We are a national charity made up of individuals in recovery, their friends, families and community recovery organisations.

FAVOR UK (Faces & Voices of Recovery UK) started life in 2009 with the primary aim of connecting people with living and lived experience of addictions to alcohol and other drugs.

We did this through our well-known and respected National Recovery Walks which took place in towns and cities across the UK. These walks gave our communities the strength in numbers to walk together and be open about our experiences with substances, and to show wider communities that we were ordinary people – breaking down the stereotypes and stigma that normally surrounds us. We officially registered as a charity in 2012, taking pains to recruit a board of trustees with their own lived experiences in order that the concept of ‘lived experience leadership’ remained at the heart of what we do. We recruited a CEO with the passion, drive and eloquence that we needed to spearhead what we wanted to achieve. For those who have met Annemarie Ward or heard her speak, you will no doubt agree that although our charity is small, our voices are not.

The 2020 pandemic had an obvious impact on our activities – forcing us to postpone our recovery walks in 2020/21. One thing we did not want to do is sit and wait it out. We came together as a board and considered what else we could do – where else were we needed? The pandemic gave us time to reflect on our aims and to re-evaluate the direction of the charity.

We are a UK-wide based charitable think tank & human rights advocacy service led by people with living and lived experience of alcohol and other drugs representing the voices of communities affected by addiction. We are a UK wide membership organisation with over 5000 members. We are also a advocacy case worker service provider. We are led, developed, managed & sustained by lived experience professionals.