A coalition of children’s service providers has launched a petition, calling on the Scottish Government to plough its £25m share of additional UK Government spending on mental health services from the Budget to improve mental health services for vulnerable children and young people in Scotland.
The Scottish Children’s Services Coalition (SCSC) – members include Falkland House School, Mindroom, Spark of Genius, Who Cares? Scotland, Young Foundations and Kindred- has launched a petition on the 38 Degrees website, calling for Scotland’s share of the £250 million extra for mental health services in England announced by the UK Government in the Budget for this year (£1.25bn over the next 5 years) to go towards Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) north of the border.
Scotland’s Commissioner for Children and Young People, in evidence to the UK Joint Committee for Human Rights (JCHR) this week, raised several concerns about both access to clinical mental health services and the quality of treatment that children and young people in Scotland receive.
The petition is available to sign on the 38 Degrees website at https://you.38degrees.org.uk/p/investinmentalhealthscot
The SCSC believes that extra funding for CAMHS, which are under increasing pressure in Scotland and have seen a 60% increase in referrals over the last 2 years, could help address and improve significantly key problem areas like:
Diagnosis and treatment wait times
Half of Scotland’s Health Boards are failing to meet an 18-week Scottish Government waiting time target for treatment from CAMHS which came into force in December 2014 and five are failing to meet a 26-week target dating from March 2013.1
This is set against a background of a 10 fold increase in waiting times for those waiting more than 13 weeks to access services from 20 in December 2013 to 226 in December 2014.
An increased number of children and young people being sent to non-specialist units
According to figures from the Mental Welfare Commission (MWC) the number of children and young people being admitted to non-specialist units such as adult and paediatric wards has increased from 177 last year to 202 (174 adult and 28 paediatric) meaning that they may not be getting the appropriate support they require.2
This situation has been worsened due to a lack of inpatient beds, 42 in all of Scotland, a totally inadequate figure, reinforced by a 60% increase in the number of those being referred to CAMHS over the last two years.
There is also no secure/locked provision in Scotland for under 18s – all 3 adolescent Inpatient Psychiatric Units are open wards and there are no units for those with a severe learning disability.
Thus those with challenging behaviours and learning disabilities are oftenbeing treated in unsuitable adult or paediatric wards, or being sent miles away from their families to England, a clearly distressing situation.
SCSC Member and Director of Kindred Scotland Sophie Pilgrim said: ““We would urge people to really get behind this campaign and sign the petition to ensure that this £25m in additional funding is put into mental health services north of the border.
“At the moment mental health services in Scotland are at breaking point, with 20% of children and young people having a mental health problem in any given year, and about 10% at any one time. This is putting medical professionals are under incredible pressure, with the number of referrals for specialist child and adolescent mental health services increasing by 60% over the last two years.
“Our health professionals do fantastic work to help people suffering from mental ill health, but this is often seen as a poor relation when compared with physical health. A lack of resources in the face of dramatically increasing demand means that we are often asking medical staff to work with one hand tied behind their back.Due to a lack of adequate provision hundreds of vulnerable children and young people are being treated in unsuitable adult or paediatric wards, or being sent miles away.
“We urge that the Scottish Government takes this opportunity to go that extra mile and ensure that we have a range of mental health services available in Scotland for those who so vitally need it.”
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