Children’s Mental Health

Cherilyn Mackrory Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

I thank the Opposition for securing this debate. It is important that we shine a light on the issue. I have always said that it takes a village to raise a child, but it actually takes an awful lot more people than that. I thank everyone in Truro and Falmouth who helps children in their lives, such as council officers, health and care professionals, teachers, early year educators, child minders, charities, volunteers and, of course, parents and families.

I will highlight a few of the challenges that we are facing in Cornwall. The end of the national lottery HeadStart grant in July is a key issue for us. It has funded trauma-informed training in schools to support professionals to work directly with children. At the moment, it is not set to be replaced.

Cornwall gets money from the Department of Health and Social Care for health provision and from the Department for Education for schools, but nothing directly to the local authority. It uses its core budget to support emotional health and wellbeing. It invests in clinical psychologists to help the most vulnerable children and school nurses to help with emotional health and wellbeing in order to prevent the escalation of need. However, I am told that there is no defined budget.

Schools in Cornwall are training and becoming trauma-informed schools, which supports children and their parents in their journey around mental health and is good for their health and wellbeing. That is being supported by Cornwall Council wellbeing for education, which is led by educational psychologists to enable staff to promote and support pupils’ wellbeing. Cornwall has successfully set up the Bloom, which offers to support all professionals in advising children and young people around the county.

Children need routine. They also need stability, stimulation and ambition. Most Members in this Chamber will be shocked to hear that there are children in Cornwall who have never seen the sea. Cornwall is an important place where we can exploit our blue and green environment, with surfing, fishing, swimming and forest schools. Where these schemes are set up, they are life-changing for children with mental health issues and difficult home lives. They not only teach children practical life skills, but build confidence and resilience. For me, that is the opposite of being sat at a screen, continuously exposed to social media and the media-driven anxious society in which we find ourselves today. As a society we must do better. For example, rather than yelling at each other from one side of the Chamber to the other, we should work together to do better for our children. We must set an example and do much better in this Chamber.

I would like to see anyone and everyone who comes into contact with a child to inspire them; to let them know that they can achieve. If we do that from the start, from the very early years, I think we will do better in the future.