Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on ensuring that pupils in (a) Rutland and Melton constituency and (b) England are able to receive support from Mental Health Support Teams.

Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs) are a new service and one of the major commitments made jointly by the Department for Education with the Department for Health and Social Care and the National Health Service (NHS) partners to implement proposals set out in the Green Paper ‘Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health Provision’, which is available at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/transforming-children-and-young-peoples-mental-health-provision-a-green-paper.

Funded through the NHS, MHSTs are designed to help meet the mental health needs of children and young people in primary, secondary and further education (primarily for ages 5 to 18).

My right hon. Friends, the Secretary of State for Education and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care both continue to monitor closely the progress made in this area.

MHSTs will be established in 20% to 25% of the country by 2023, delivering interventions to help children and young people with mild to moderate mental health issues, supporting development of whole-school or college approaches to mental health, and helping children and young people to get the right support and stay in education.

The first 2018-19 trailblazer sites in England, delivering 59 MHSTs, are all expected to be fully operational in early 2020 following completion of their training. A further 123 MHSTs will be delivered through the 2019-20 recruitment wave. Each MHST will work with schools and colleges supporting an estimated 8,000 children and young people.

There are currently no recorded MHSTs in Rutland and Melton constituency, however, recruitment of 2020-21 MHST sites was launched on 10 January 2020 and is open until 16 March 2020. NHS England have invited expressions of interest to establish new MHSTs from all Clinical Commissioning Group(s) in England.