Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that there is sufficient high quality residential placements for children and young people with serious mental health challenges in every locality.

Our overall strategy is to reduce reliance on inpatient mental health beds for children and young people with a severe mental illness and to have fewer young people being detained under the Mental Health Act. To support this the model of provision of National Health Service-funded inpatient treatment is being reviewed and re-designed to support the move to community-based provision, where children and young people are able to access appropriate support in a timely, effective, and patient-centred way, close to home and in the least restrictive environment.

We recognise that for some young people, admission to hospital will not be the most appropriate way to meet their needs. This has been a focus of the transformation of children and young people’s mental health services and continues to be a priority in the NHS Long Term Plan. This transition is being supported by the introduction of provider collaboratives to support place-based commissioning and to develop local services that meet the needs of their communities. Options may include increased day provision and the new model would see a change to how inpatient environments are best utilised.

NHS England’s new Quality Transformation Programme is currently undertaking a review of children and young people’s inpatient services. The purpose is to support development of a new model of inpatient care for specialist services that can support localised treatment in the least restrictive environment but also to ensure inpatient care is part of a seamless pathway that delivers quality care.