Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to improve access and reduce waiting times for children's mental health services.

Achieving Better Access to Mental Health Services by 2020 also announces the introduction of standard waiting times for Early Intervention in Psychosis services which will be of benefit to young people, and for the adult Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme. It makes it clear that the waiting time standards announced are a first step. There will also be £30 million increased investment in liaison psychiatry to help people including young people presenting in accident and emergency departments with mental health problems. The vision is for comprehensive standards to be developed over the coming years for all ages, including for children and young people. Where adult IAPT services are commissioned to provide a service to 16 and 17 year olds, the new waiting time standard will apply.

The Department and NHS England will work together with mental health system partners to set out how and when access and further waiting time standards could be introduced, subject to resourcing decisions following the next Spending Review.

We have invested £54 million into the Children and Young people’s Improving Access to Psychological Therapies programme (CYP IAPT) over 2011-15/16, which is designed to improve access to evidence-based psychological therapies and collaboration with children, young people and families. The programme works with 82 Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) partnerships and currently covers 60% of the 0-19 population. The Government’s aim is that all of England will be involved by 2018 reflected in the Mandate with NHS England.

The Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Well-Being Taskforce is considering ways to improve access for children and young people and promote collaborative commissioning of services to reflect the needs of children and young people.

On 2 December, the Deputy Prime Minister announced recurrent funding for the next 5 years of £30 million per year to improve services for young people with mental health problems. This investment places a particular emphasis on eating disorders and self-harm and it will deliver swifter access to evidence-based community treatment for children and young people with eating disorders.

In response to NHS England’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services Tier 4 Report, published in July, NHS England are using £7 million to provide 50 extra CAMHS specialised Tier 4 beds for young patients in the areas with the least provision. 36 of the 50 planned new beds have opened - 27 in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw, five in East Anglia and four in Somerset. NHS England continues to seek to build capacity in the areas with least provision.