Mental health services for looked after children – stable funding is the first step

Yesterday (28 April 2016) the vice chair of the Cavendish Square Group, Paul Jenkins, spoke to the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire Show in response to an Education Select Committee report on the mental well-being of children in care.

The report identified that a significant number of local authorities were not assessing the mental health of children as they entered care, despite finding that half of looked-after children have a diagnosable mental health condition – four times higher than their peers.

Paul said: “Good mental health services for looked after young people works on two levels – the first by having the right set of skills among the everyday organisations who support young people such as schools, social workers, foster carers and adoptive parents, who can then fast track problems into formal CAMHS services when they arise. In addition to this, while the government has promised more funding for these services, we need to make sure that this is translated into better frontline delivery and further investment. Politicians can’t talk about mental health being a priority if it’s not backed up with the right levels of funding.

The full interview can be found here.