CQC (2019) Are we listening? A review of children and young people’s mental health services
The Supporting Families Programme (2021)
The Supporting Families programmes builds on the Trouble Families Programme which launched in 2011. The programme seeks to build the resilience of vulnerable families by providing joined up local support in areas such as mental health, domestic abuse, and unemployment. The first phase of this programme is backed by £165 million which was announced in the 2020 Spending Review.
The NHS Long Term Plan (2019)
The Long-Term Plan set out a 10-year programme of phased improvements to NHS services.
As part of this strategy, NHS England has made a commitment that funding for children and young people’s mental health services would grow faster than both overall NHS funding and total mental health spending. This funding would be used to expand support for all those aged 0 to 25.
Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health (2018)
In 2018, the Government published proposals for providing mental health support in schools and colleges through the establishment of Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs), the appointment and training of a Designated Senior Lead for Mental Health in educational settings and the trialling of a four-week waiting time target.
System transformation (2015 – 2021)
In practice, the children and young people’s mental health system is complex and fragmented from a commissioning perspective. Councils, Integrated Care Systems (ICSs), NHS clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), NHS England, educational providers, and the voluntary and community sector are all involved in designing and delivering mental health support for young people within their locality. For all young people aged 0-25 to experience a seamless pathway to mental health support whatever their level need, councils must work in partnership with other organisations.
Children and Young People’s Mental Health Local Transformation Plans set out system-wide approaches to young people’s mental health with contributions from all partners. Local councils play a leading and influential role in ensuring that Local Transformation Partnerships/Boards deliver services that work for young people and their families, meets local needs, and makes best use of local assets outside of traditional mainstream mental health services.
In 2021, the Department of Health and Social Care published proposals to reform health and care systems. These proposals aim to ‘join up care’ for everyone in England in line with the overall direction of the NHS Long Term Plan.
The proposals will merge NHS CCGs into ICSs. The ICSs will be responsible for the strategy, commissioning, and design of health and care services. They will cover much larger areas than CCGs and many will encompass multiple council areas.
ICSs will be expected to take a new focus on population health, bringing NHS services much closer to the range of prevention activities, public health, social care, and other support delivered by local councils. Supporting young people’s mental health is an important element of population health which will avert both short-term and long-term problems.
Councils can support the delivery of whole school and college approaches to mental health and work with schools and colleges to deliver preventive mental health initiatives such as campaigns, staff training or embedding mental health and wellbeing within the curriculum. School nurses also have a vital role to play in promoting young people’s mental health as part of a whole school and college approach. Public Health England and the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Coalition have produced a whole school and college approach guide.