Government's mental health plans to leave hundreds of thousands of children without needed support, MPs warn

The government’s flagship proposals for improving mental health care for young people will leave hundreds of thousands of children without the support they desperately need, MPs have warned.

A damning report by two select committees, Education and Health and Social Care, said the government’s strategy lacks ambition and fails to take into account the needs of the most vulnerable groups.

The slow rollout of the government’s plans means support will only reach between a fifth and a quarter of the country by 2022-23, which provides no help to the majority of children in need of it.

And the cross-party report said the government’s approach – of rolling it out in “trailblazer areas” – may lead to increased inequality in provision if staff move to areas where services are better.

Under the £300m plans – set out in the government’s green paper in December – schools and colleges are required to appoint and train a “mental health lead” to ensure pupils access support services.

Mental health support teams will also be created as part of the government’s proposals to improve linkups between schools and the NHS to improve early intervention services.

But MPs said it fails to look at how to prevent child mental ill health, and a lack of “substantive plans” for young people transferring to adult mental health services is “disappointing”.

“Young people are falling through the gaps and not receiving the services they need as they enter adulthood,” the report said.

It warned that the green paper also failed to address the needs of pupils who had been excluded from school, who were more likely to have mental health needs – as well as children in care, pupils in alternative provision, and young people not in education, employment or training.

“The government’s strategy lacks ambition and will provide no help to the majority of those children who desperately need it. The narrow scope does not take several vulnerable groups into account.”

MPs also called on the government to gather independent evidence on the impact of “high-stakes exams” on children’s wellbeing after young people said testing in schools was a “considerable source of pressure” and they were concerned about adverse effects on their mental health.

But schools minister Nick Gibb told the joint committee earlier this year that he did not believe the government’s reforms to exams had made young people’s mental health worse.

“We are not persuaded that the adverse effects of the current exam system on young people’s mental health at both primary and secondary level have been adequately considered and are struck by the contrast between the views of young people and those of the minister,” the report said.

It also warned that the government’s proposals put more pressure on an already “stretched” teaching workforce without sufficient resources, while the funding for the plans “is not guaranteed”.

“We are concerned that an unintended consequence of the government’s proposals would be that financially stretched schools and colleges could further cut their current provision of mental health support, assuming that mental health support teams will be there instead,” the report said.

It adds: “Given the delays inherent in the proposed time frames for implementation of the government’s strategy, this would leave institutions with less support than before and further increase the demand on NHS services.”

Robert Halfon, chair of the Education Committee, said: “The government must back up its warm words by taking urgent action to address the mental health issues which children and young people face today.

“This strategy does not go far enough, which raises the very real prospect of hundreds of thousands of children missing out on getting the help they so desperately need.

He added: “If the government is serious about tackling injustices in our society, it must ensure proper targeted funding of support for those most in need.”

Dr Sarah Wollaston, chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, said: “The green paper is just not ambitious enough and will leave so many children without the care they need. It needs to go much further in considering how to prevent mental health difficulties in the first place.

“We want to see more evidence that government will join up services in a way which places children and young people at their heart and that improves services to all children rather than a minority.”

Anne Longfield, the children’s commissioner for England, said: “The committee is right to say the green paper is not ambitious enough.

“Many thousands of children are failing to receive support and care when they need it and too often referrals for treatment are only being made when a child reaches crisis point. In the worst cases, children have even attempted to take their own life just to access services.”

Javed Khan, chief executive of children’s charity Barnardo’s, said: “We agree that the government risks missing a golden opportunity to radically transform a failing mental health system.

“Despite Theresa May describing it as a ‘burning injustice’ that required a new approach from government, we now find ourselves sleepwalking into a deepening mental health crisis. Our children deserve far better.”

A government spokesperson said: “We completely reject any suggestion that our plans lack ambition – these changes will transform mental health services for children and young people, including the first ever waiting time standards for those with the most serious problems.

“This will be supported by a new workforce – larger than the entire current workforce – and backed by £300m of additional funding that will also provide significant additional resources for all schools.

“This builds on what good schools are already doing, without adding unnecessarily to teachers’ workloads.

“We agree that every young person should be able to access mental health support – however we need to ensure we get this right, which is why we will pilot this approach to make sure services are correct.”