the truly humbling accolade of being awarded an Honorary Doctorate

of Education from Bournemouth University in November. It has always been a huge privilege to share our passion, lessons learnt and best practice with students and academics, and this also formalises my guest lecture status at Bournemouth University and at UCL.

LOOKING AHEAD

2025 is our 15th Birthday year and we plan to celebrate in style!

5th Alcohol, Drug and Addictions Education conference 2025

First of all, we are holding our 5th Alcohol, Drug and Addictions Education conference at Bournemouth University on the 18th June. We have some wonderful speakers including Professor John Macaulney (on gaming and gambling harms), Escape Line on County Lines, Face2 Face on substance misuse risks among the neuro diverse, ourselves on vaping and ensuring drug, alcohol and nicotine education programmes are trauma informed, and appropriate for a diversity needs and backgrounds. There will be workshops in the afternoon as well as the opportunity to receive CPD accreditation for TALK ABOUT trust programmes.

We are also hosting two large fundraising events in 2025, something we only do every five years so that we don’t ask for promises or support from the wonderful businesses, patrons and friends who so kindly support us and attend our events to often!

Gardeners Delight – question time lunch and auction of promises 28th June 2025

There will be an opportunity to sit down with an array of gardening experts, including former Head Gardener at Highgrove on the 28th June.

Black Tie Dinner, Minterne House October 2025

We will hold a dinner and auction of promises. For more information or to be involved in any way, please email helena@talkabouttrust.org

A HUGE THANK YOU TO OUR PATRONS, FUNDERS AND THOSE WHO COMMISSION OUR WORK

After 15 years of providing evidenced engaging and evaluated alcohol and drug education across England and Scotland thanks to the support of individuals, other charities, organisations and grant making organisations, we are so grateful to those who continue to make our work possible. Our work evolves each year to meet the new challenges that children and young people face – from the rise of use of vapes and pouches to the move of drug sales and marketing to social media platforms.

Thank you for enabling us to build the knowledge, skills and resilience of children and young people in schools, youth clubs, children’s homes, alternative education and other settings - empowering them to make safer choices and so improving their health and life chances.

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TALK ABOUT Trust outreach from our community hub, Pavilion in The Park

The use of our Pavilion as a community hub is fulfilling its remit so well, providing a regular space for Chess Club, NHS Midwives, social prescribing, the deaf community group, walkers, The Park Run and Junior Park Run and The Teaching Alliance for Dorset Special Schools, for example.

We have expanded our clubs and social events, ensuring they include opportunities for all ages and abilities. From Holiday Clubs, teen hang out days, after school art club, creative clay, senior social, digital help classes, supper clubs, a book swap and more.

We have also hosted Summer music at The Pavilion and special events for Halloween, Easter and Christmas. You can read our community outreach report here.

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RESOURCE

DISTRIBUTION & REACH

Kate Hooper, schools and youth organisation coordinator

Examples of comments from those attending training: “The session was delivered with knowledge, passion and humour. Very good.”

“The training was so informative. The trainer was great and made the session interactive and showed some very useful resources too.” “Thank you we don’t have any vape training regarding children and young people so this has been invaluable.”

“Thank you for the training. It was really engaging and useful in terms of resources available and interactive online games.”

What a busy year it’s been with our name change, new regional staff, the development of our new drugs lessons and expansion of topics we cover! We have supported nearly 1,100 settings UK-wide, many new and others returning users with hard copies or downloads of our resources. It’s always interesting to see the huge range of settings supported which this year included Public Health, youth clubs, Barnardo’s, libraries, councils, children’s homes as well as a wide variety of schools including independent schools, special schools and pupil referral units.

Due to the cost of production and distribution, we are moving away from hard copies towards online versions for some of our resources such as the guides for parents and carers and for young people we support. We will always continue to make our activity boxes and teacher workbooks available in hard copy form , however, as teachers and youth professionals tell us that they use them year on year. Across England and Scotland our dedicated small regional team delivered an incredible 222 training workshops to professionals in 1,149 schools, youth clubs, sports clubs, youth charities, special schools, pupil referral units and alternative education settings this year. Those trained include cadet leaders, police education teams, school nurses as well as teachers and youth professionals. 96% of those trained say they will use the interactive skills learnt from the training and 95% will use social norms to highlight how few young people use alcohol or other substances harmfully.

In addition this year, we have doubled our direct outreach to young people with delivery of lessons, assemblies and drop down days and have been involved in 124 other events such as conferences and regional PSHE meetings.

Following our training, we ask attendees for feedback. Respondents rated our training and resources as 9/10 overall, which was great to hear. Other findings showed:

“What I really liked was the practical and visual experiments with what alcohol measures look like. I think this is huge when teaching people about alcohol consumption so we will use these going forward.”

When downloading our resources, we ask people to tell us how they heard about us. A quarter of respondents heard about us via a recommendation, which is wonderful, and 74% of respondents from schools said they have timetabled PSHE lessons. 32% of those downloading our resources asked for further help such as personalised advice, further resources and training sessions.

We have continued our important work around spiking this year and this has included providing colleges and universities with our anti-spiking posters and awareness cards, training and support. We know that these are hugely appreciated by the settings receiving them, especially around Freshers’ Week. I am look forward to another exciting year in 2025 for our 15th anniversary!

HARD COPY RESOURCE DISTRIBUTION BY REGION

HOW PEOPLE HEARD ABOUT US

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REPORTS FROM OUR SPECIALIST TRAINERS

Our regionally based staff work to support our three key pillars of:

Supporting and engaging children and young adults

Supporting and training teachers and health professionals

Empowering parents and carers and to protect young people

This helps fulfil our goals to

Our small band of regionally based staff, Kathryn (The North), Karen (Midlands and The South), Soraya and Sophie (London and the South-East) and Ailsa (Scotland), who both joined us this year, provide Drug, Alcohol and Nicotine Education (DANE) for young people, training for teachers and youth professionals and workshops for parents and carers nationally. This year we trained over 1,100 teachers and professionals working with young people of all abilities and backgrounds. Teachers and health professionals are given an insight into activities and approaches that inspire young people to learn through enjoyment – by providing evidenced but fun activities, ‘bottom up’ materials that build resilience, self-esteem, encourage working in groups, role play and ‘rehearsal strategies’. The Talk About Trust takes a positive engaging approach that does not attempt to induce shock or stigma, but focuses on what young people can do to be healthy, stay safe, enjoy, make a positive contribution and achieve physical and mental wellbeing.

By engaging younger people BEFORE they begin drinking, vaping. smoking or experimenting with substances in an unsupervised environment, we ensure that children and young people think about the consequences of short-term decisions. Our programmes develop the skills and knowledge needed to make informed choices about when, if and how much to drink as they reach the legal drinking age and the short and long term consequences of substance use, Following training, those trained are fully supported online via talkabouttrust.org with a fun learning zone for teenagers talkaboutalcohol.com, with regular updates and newsletters. 6th formers and students are supported with a comprehensive wellbeing hub lifestuff.org

Having regionally based staff also ensures that the Talk About Trust reaches more young people in different settings and can effectively target the geographical areas where substance-related harms for under 25s are highest. Our regional staff help train young health champions, students studying health and social care as part of their outreaches to ensure peer mentors are engaging and knowledgeable.

Using data from the indices of deprivation as well as substance treatment statistics for Under 18’s and hospital admissions for U18s in England and Scotland, we focus our resource on young people in areas that need our support most including East Tyneside, Birmingham, Lancashire, Leeds Liverpool and Manchester, Cornwall, The Isle of Wight, Kent and Dorset, as well as all areas of Scotland where alcohol and drug related deaths are nearly twice those in England.

Parents and carers are also supported locally by our specialist coordinators around ‘tough love’ parenting skills, setting boundaries, the law and how to keep their children safe around alcohol. Research shows that unless parents/ carers are good role models, set boundaries and know where their children are and who they are with, any efforts by schools/other organisations to reduce risk taking, including underage drinking and substance use are limited. Parents/ carers are also the key suppliers of alcohol to those under the age of 18. The Talk About Trust specialists engage parents and carers via school and the community. We also have a dedicated web area for parents.

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Kathryn Arnott-Gent, Northern Manager

This year has been unbelievably busy with our 16+ support and the new vaping training sessions and lesson plans have been particularly popular. Around 120 sessions have been delivered across the North, both to staff supporting young people up to the age of 25 as well as a number of direct sessions to students. It has been great to support students in Yorkshire attending York College, Craven College and Ripon Grammar school who have all received sessions around alcohol, vaping and cannabis. There’s been fantastic engagement with young people and important face to face discussions around spiking including vape spiking and I look forward to continuing this stream of work across more Colleges and Universities in the North of England.

In addition to teachers, police, lecturers, youth workers, Youth Justice workers, residential staff and community safety teams, student welfare officers have attended our train the trainer events both virtually as well as face to face.

Particular highlights have been the connections made with Colleges and Universities, particularly across North Yorkshire, and with thanks to funding received from York & North Yorkshire Office for Policing, Fire, Crime and Commissioner, we have been able to engage with thousands of young people and the staff who support these young people. It’s also very exciting to carrying out similar work across Cheshire thanks to the wonderful Crimebeat charity.

STAFF SESSIONS

With thanks to The National Lottery Community Fund, we were able to complete our project with training sessions for teachers from Orchard school and 4 further sessions, including multi agency sessions for the Children’s Safeguarding Team, Children & Families Team, The Girls’

Brigade and a fabulous virtual session for a number of secondary schools across Humber.

“Such a great session for our staff that will 100% support our offer to learners.

“We appreciate the way it was delivered very interactive and involved for all participants. Thanks.” Orchard School, Grimsby

“From my own perspective, this training was excellent and I definitely feel that school staff will find it hugely beneficial”. Susie Talbut, Effective Practice Consultant

“I loved your positivity surrounding young people and how many are actually taking part in the activities. It isn’t often thought and presented that way around it was refreshing ……. Both the girls and leaders learned lots. It was great learning about unit measurements and drink spiking, especially surrounding the needles”. East Riding Girls’ Brigade.

Our North Yorkshire Funding has allowed us to deliver numerous 16+ staff sessions as well as the student sessions detailed below. Staff from the Police, Colleges, the Youth Service, Youth Offending Service, Inspire Youth and Community Safety Hub have all received our resource pack and staff training sessions.

It was also an honour to attend Inspire Youth’s opening in their brand new premises – back soon to deliver our vape training.

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“Thanks for Friday, it went really well and I heard some great comments afterwards!”. Cheryl Parker, Substance Use Officer, NYC Youth Justice Service staff

It was a pleasure to deliver a session for around 200 staff From Craven College. I delivered 2 sessions, a cannabis session and a vaping session. Fantastic interaction online – so many questions and really great to hear that staff now feel more confident to engage students in constructive conversations. Looking forward to returning to deliver a face to face alcohol session.

“Kathryn’s support through staff training around the current risks and support on drugs, alcohol and vaping has been paramount to us as safeguarding team and as a college to have this up to date knowledge so that we can support our students. She is so kind, friendly, knowledgeable and very flexible within supporting us. With our staff training it has made staff feel more confident, knowledgeable and able to help student on an earlier basis”. R.Simpson, Craven College

I spent a fabulous full day with staff from RossCon Training LTD in Blackpool. We looked at all of our resources, including our Talk About Alcohol Resources for the younger age group, plus our 16+ cannabis and vaping. Some great discussions around alcohol, cannabis and vaping. Great fun pouring unit’s and playing the alcohol clock game, introduced our ‘characters’ to illustrate how to use a distancing approach, discussed social norms around drug use and also spiking including vape spiking.

RESIDENTIAL CARE HOMES / LOOKED AFTER CHILDREN Our work with residential care homes, for some of our most deprived and vulnerable young people up to the age of 25 has been so well received and continues to flourish.

“Great informative course with excellent tools ideal to better engage our young people.” Parkwood Care Home, Manchester Huge thanks to A Wilderness Way who have commissioned us to deliver monthly sessions to new staff on Alcohol & Cannabis – around 40 staff are trained every month - a total of 500 staff to date. I am delighted to say that this partnership will be continuing next year. It’s always a pleasure to support Cheshire West and Cheshire Special Guardians

and they were my first group to receive our fantastic vape awareness training. Always such an engaging group – they loved the resources and we used the quiz cards to generate discussions to illustrate how to start a conversation with their child, a further session was also delivered to look at our older resources for young people aged 16+ around alcohol and cannabis and I’m looking forward to returning this year to deliver our brand new County Lines Awareness training.

“Thank you for coming yesterday to share with us your wealth of wisdom. As always, you delivered a brilliant presentation.” Belinda Dean, Special Guardianship Advisor, Cheshire West & Chester Council.

After an incredible decade with The Talk About Trust, I’m thrilled to be leading our CPD accreditation for our resources. This will not replace our day to day free training but give a welcome addition for professionals who require in depth training on alcohol, cannabis, vaping and other substances according to age, ability

and need. As a staff we have learnt so much from attending Ketamine, county lines, cannabis, safeguarding trauma informed approaches and NOS training and are really excited to be able to offer our expertise to others.

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Karen Perryman, Midlands, South and West Manager

My work for the Talk About Trust is so varied and rewarding. Training youth professionals, parents and carers and working with older teenagers and young adults to empower them to avoid negative risk taking. Here are some of the highlights of my busy year across the South West and Midlands.

TEACHER TRAINING

With our proven to work six ready made lesson plans, teacher training is at the heart of what we do. Working with Healthy Schools, PSHE, safeguarding, pastoral and support staff, training has taken place in many schools including across Dorset, Devon, Gloucestershire, Derbyshire, Wolverhampton and Staffordshire.

Magna Academy, Poole

“We have made sure to promote the Talk About Trust in all our monthly newsletters, on our award guidance documents and during our webinars/ information sessions with schools”.

“Your online resources are exactly what we use to support schools as part of their whole-school approach to preventing, reducing and delaying substance use.” Bristol Healthy Schools

“Very informative and helpful, feel much more confident to deliver sessions for our young people.” St John Houghton CVA, Derbyshire

TRAINING STAFF AND VOLUNTEERS IN YOUTH SUPPORT ROLES

A very important part of my work is training those who work in youth support roles to help them empower young people to make safer choices. TAT’s train the trainer model and resources mean that we provide a legacy for future generations. Working in

partnership with a wealth of councils and organisations, I have been able to offer this to a large number of individuals. Examples of these partnerships include both Dorset and Derbyshire Councils where training sessions were available for anyone working with 11 – 25 year olds. These partnerships alone account for many, many organisations/individuals supported this year.

“Loved information to back evidence, guidance on how to deliver course and how to engage crew members. Course content was relevant. Thank you so very much for a very informative course. I can’t wait to share in our talk about sessions with crew. The course was delivered in an extremely friendly way.” Allsorted

Dorset Council Children’s Services employees

“Great session and so much usable information. Taking away more awareness of support in crisis, conversation starters and information to support young people.” Dorset Youth Worker

“Looking forward to choosing from resources; thank you for your time and offering these resources in our work with young people, it really helps boost our confidence in working with them on what can be tricky subjects.” 1st Fatfield Scout Troop

“I liked the idea of getting the young people to come up with their understanding first and then show the facts. Very visual, not too over complicated.” TACT South West

“Karen is a fantastic friendly, knowledgeable trainer.” SWISH (Somerset Wide Integrated Sexual Health Services)

“Resources are excellent, trainer delivery was effective and concise, presentation was informative but efficient - Overall, loved it!” NGage with Aquarius, Midlands

Dorset Police Safer School team

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TRAINING AND INFORMING HEALTH PROFESSIONALS

Working in collaboration with school nurses, we ensure that they have training and resources to enable conversations with young people.

SPECIAL NEEDS STUDENTS

Having worked in partnership with SEN specialists, TAT’s resources ensure that our messages can be communicated with young people of all abilities. I especially enjoy this area of my work and have the opportunity to work with amazing special schools and organisations.

Quay School, Bournemouth

“I learned a lot of new things. The focus on how to support students who have already started vaping was very helpful.” Quay School, Bournemouth

“The fact that the training and resources are based /prepared for SEN students is a huge bonus.” F lexible Learning Team, Gloucester

SUPPORTING OLDER STUDENTS AND VULNERABLE YOUNG ADULTS

Through interactive workshops, assemblies and attendance at students’ fairs, I have had the privilege of working with hundreds of older teenagers across the whole of the South West and Midlands. Communicating social norms messages and harm reduction/ resilience strategies both face to face and virtually, the participation and enthusiasm of students demonstrates the positive impact we have on young people helping to reduce negative risk taking.

The Woodroffe School, Lyme Regis

I had the privilege of working with The Chatterboxes, a youth action project run by young people with disabilities aged 11-25 years old from Bournemouth, Poole and other parts of Dorset.

CONFERENCES AND NETWORKING

Attending conferences is a fun part of my work and a brilliant way to provide training and resources, network, form new partnerships and

spread the word of the valuable work we do. This year I had the pleasure of running workshops at the Gloucestershire Healthy Living and Learning Conference.

WORK WITH UNIVERSITIES AND FE COLLEGES - ADDRESSING SPIKING AND SAFER CHOICES

In summary, a very busy year forming new partnerships whilst all the while offering support to existing schools and organizations partners, all to help keep young people safe around alcohol and other substances. None of this work would be possible without the generous funding we receive. Thank you.

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Soraya Williams, Manager London and South East and Sophie Whitcombe, London & South East Regional Trainer and Youth Outreach Manager

Soraya was joined by Sophie, a secondary school teacher and our youngest member of staff in October 2024 and both have had the privilege of collaborating with a diverse

group of teachers, youth practitioners and engaging with young people to deliver educational sessions on various topics, including the safe use of alcohol and information about cannabis and nicotine. A few highlights of the year follow!

HEALTH PROMOTION CONFERENCE AT MARCHWOOD BARRACKS

It has been very interesting to support the military and police in a range of settings in 2024, one was Marchwood Barracks, where Sophie delivered three sessions to over 100 soldiers at their Health Promotion Conference. Explaining the safe use of alcohol by exploring units, how the body breaks down alcohol, and the potential effects of binge drinking and dependency and the potential effect on health, family, performance and military career resulted in reflective debate and engagement. Soldiers were shocked by the shared information on the quantity and availability of illegal vapes, as well as how the negative effects of nicotine withdrawal might impact a soldier’s deployment.

HEALTH AND WELLBEING CONFERENCE AT SOUTHAMPTON UNIVERSITY

As part of our train-the-trainer sessions, Sophie visited Southampton University for their Health and Wellbeing Conference and led two training sessions with PGCE students on teaching young people about alcohol in PSHE lessons, focusing on binge drinking, alcohol norms, and delaying the age at which young people start drinking. We highlighted the spiral curriculum design and introduced techniques for assessing knowledge. Students engaged

with our 16+ Alcohol Clock Game to explore how alcohol affects the body. We also discussed the consequences of drinking and strategies for empowering students to make informed decisions and resist peer pressure.

LEIGH STATIONERS’ ACADEMY (LSA)

Sophie had the pleasure of attending LSA to train their Year 8 and 9 tutors on vaping and alcohol. Our resources have contributed to their long-term PSHE curriculum at Key Stage 3. This training equipped the tutors with knowledge of vaping and alcohol consumption, including peer pressure, to help them facilitate conversations during their PSHE sessions.

KINGSTON COLLEGE

Soraya and Sophie attended Kingston College to host an information stall and engage with students on a one to one on alcohol and vaping at their “Be Safe” drop down day. They engaged in meaningful conversations with students about safe drinking limits for social situations, using measure cups to demonstrate these guidelines effectively. Additionally, discussions were held about vaping and cannabis through our interactive spinning wheel true-or-false game.

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EAST SUSSEX PSHE NETWORK

Delivering training to all PSHE leads across a region on one is always a fantastic opportunity - it not only gives RSHE leads a chance to share best practice, challenges and discuss emerging issues, such as spice in illicit vapes, county lines and safe guarding issues for example, but is a highly efficient way for us to ensure all secondary schools in a region receive our resources and the training needed to be able to implement our drug and alcohol education effectively and with confidence.

East Sussex is such a well organised PSHE network and it is always a pleasure to showcase a different topic, activities and games each year at their conference in Eastbourne, and the feedback is always so positive.

EAST Sussex PSHE conference 2024

ST DUNSTAN’S 2024 YOUNG PEOPLE AND ADDICTIONS CONFERENCE OPEN TO PSHE LEADS IN LONDON SCHOOLS

St Dunstan’s Young People and Addictions conference, Mansion House

It is unusual for a school to organise conference on addictions and to make it open to PSHE leads from schools across London. The school organised a fascinating day for teachers at The Mansion House courtesy of The Lord Mayor of London. Over 90 teachers had the opportunity to learn about vaping, the neuroscience of addiction, and teaching effectively about drug education and the risk of addictions. We were pleased to engage the attendees on how to make RHSE on drug, alcohol and nicotine addiction more engaging and effective and are pleased to be supporting St Dunstan’s with the 6th form facing conference on young people and addictions this spring, again open to students in secondary schools across London.

MAKING RSHE MORE ENGAGING AND EFFECTIVE TEACHER TRAINING

Working closely with the senior leadership and pastoral teams in schools with a deep dive into their PSHE/RSHE provision can be hugely effective and reassuring for staff, so we have really enjoyed developing this stream of support for teachers across the country during 2024. In London we supported the PSHE leadership at Hampton School and The London Academy for Excellence (LAE) for example and inspired them to incorporate more interactive resources, more class participation and less ‘top down’ information/ lecturing type RSHE provision.

At Framlingham College we spent two days not only ensuring staff were up to date on knowledge on drug, alcohol and nicotine awareness and education, but also delivered workshops to every year group across the school in an age appropriate manner.

NEW LGBTQ+ RESOURCES IN DEVELOPMENT

Sophie, with the support of our LGBTQ+ Ambassador, Naomi Howell-Steven, and in collaboration with Free2Be, are in the process of developing new LGBTQ+ resources with a harm reduction approach.

These resources will guide LGBTQ+ youth to navigate the risks associated with substance use, how to seek support, and when to do so. Naomi is also helping us create information tailored for individuals focusing on Freshers and queer nightlife to equip 18+ LGBTQ+ adults with the tools to make safer choices.

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Ailsa Christie, Scotland Manager

I feel extremely privileged to have joined the team at The Talk About Trust during 2024 and committed to using my background, leading an Additional Support Needs department in a large Secondary School, to support taking forward the great work The Talk About Trust has been doing across Scotland for many years.

In Scotland, substance use among our young people remains a significant public health concern, with alcohol, nicotine, and cannabis being their most used substances among young Scots. Research consistently shows that these substances have longterm negative effects on physical and mental health, academic achievement, and social development. Harms associated with substance use are farreaching, and we know that early use of alcohol, nicotine, and cannabis is linked to an increased risk of physical and mental health issues, as well as the potential for young people to develop problematic use over time.

Substance misuse among young people affects their ability to learn and achieve at school or college, hindering the development of skills necessary for future employability. In 2023, there were 1,194 alcohol-related deaths in Scotland. Drug deaths also remain a critical issue, with 1,051 drug-related deaths recorded in 2023, contributing to Scotland’s position as having one of the highest drug-related mortality rates in Europe. The HBSC international study of school children also showed that Scottish children have the highest cannabis use in Europe among boys and among the highest vaping use among girls.

These statistics highlight the ongoing need for effective, evidence-based education in Scotland to help young people navigate the pressures and challenges they face, while promoting healthier choices and reducing the potential for harm.

MAPPING TO SCOTLAND’S NATIONAL PRIORITIES

Everything the TALK ABOUT Trust does is completely aligned with Scottish National Priorities. Our work supports the ‘ National Improvement Framework How Good is our School Quality Indicators’ , and is closely aligned to principles and values of ‘ UNCRC Rights Respecting Schools’ programme, ‘ The Nurture Principles’ and The Promis e for our care experienced young people.

We are so lucky to work collaboratively with so many amazing partners. At a recent impact review with Inspiring Scotland’s Youth Action Fund , ourselves, partner organisations and representatives from key funding organisations gathered to discuss and unpick adversity and barriers that our young people face and looked together to evaluate the impact of our work and identify solutions to support young people into long term, sustainable positive destinations.

TRAINING

Our training is a key part of this and during 2024 I was lucky to work closely with our Inspiring Scotland partner organisations FARE, Action for Children, Enable and Aberdeen Foyer. Delivering our training to ensure that all trusted adults can offer quality educational experiences that make a direct impact to disadvantaged young people building their resilience and ability to make safe, healthy informed choices. I’ve had the pleasure of clocking up miles visiting Glasgow, Edinburgh, Motherwell Aberdeen and Paisley. Our partners and others receiving our 16+ training have varied daily roles, supporting young people aged 16 – 25 with wellbeing, employability, sustaining engagement in Further Education at College and supporting those young people facing the challenge of homelessness/housing issues. Staff received our 16+ toolkits and games and activity-based resources to allow them to hold workshops of drugs, alcohol or vaping with the young people on their caseloads.

Action for Children, Glasgow

Enable Works, Motherwell

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Staff from Aberdeen Foyer receiving our vaping training. All who attended fed back that they left with some new knowledge and with inspiration in terms of their approaches with the young people they work with. A lovely warm welcome on a very cold snowy day, with soup and sandwiches for all.

Street league, Paisley

We have worked closely with Street Assist for several years, so supporting night time economy volunteers with training on Alcohol and Spiking in Edinburgh and how nights out can be made safer.

Staff at Hillside ASN School in Aberlour receiving the first of 3 sessions on Vaping. They shared post session that their confidence levels in holding conversations with young people in their school had now increased and that they had used strategies and knowledge from the session in real life scenarios from the very next day.

Evaluation of our impact has been overwhelmingly positive. Combining responses from Scottish schools and youth

organisations the average overall rating for our training is 9.51 out of 10. Comments highlighting new knowledge and insight, the useful level of detail and statistics on social norms and a marked increase in confidence of attendees in their ability to now add value to the work they do with young people.

FEEDBACK

“Great day, looking forward to developing our PSE course with this included.”

“Enjoyed the training. Knowledgeable and engaging trainer.”

“Amazing day! Loved the session.”

SCOTTISH SCHOOLS

We are thrilled to have extended our reach across Scottish Secondary Schools during 2023/24 with training being delivered in many local authorities, including new areas such as Falkirk where Falkirk High School, Graeme High School, Denny High School and Grangemouth High School and Council staff explored how to embed our resources and make positive impact for their young people.

Falkirk Council INSET Day

A full day training at Lochaber High School in Highland Council enabled teachers and support staff from 4 local schools linked together in their learning to ensure they can offer the best support to their young people.

“Learned more knowledge about substance abuse and feel confident talking about this to young people.”

“Really useful training that will help me deliver more confidently to young people.”

“Ailsa delivered the training excellently. It was very informative and interesting!”

“An excellent delivery and really keen to build on these sessions to bring in alcohol and family learning twilight sessions.”

“Brilliant session, evidence-based and very useful.”

“Very useful with lots of information about resources to use. Many thanks”

LOOKING AHEAD

Looking ahead to 2025: we are working with many new organisations to raise awareness of our amazing free resources and our training offering: Youth Futures Glasgow, Youth Scotland, Link Academy, CVS Children’s Forum – Central Scotland’s Third Sector Interface. We are also expanding the number of local authorities who are aware of how easy it is to access our free, fully evaluated resources and use them within their schools to support their young people. The challenge to ensure that ALL Scotland’s Young People have access to effective, informed substance education to prevent early use and reduce harm continues.

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TREASURER’S REPORT AND FINANCIAL REVIEW

Julie Sutton - FINANCE, HR and Governance Manager

Our charity changed its name from the Alcohol Education Trust to the TALK ABOUT Trust in February 2024 to reflect that we cover a range of other substances and topics in addition to alcohol such as cannabis, spiking, vaping, indeed all aspects of drug, alcohol, nicotine education.

In 2023 & 2024 we completed a large piece of work to develop and pilot a new suite of drug, alcohol & nicotine resources and teacher training for Dorset secondary schools and will now be moving to roll this out across Dorset schools and will then make the programme freely available across the UK. The widespread use of vapes, and other nicotine containing substances, by young people is causing an increasing amount of concern and we have recently been awarded funding from three sources to create vaping resources and training for primary schools in Dorset and for primary & secondary schools across Glasgow & Clyde.

Our primary focus remains training teachers and professionals, developing the knowledge, skills and resilience of children and young people to enable them to make safer choices and supporting parents and carers through our network of highly experienced regionally based staff. We continue to provide our core ‘Talk About Alcohol’ programme, our tailored activities and resources for children with SEN and ASN, resources for informal settings such as youth and sports clubs and our 16+ work on alcohol, cannabis and spiking across England & Scotland.

Locally, we run a variety of very successful community activities and diversionary activities for young people from the Pavilion in the Park in Poundbury.

Income for the year amounted to £342,032 (in line with last year).

INCOME 2023-24

Incoming restricted funds during the year amounted to £171,205.

EXPENDITURE 2023-24

Expenditure for the year amounted to £286,412 (up £10k). Expenditure from restricted funds during the year amounted to £154,688.

RESTRICTED EXPENDITURE 2023-24

This was principally expended on:

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Incoming general funds amounted to £170,827. This included an impressive £84k from PiP Café comprising a donation from their 2023 profits of £57,139, rental of £8,000 plus a contribution of £7,418 towards the shared costs of the Pavilion and £11,082 for shared staff costs.

Gross expenditure from general funds during the year amounted to £208,683 with the majority funding our central staff and school and regional co-ordinators (plus their associated travel costs) of £163,126, office expenses and associated ground rent for the Pavilion £18,826, printing and postage of resources of £7,915, IT & Software £2,106, accountancy & other professional fees £5,886, other costs £2,796 and depreciation of £8,028.

This was offset by the cost recovery of £28,872 for resources and £48,067 for staff costs, both relating to the delivery of fully funded training & resources as part of our project work. Income from resources through commissioning and purchases by organisations (schools, youth and sports clubs are supported free of charge), generated £8,591 and we generated £4,546 from the hire of the community room and £578 commission on arts and crafts sold in the cafe for local young artists and other donated items. This brought our total sales figure to £13,716. Our partnership with Dorchester Town Council remains strong and their annual contribution towards the provision of public toilets at the Pavilion increased to £5.4k to include a share of the water rates and toilet repairs/ maintenance. Our SJP investment saw good growth in 2024, providing an unrealised gain of £11,184 for the year and we placed funds in a variety of savings accounts which provided interest of £4,155.

Our reserves at the 30th September 2024, comprised £60k in the CEO Succession Reserve (recognising that the true market cost of replacing the current CEO would be significantly higher than the existing CEO remuneration) and £62,652 in our Pavilion Maintenance Fund for future repairs/replacement of the Pavilion Building. After placing these designated funds aside and adjusting for Stock, Fixed Assets & our investment in Pip Café, our balance of ‘Free Reserves’ at the year-end was £243,521 providing 14 months cover for our gross operating costs of £208,683 which is in line with our reserves policy.

Our budgeted costs for next year are £331k, being an increase of 15% on 2023-24 costs, which is primarily related to our planned project work, which varies from year to year depending on availability of funding. Our focus for 2025 is to complete the drug education work in Dorset and make the programme available across England & Scotland and create the new Vaping materials for primary schools in Dorset and primary/secondary schools in Glasgow & Clyde. We are also seeking CPD accreditation for some of our training modules which will create a new income stream and will continue with our core regional work with schools and youth organisations and our 16+ work.

PIP CAFÉ

The charity runs PiP Café via a trading subsidiary called Pavilion in the Park (PiPs) Ltd. Café trading continued to exceed expectations by some margin this year with turnover for the year being £277k which was £23k ahead of budget and £28k higher than last year. Our gross profit was £201k and expenditure amounted to £133k resulting in an operating profit of £68k which was £14k higher than last year’s profit.

For 2024-25, we have budgeted sales at £292k (up 6% versus 2023-24) and we expect a trading profit of £65k being slightly under the 2023-24 figure to allow for the impact of the increasing minimum wage and national insurance changes. Our reliance on the weather continues to have a big impact on both turnover and staffing and the flexibility or our workforce is key as the café manager constantly reviews staffing levels to balance the variations in trade from day to day.

PiP Café continues to make a significant contribution to the charity. In addition to the taxable profits which are donated to the charity, there is also an annual rental of £8k and a contribution towards the shared Pavilion costs and shared staff costs.

The contribution received by TAT over the last few years has risen from £30k in 2021-22 to £81k and then £84k in 202223 and 2023-24 respectively. We expect the contribution to increase further to £97k in 2024-25 but then expect it to flatten out in future years.

PiP Café provides an invaluable income stream for our work with young people across the UK, contributing just over 60% of our net core operating costs and it continues to provide an incredible return on the original investment.

THE TALKABOUT TRUST, TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT AND ACCOUNTS 2024 | 27

YOUNG PEOPLE’S VULNERABILITES FOR ALCOHOL AND SUBSTANCE RELATED HARMS

The complexity of the task:

KEY TALK ABOUT TRUST INTERVENTION POINTS:

THE TALKABOUT TRUST, TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT AND ACCOUNTS 2024 | 28

AWARDS AND RECOGNITION

BETTER SOCIETY AWARDS 2024

TEACH SECONDARY AWARDS 2024 Highly commended SEN resource

EDUCATION RESOURCE AWARDS 2019 Best secondary school resource - Commended

TEACH SECONDARY AWARDS 2024 Winner - best free resource

CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE NOW! 2022 Finalist for best early intervention awards

PRIVATE EDUCATION AND DEVELOPMENT AWARDS 2019

A JOINED UP APPROACH

REDUCING ALCOHOL AND OTHER SUBSTANCE RELATED HARMS

Ensuring young people learn to stay safe around alcohol and other substances

Support children And young people

Support schools and organisations

Empower parents And carers

Quality assurance measures

Focus areas

THE TALKABOUT TRUST, TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT AND ACCOUNTS 2024 | 29

IMPACT AND OUTCOMES

INDEPENDENT EVALUATION OF OUR IMPACT, FIDELITY AND EFFECTIVENESS

The Talk About Alcohol programme is selected as best practice by:

EARLY INTERVENTION FOUNDATION

EUROPEAN PLATFORM FOR INVESTMENT IN CHILDREN PROMISING PRACTICE

NCVO CHARITY ETHICAL PRINCIPLES

The trustees carried out their annual review of the NCVO Charity Ethical Principles which provide a framework for the ethical execution of charitable purpose and help guide decision-making and development of policies and procedures. The trustees report that they are confident that the charity is upholding the Guiding Principles to put Beneficiaries First, act with Integrity and Openness & protect everybody’s Right to be Safe.

DATA MATURITY

The TALK ABOUT Trust recently used the Data Orchard SelfAssessment tool to update the status of our Data Maturity. We were delighted that our average score across seven themes had increased over the last 3 years from 3.8 to 4.1. Our main focus for improvement will be developing more training for our staff and trustees.

Unaware Emerging Learning Developing Mastering

Uses

Data

Analysis Leadership Culture Tools Skills

The TALK ABOUT Trust strictly incorporates the principles of evidenced Health Education which are detailed in the International Standards on Drug Use Prevention (unodc.org).

The standards clearly define the Characteristics of programmes for prevention education based on social competence and influence deemed to be associated with efficacy and/or effectiveness based on expert consultation. Namely:

Approaches are detailed which are associated with lack of efficacy and/or effectiveness or with adverse effects based on expert consultation which we emphatically avoid;

The principles below from CEOP are also embraced. icmec.org/wp-content/ uploads/2017/03/Key-Principlesof-Effective-Prevention-EducationCEOP-UK.pdf

The annual report was approved by the trustees of the charity on the 24th February 2025 and signed on its behalf by:

Keith Newton

______ eDate: 24/02/2025

THE TALKABOUT TRUST, TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT AND ACCOUNTS 2024 | 30

SECTION 2

Accounts

THE TALKABOUT TRUST, TRUSTEES ANNUAL REPORT AND ACCOUNTS 2024 | 31

Charity registration number: 1186202

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST ANNUAL REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

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Chartered Accountants
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THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

CONTENTS

Reference and Administrative Details 1
Independent Examiner's Report 2
Statement of Financial Activities 3
Balance Sheet 4
Notes to the Financial Statements 5 to 16

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

REFERENCE AND ADMINISTRATIVE DETAILS

Trustees Victoria McDonaugh PGCE, Chair
David Cox
Stephen Foster
Andrew Morse BSc Hons
Keith Newton ACA
Dr Lara Jayne Wear MB BS BSc DCH (SA) MRCGP
Alison Winsborough BMus PGCE
Jacqueline Sonner BAHons PGCE
Richard Mangnall
Senior Management / Helena Conibear, Chief Executive
Leadership Team
Charity Registration Number 1186202
Principal Office Pavilion in the Park
St John Way
Poundbury
Dorchester
Dorset
DT1 2FG
Independent Examiner S J Hough FCA
Edwards and Keeping Limited
Chartered Accountants
Unity Chambers
34 High East Street
Dorchester
Dorset
DT1 1HA
Bankers The Co-operative Bank
P O Box 250
Skelmerdale
WN8 6WT

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

INDEPENDENT EXAMINER'S REPORT TO THE TRUSTEES OF THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of The Talk About Trust for the year ended 30 September 2024.

Responsibilities and basis of report

As the charity trustees of The Talk About Trust you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 (the ‘2005 Act’), the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and the Charities Act 2011 (‘the 2011 Act’). You are satisfied that your charity is not required by charity law to be audited and have chosen instead to have an independent examination.

I report in respect of my examination of the The Talk About Trust's accounts carried out under section 44 (1)(c) of the 2005 Act and section 145 of the 2011 Act. In carrying out my examination I have followed the requirements of Regulation 11 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.

Independent examiner’s statement

Since The Talk About Trust has prepared its accounts on an accruals basis and is also registered in Scotland your examiner must be a member of a body listed in Regulation 11(2) of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended). I confirm that I am qualified to undertake the examination because I am a member of Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, which is one of the listed bodies.

I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:

  1. accounting records were not kept in respect of The Talk About Trust as required by section 44 (1) (a) of the 2005 Act and Regulation 4 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and section 130 of the 2011 Act; or

  2. the accounts do not accord with those records; or

  3. the accounts do not comply with the accounting requirements Regulation 8 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and do not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair view which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination.

I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

S J Hough FCA Edwards and Keeping Limited Chartered Accountants

Unity Chambers 34 High East Street Dorchester Dorset DT1 1HA

31 January 2025

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

Note
Income and Endowments
from:
Donations and legacies
2
Charitable activities
3
Other trading activities
4
Investment income
5
Total income
Expenditure on:
Raising funds
Charitable activities
6
Total expenditure
Gain/(loss) on investment
assets
12
Net income
Gross transfers between
funds
Net movement in funds
Reconciliation of funds
Total funds brought forward
Total funds carried forward
18		 Unrestricted
£
123,968
33,983
8,721
4,155
170,827
(14,659)
(117,085)
(131,744)
11,184
50,267
(16)
50,251
623,794
674,045		 Restricted
£
170,803
402
-
-
171,205
-
(154,668)
(154,668)
-
16,537
16
16,553
165,091
181,644		 Total
2024
£
294,771
34,385
8,721
4,155
342,032
(14,659)
(271,753)
(286,412)
11,184
66,804
-
66,804
788,885
855,689		 Total
2023
£
293,444
40,819
8,735
-
342,998
-
(276,453)
(276,453)
4,370
70,915
-
70,915
717,970
788,885

All of the charity's activities derive from continuing operations during the above two periods. The funds breakdown for 2023 is shown in note 18.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

(CHARITY COMMISSION REGISTRATION NUMBER: 1186202) (OSCR REGISTRATION NUMBER SC050360) BALANCE SHEET AS AT 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

Note
Fixed assets
Tangible assets
11
Investments
12
Current assets
Stocks
13
Debtors
14
Cash at bank and in hand
15
Creditors: Amounts falling due within one year
16
Net current assets
Net assets
Funds of the charity:
Restricted income funds
Restricted funds
18
Unrestricted income funds
Unrestricted funds
Total funds
18		 2024
£
270,199
118,353
388,552
12,673
24,389
453,643
490,705
(23,568)
467,137
855,689
181,644
674,045
855,689		 2023
£
278,227
107,169
385,396
10,398
23,002
401,037
434,437
(30,948)
403,489
788,885
165,091
623,794
788,885

The financial statements on pages 3 to 16 were approved by the trustees, and authorised for issue on 29 January 2025 and signed on their behalf by:

Keith Newton ACA Trustee

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

1 Accounting policies

Statement of compliance

The financial statements have been prepared in accordance with the second edition of the Charities Statement of Recommended Practice issued in October 2019, the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) and the Charities Act 2011.

Basis of preparation

The Talk About Trust meets the definition of a public benefit entity under FRS 102. The accounts (financial statements) have been prepared under the historical cost convention with items recognised at cost or transaction value unless otherwise stated in the relevant note(s) to these accounts.

Going concern

The trustees consider that there are no material uncertainties about the charity's ability to continue as a going concern.

Income and endowments

Voluntary income including donations, gifts, legacies and grants that provide core funding or are of a general nature is recognised when the charity has entitlement to the income, it is probable that the income will be received and the amount can be measured with sufficient reliability.

Donations and legacies

Donations and legacies are recognised on a receivable basis when receipt is probable and the amount can be reliably measured.

Grants receivable

Grants are recognised when the charity has an entitlement to the funds and any conditions linked to the grants have been met. Where performance conditions are attached to the grant and are yet to be met, the income is recognised as a liability and included on the balance sheet as deferred income to be released.

Deferred income

Deferred income represents amounts received for future periods and is released to incoming resources in the period for which, it has been received. Such income is only deferred when:

Investment income

Dividends are recognised once the dividend has been declared and notification has been received of the dividend due.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

Expenditure

All expenditure is recognised once there is a legal or constructive obligation to that expenditure, it is probable settlement is required and the amount can be measured reliably. All costs are allocated to the applicable expenditure heading that aggregate similar costs to that category. Where costs cannot be directly attributed to particular headings they have been allocated on a basis consistent with the use of resources, with central staff costs allocated on the basis of time spent, and depreciation charges allocated on the portion of the asset’s use. Other support costs are allocated based on the spread of staff costs.

Charitable activities

Charitable expenditure comprises those costs incurred by the charity in the delivery of its activities and services for its beneficiaries. It includes both costs that can be allocated directly to such activities and those costs of an indirect nature necessary to support them.

Support costs

Support costs include central functions and have been allocated to activity cost categories on a basis consistent with the use of resources, for example, allocating property costs by floor areas, or per capita, staff costs by the time spent and other costs by their usage.

Government grants

Government grants are recognised based on the accrual model and are measured at the fair value of the asset received or receivable. Grants are classified as relating either to revenue or to assets. Grants relating to revenue are recognised in income over the period in which the related costs are recognised. Grants relating to assets are recognised over the expected useful life of the asset. Where part of a grant relating to an asset is deferred, it is recognised as deferred income.

Taxation

The charity is considered to pass the tests set out in Paragraph 1 Schedule 6 of the Finance Act 2010 and therefore it meets the definition of a charitable company for UK corporation tax purposes. Accordingly, the charity is potentially exempt from taxation in respect of income or capital gains received within categories covered by Chapter 3 Part 11 of the Corporation Tax Act 2010 or Section 256 of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992, to the extent that such income or gains are applied exclusively to charitable purposes.

Tangible fixed assets

Individual fixed assets costing £1,000 or more are initially recorded at cost, less any subsequent accumulated depreciation and subsequent accumulated impairment losses. However, the Trustees may consider capitalising lower cost items where appropriate,

Depreciation and amortisation

Depreciation is provided on tangible fixed assets so as to write off the cost or valuation, less any estimated residual value, over their expected useful economic life as follows:

Asset class Depreciation method and rate
Leasehold Buildings Over the minimum period of the lease
straight line
Fixtures and Fittings 20% reducing balance

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

Fixed asset investments

Fixed asset investments, other than programme related investments, are included at market value at the balance sheet date. Realised gains and losses on investments are calculated as the difference between sales proceeds and their market value at the start of the year, or their subsequent cost, and are charged or credited to the Statement of Financial Activities in the period of disposal.

Unrealised gains and losses represent the movement in market values during the year and are credited or charged to the Statement of Financial Activities based on the market value at the year end.

Unlisted investments, including the investment in the subsidiary are measured at cost less provision for impairment as the fair value cannot be measured reliably.

Stock

Stock is valued at the lower of cost and estimated selling price.

Trade debtors

Trade debtors are amounts due from customers for merchandise sold or services performed in the ordinary course of business.

Trade debtors are recognised initially at the transaction price. They are subsequently measured at amortised cost using the effective interest method, less provision for impairment. A provision for the impairment of trade debtors is established when there is objective evidence that the charity will not be able to collect all amounts due according to the original terms of the receivables.

Cash and cash equivalents

Cash and cash equivalents comprise cash on hand and call deposits, and other short-term highly liquid investments that are readily convertible to a known amount of cash and are subject to an insignificant risk of change in value.

Trade creditors

are obligations to pay for goods or services that have been acquired in the ordinary course of business from suppliers. Accounts payable are classified as current liabilities if the does not have an unconditional right, at the end of the reporting period, to defer settlement of the creditor for at least twelve months after the reporting date. If there is an unconditional right to defer settlement for at least twelve months after the reporting date, they are presented as non-current liabilities.

are recognised initially at the transaction price and subsequently measured at amortised cost using the effective interest method.

Fund structure

Unrestricted income funds are general funds that are available for use at the trustees discretion in furtherance of the objectives of the charity.

Designated funds are unrestricted funds set aside for specific purposes at the discretion of the trustees.

Restricted income funds are those donated for use in a particular area or for specific purposes, the use of which is restricted to that area or purpose.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

2 Income from donations and legacies

Unrestricted

Donations and grants;
Grants and charitable
donations
Donation from subsidary of
2022/23 profits
Other donations
Government grants		 General
£
60,422
57,139
3,000
3,407
123,968		 Restricted
£
127,272
-
18,000
25,531
170,803		 Total
2024
£
187,694
57,139
21,000
28,938
294,771		 Total
2023
£
150,423
53,105
51,534
38,382
293,444

Included in general grants for 2023-24 is £15,000 from the Garfield Weston Foundation for core costs and £2,350 from the Dorset Council Holiday & Activities Food Program to support the provision of Holiday Kids Clubs.

3 Income from charitable activities

Miscellaneous sales and hire
income		 Unrestricted
General
£
33,983		 Restricted
£
402		 Total
2024
£
34,385		 Total
2023
£
40,819

4 Income from other trading activities

Community fundraising
Property rental income (PIP Cafe)		 Unrestricted
funds
General
£
721
8,000
8,721		 Total
2024
£
721
8,000
8,721		 Total
2023
£
735
8,000
8,735

5 Investment income

Interest receivable and similar income;
Interest receivable on bank deposits
Total for 2024		 Unrestricted
funds
General
£
4,155
4,155		 Total
funds
£
4,155
4,155

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

6 Expenditure on charitable activities

Unrestricted

Note
Staff costs
8
Pavilion ground rent
Office expenses
Computer software and
maintenance
Printing, postage and
stationery
Travel and subsistence
Advertising
Legal and professional
fees
Sundry expenses
Resource allocation
Pavilion Event cost
Independent Examiner’s
remuneration
9
Depreciation		 General
£
143,420
4,440
14,387
2,106
8,106
5,047
949
3,966
1,655
(76,939)
-
1,920
8,028
117,085		 Restricted
£
54,434
-
577
476
9,945
7,147
315
483
306
76,939
4,046
-
-
154,668		 Total
2024
£
197,854
4,440
14,964
2,582
18,051
12,194
1,264
4,449
1,961
-
4,046
1,920
8,028
271,753		 Total
2023
£
179,844
3,900
14,519
2,790
25,650
11,767
1,326
10,356
11,957
-
4,161
1,980
8,203
276,453

The Resource allocation total of £76,939 consists £48,067 staff costs and £28,872 other costs. Included in expenditure on charitable activities are governance costs of £27,768 (2023 £25,988).

7 Trustees remuneration and expenses

During the year the charity made the following transactions with trustees:

David Cox

£429 (2023: £470) of expenses were reimbursed to David Cox during the year.

The expenses were reimbursement of travel expenses incurred.

No trustees, nor any persons connected with them, have received any remuneration from the charity during the year.

No trustees have received any other benefits from the charity during the year.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

8 Staff costs

The aggregate costs were as follows:

Staff costs during the year were:
Wages and salaries
Social security costs
Pension costs
Self-employed contractors		 2024
£
165,132
7,450
3,339
175,921
36,592
212,513		 2023
£
139,862
6,421
2,953
149,236
30,608
179,844

The monthly average number of persons (including senior management / leadership team) employed by the charity during the year (head count) was as follows:

All persons employed 2024
No
8		 2023
No
7

No employee received emoluments of more than £60,000 during the year

9 Independent examiner's remuneration

9
Independent examiner's remuneration
Other fees to examiners
Examination-related assurance services
All other services		 2024
£
1,188
732
1,920		 2023
£
1,188
792
1,980

10 Taxation

The charity is a registered charity and is therefore exempt from taxation.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

11 Tangible fixed assets

11 Tangible fixed assets
Cost
At 1 October 2023
At 30 September 2024
Depreciation
At 1 October 2023
Charge for the year
At 30 September 2024
Net book value
At 30 September 2024
At 30 September 2023		 Land and
buildings
£
293,031
293,031
18,314
7,326
25,640
267,391
274,717		 Furniture and
equipment
£
6,302
6,302
2,792
702
3,494
2,808
3,510		 Total
£
299,333
299,333
21,106
8,028
29,134
270,199
278,227

Included within the net book value of land and buildings above is £Nil (2023 - £Nil) in respect of freehold land and buildings and £267,391 (2023 - £274,717) in respect of leaseholds.

12 Fixed asset investments

Shares in group undertakings and participating interests
Other investments
Shares in group undertakings and participating interests
Cost
At 1 October 2023
At 30 September 2024
Net book value
At 30 September 2024
At 30 September 2023		 2024
£
25,000
93,353
118,353
Subsidiary
undertakings
£
25,000
25,000
25,000
25,000		 2023
£
25,000
82,169
107,169
Total
£
25,000
25,000
25,000
25,000

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

Other investments

Cost or Valuation
At 1 October 2023
Revaluation
At 30 September 2024
Net book value
At 30 September 2024
At 30 September 2023		 Unit Trust
investment
£
82,169
11,184
93,353
93,353
82,169		 Total
£
82,169
11,184
93,353
93,353
82,169

Details of undertakings

Details of the investments in which the charity holds 20% or more of the nominal value of any class of share capital are as follows:

Country of Proportion of voting Principal
Undertaking incorporation Holding rights and shares held activity
2024
2023
Subsidiary undertakings
The Pavilion in the
Park (PIPS) Ltd
St John Way,
Poundbury,
Dorchester, DT1 2FG		 England & Wales Ordinary 100%
100%		 Running
cafe
Pavilion
the Park		 the
at
in

Subsidiaries

The profit for the financial period of The Pavilion in the Park (PIPS) Ltd was £67,682 (2023 - £53,332) and the aggregate amount of capital and reserves at the end of the period was £102,440 (2023 - £91,897).

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

13 Stock
Stocks
14 Debtors
Trade debtors
Due from group undertakings
Accrued income
15 Cash and cash equivalents
Cash on hand
Cash at bank
16 Creditors: amounts falling due within one year
Trade creditors
Accruals
Deferred income		 2024
£
12,673
2024
£
646
20,463
3,280
24,389
2024
£
1,065
452,578
453,643
2024
£
9,262
6,806
7,500
23,568		 2023
£
10,398
2023
£
541
22,461
-
23,002
2023
£
-
401,037
401,037
2023
£
15,216
2,340
13,392
30,948

17 Commitments

Lease commitments

The Talk About Trust leases land from His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales for a 60 year period from 1 April 2021 with a rent starting from 1 April 2022 at £3,000pa, index linked each year.

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

18 Funds

Unrestricted
General
General funds
Designated
CEO Succession
Reserve
Pavilion
Maintenance Fund
Total unrestricted
Restricted
Dorset
16+
Midland & South
West
Scotland
SEN/LAC
PiPs space
16+ Scotland
Humber
L&SE
16+ NYORKS
DRUG
16+ Scotland YAF
LAG East
LAG North
LAG West
MS & W New
Total restricted
Total funds		 Balance
at
1 October
2023
£
508,468
60,000
55,326
115,326
623,794
9,561
39,467
5,712
27,266
7,887
19,174
25,173
2,938
5,658
10,408
11,847
-
-
-
-
-
165,091
788,885		 Incoming
resources
£
170,827
-
-
-
170,827
7,800
3,252
-
-
24,250
19,776
12,085
-
41,850
-
18,825
20,617
1,500
1,100
750
19,400
171,205
342,032		 Resources
expended
£
(131,744)
-
-
-
(131,744)
(10,188)
(17,525)
(5,746)
(11,272)
(9,497)
(14,039)
(18,271)
(2,920)
(24,133)
(9,132)
(12,724)
(10,553)
-
(520)
-
(8,148)
(154,668)
(286,412)		 Transfers
£
Other
recognised
gains/(losses)
£
(7,342)
11,184
-
-
7,326
-
7,326
-
(16)
11,184
-
-
-
-
34
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
(18)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
16
-
-
11,184		 Balance
at
30
September
2024
£
551,393
60,000
62,652
122,652
674,045
7,173
25,194
-
15,994
22,640
24,911
18,987
-
23,375
1,276
17,948
10,064
1,500
580
750
11,252
181,644
855,689

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

Unrestricted funds
General
General funds
Designated
CEO Succession
Reserve
Outdoor Kiosk
Fund
Pavilion
Maintenance Fund
Total unrestricted
funds
Restricted
Dorset
16+
Leeds & Kirklees
Midland & South
West
North Yorkshire
Scotland
SEN/LAC
Digital
PiPs space
16+ Scotland
Humber
L&SE
Newham
University
16+ NYORKS
DRUG
Total restricted
funds
Total funds		 Balance
at
1 October
2022
£
466,916
50,000
3,000
48,000
101,000
567,916
5,077
50,101
1,017
14,969
57
20,424
17
549
19,891
12,540
9,117
11,658
4,578
59
-
-
150,054
717,970		 Incoming
resources
£
163,131
-
-
-
-
163,131
10,000
990
-
13,000
-
15,000
21,250
-
10,650
48,351
1,156
15,000
-
12,620
15,850
16,000
179,867
342,998		 Resources
expended
£
(111,484)
-
(150)
-
(150)
(111,634)
(5,516)
(14,817)
(990)
(22,257)
(50)
(8,158)
(13,380)
(572)
(11,367)
(35,718)
(7,335)
(23,867)
(1,711)
(9,486)
(5,442)
(4,153)
(164,819)
(276,453)		 Transfers
£
Other
recognised
gains/(losses)
£
(14,465)
4,370
10,000
-
(2,850)
-
7,326
-
14,476
-
11
4,370
-
-
3,193
-
(27)
-
-
-
(7)
-
-
-
-
-
23
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
2,867
-
(2,867)
-
(3,193)
-
-
-
-
-
(11)
-
-
4,370		 Balance
at
30
September
2023
£
508,468
60,000
-
55,326
115,326
623,794
9,561
39,467
-
5,712
-
27,266
7,887
-
19,174
25,173
2,938
5,658
-
-
10,408
11,847
165,091
788,885

THE TALK ABOUT TRUST

FORMERLY CALLED THE ALCOHOL EDUCATION TRUST

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 SEPTEMBER 2024 (CONTINUED)

The specific purposes for which the funds are to be applied are as follows:

Designated funds:

CEO Succession Fund - £60,000 is held in a designated fund to recognise that the true cost of replacing the current CEO would be significantly higher than the existing CEO remuneration.

Pavilion Maintenance Fund - £62,652 is held in a designated fund for future Pavilion maintenance costs.

19 Analysis of net assets between funds

Tangible fixed assets
Fixed asset investments
Current assets
Current liabilities
Total net assets
Tangible fixed assets
Fixed asset investments
Current assets
Current liabilities
Total net assets		 Unrestricted funds
General
£
Designated
£
270,199
-
118,353
-
174,623
122,652
(11,782)
-
551,393
122,652
Unrestricted funds
General
£
Designated
£
278,227
-
107,169
-
139,039
115,326
(15,967)
-
508,468
115,326		 Restricted
funds
£
-
-
193,430
(11,786)
181,644
Restricted
funds
£
-
-
180,073
(14,982)
165,091		 Total funds
at 30
September
2024
£
270,199
118,353
490,705
(23,568)
855,689
Total funds
at 30
September
2023
£
278,227
107,169
434,438
(30,949)
788,885

20 Related party transactions

During the year the charity made the following related party transactions:

Pavilion in the Park (PIPS) Ltd

(Pavilion in the Park (PIPS) Ltd is a wholly owned trading subsidiary of The Talk About Trust) During the year, expenses relating to the Pavilion in the Park are shared between The Talk About Trust and Pavilion in the Park (PIPS) Ltd. At the balance sheet date the amount due from Pavilion in the Park (PIPS) Ltd was £20,463 (2023 - £22,461).

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