Luciana Berger – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2015-11-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much of the additional £1.25 billion allocated in the Spending Review and Autumn Statement 2015 for funding for child and adolescent mental health services over five years will be allocated in each financial year to 2020.

Alistair Burt

In total £1.4 billion will be made available over the course of this Parliament to improve children and young people’s mental health. In addition to the £1.25 billion made available in the March 2015 budget, which includes £75 million for perinatal mental health services, an additional £150 million was also allocated in the 2014 Autumn Statement to improve community-based eating disorder services.

The Government is firmly committed to delivering the major changes needed to improve services for children and young people with mental health problems, including investment in early intervention and prevention.

The Government is taking a targeted and phased approach to the additional investment to enable local areas to develop additional capacity and a collaborative approach across health, education and children’s services. This is what is needed to make a real difference. We are spending £143 million this year, much of which is going to local area, underpinned by a national programme of work.

Exact allocations for each financial year will be confirmed as part of the annual planning process, but the government remains committed to delivering the full amount over the five year period to 2019/20.