Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of waiting times for mental health support on the incidence of self-harm.

Whilst we have made no specific assessment, we expanded the scope of the National Suicide Prevention Strategy in 2017 to include addressing self-harm as a highlighted issue, and we continue to fund the Multi-Centre Study of Self-harm which is the most in-depth analysis and monitoring of self-harming trends in England. The NHS Long Term Plan also commits an additional £2.3 billion a year for the expansion and transformation of mental health services in England by 2023/24 so that an additional two million people can get the NHS-funded mental health support that they need.