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 through the Cross-government suicide prevention workplan to help prevent loneliness and other underlying factors associated with suicide in children and young people.

Protecting the mental health of our children and young people is a top priority for this Government and is a core part of the National Health Service Long Term Plan. The cross-Government suicide prevention workplan highlights steps we are taking across Government to reduce suicides in children and young people, including implementation of the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Green Paper, addressing online harms through the forthcoming Online Harms White Paper, action to tackle bullying, and action to improve support for university students.

The Government takes the issue of loneliness, and the impact it can have on people’s wellbeing, seriously, which is why the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport published the Cross-Government Loneliness Strategy last year. The strategy includes a number of commitments across Government to tackle youth loneliness. The Department of Health and Social Care is working across central and local government to implement the National Suicide Prevention Strategy, which includes collaboration with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.

The Department has also noted the report published by the Samaritans on 21 January 2019 into loneliness, suicide and young people, and will consider its findings.

The National Suicide Prevention Strategy highlights that addressing suicide prevention in children and young people requires tailored approaches to meeting their mental health needs.

We are working with local government to ensure every local area in England has an effective suicide prevention plan in place. Public Health England provided suicide prevention planning guidance to local authorities to support them in developing their plans, which advises that local plans should implement the key areas for action in the National Strategy, including implementing tailored approaches to meet the needs of children and young people. This guidance highlights research published by the National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Safety in Mental Health, which found that social isolation and withdrawal was a common theme in suicide by children and young people. The guidance is available at the following link:

https://www.hqip.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/8iQSvI.pdf