Wigan singer and mental health campaigner has ambitious plans for charity song

Peter Hill, a Beech Hill dad-of-two, was recently crowned as the BBC’s Unsung Sporting Hero for the North West region.

Other news: Couple launch groups to offer mental health supportThe 35-year-old scooped the gong for his creation of Place 2 Place FC, which uses five-a-side football as a casual way to start conversations about mental health.

Peter’s regional triumph put him among the 15 people in contention to win the national Unsung Hero trophy at the Sports Personality of The Year Awards, though the prize ultimately went to Keiran Thompson, who runs a community project called Helping Kids Achieve in one of the most deprived areas of Nottingham.

Place 2 Place’s efforts to help people through their struggles have received a whirlwind of praise since its formation in 2017.

And now Peter, a singer and DJ by trade, is looking to thrust the cause further into the spotlight with the idea of a charity single featuring all of his fellow Unsung Hero nominees.

The plan is in its infancy but, should it come to fruition, Peter would travel the country, “place to place”, to record each of the other 14 nominees vocals, which would be put together and produced into a song, the proceeds of which would go towards mental health funding.

The Beech Hill dad-of-two came face to face with the devastating effects of mental illness, after his best friend took his own life in 2014, at just 30 years old.

Shortly after his friend passed away, his friend’s stepdad and brother also died by suicide.

Within the space of 18 months, three men in the same family had taken their own lives.

It was following these tragic deaths, and then the shock of another, that Peter decided to take a stand against the stigma of speaking out about these illnesses, starting with a charity bike ride to Paris, before later going on to found the five-a-side team, which then became a league of its own.