Rehab centre celebrates tenth anniversary

The team at Littledale Hall with founder Keith Robertson in the centre and Dr Huntington on the far right.

Littledale Hall Therapeutic Centre was established in 2006 and this summer they will see the 300th client complete their innovative programme.

Set up by Keith Robertson and his late business partner Kim Wong, with the support of Dr Annie Huntington, people from across the UK have voluntarily attended the programme at the former country house to try to beat their addiction.

Clients have gone on to set up new businesses as well as returning to previous jobs in nursing, professional sports and the law.

Keith, still working with two of his original colleagues, is now planning to mark their first decade in business with an open day on Friday, October 14 where they will invite the community in to see the work they do.

When Littledale opened it offered a brand new programme which Keith and psychotherapist Dr Annie Huntington drafted: a 12-month recovery programme where residents lived and ran the house while receiving therapeutic care.

Due to local authority cutbacks it now offers shorter six and three-month programmes.

“We did this ourselves” said Keith. “We were reinventing the wheel, there were lots of treatment centres delivering rehab but none had a written programme where people could follow manuals for every group and all of it was knowledge informed.

“It was something distinctively different.”

After visiting America on a research trip, he and Kim opened the centre, which had previously been used as a Christian retreat.

The pair met while working at Inward House rehab centre in Lancaster.

“The local community have been so supportive of us, particularly the churches,” Keith said.

Keith, who lives in Bolton-le- Sands, says his inspiration was and remains his friend and mentor Dr Walter Lyons who set up Inward House.

“I always had faith in the people around me and I had faith that we were doing the right thing and that we were doing it in Walter’s memory,” he said.

For more information, including how to book tickets for the October celebration when available, go to www.littledalehalltc.co.uk.