The expansion has begun with three new Lifeline stores being established over the past year, and aims to culminate in the establishment of a New England support centre.

CEO of Lifeline for New England Robert Sams says there are currently no call support workers based in New England, but said the new stores will give them the resources to fund one.

READ MORE:

"Fifty per cent of our revenue or thereabouts comes from retail and other fundraising," he said.

"It's on the local Lifeline centres to find the funding to support the people on the ground to do the work.

"So it's critical. There's no other way to say that."

While locals experiencing a mental health crisis have previously been able to call 13 11 14, their calls would be redirected to a call centre well beyond the borders of New England.

This has meant speaking to someone who may not understand the local factors that underpin and explain the hardship a caller has experienced.

Mr Sams said their plan is to have local crisis supporters in place before the next six months are out.

"It means that we have a greater capacity to answer more calls," he said.

But in order to get supporters on the phones, they first need a base of operations, and Mr Sams said that they're currently looking at a few options.

"There's three options ... We're looking to have a new facility in Tamworth in the next 12 months," he said.

"We've got our Armidale shop ... There's some rooms off to the side of the shop where crisis supporters could be."

New England could therefore finally have a local call centre within the next year.

This is vital when many in the region are only now emerging to speak about their weakened mental health following the region's last drought.

"We know that demand across Australia, which is reflected in the statistics for New England, has gone up by a much as 40 per cent pre bushfires and pre COVID," he said.

"It went from 2500 calls a day before the bushfires of 2019/20 and through COVID went to 3700 on the highest day.

While those number are now back to about 2800 calls a day, this is still a 15 per cent increase on where demand was before the series of natural disasters and COVID-19 waves.

"We also know that there is cumulative trauma in the New England region," he said.

"There was drought not that long ago. There was bushfires in certain areas, and the Covid hit in different ways."

While demand has increased, Mr Sams said it has also been increasingly difficult to find volunteers.

Many volunteers have stepped back, having been impacted by the same waves of trauma and uncertainty hitting the rest of the community.

"It's becoming harder and harder for us to attract and keep crisis supporters," he said.

"Volunteering has become tough and people have other priorities.

"We've always got to be looking to bring on more volunteers. It's a big part of the job that we have."

This is why Lifeline is now piloting a remote crisis supporter program, allowing crisis supporter to be based at home, making volunteering easier.

"We're not too far from making that a reality," said Mr Sams.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: