As Britain’s oldest LGBT+ telephone helpline celebrates its 50th anniversary, five people – from volunteers to callers – reflect on the work of this life-changing service
Neal McCullough, 34, Trustee and Listening Volunteer� “People need to talk. Whether this is because they are lonely, don’t know where their nearest gay bar is, or don’t know what pronouns to use, thus the ability to chat to someone who is LGBT+ is incredibly important. “I arrived at Switchboard as a volunteer in 2017 and became a Trustee in 2018. I’d worked on LGBT+ networks on a corporate level, but I felt these were frustratingly separate from the actual community.
“As long as people want to call us, switchboard will keep listening” “Taking Switchboard to Pride in my hometown of Belfast was probably one of my proudest moments. Being able to go back and directly engage with people in Northern Ireland was fantastic. It was even better to get an increase in the number of calls from Northern Ireland in the weeks after, making the event a success. “Switchboard has taught me humility.
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