Rehman Chishti – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rehman Chishti on 2015-11-04.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what discussions he has had with the Chief Executive of NHS England on spending on mental health services during 2015-16.

Alistair Burt

In total, clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) have set plans for 2015/16 which reflect an increase in mental health care expenditure in excess of their increase in allocation for the year. NHS England is tracking actual expenditure against those plans and it will report to the Secretary of State at the end of the year on whether those plans have been met.

Departmental Ministers meet the Chief Executives of NHS England and Monitor regularly and discuss a wide range of issues, including funding for mental health services.

NHS England was formally established on 1 April 2013.Expenditure by NHS England on Specialist Mental Health Services for 2013/14 was £1.780 billion and £1.795 billion in 2014/15. NHS England’s planned expenditure on Specialist Mental Health Services for 2015/16 is £1.859 billion.

NHS England has published CCG level expenditure on mental health for 2013/14, which was estimated to be £8.1 billion. CCGs are currently in the process of preparing estimates of expenditure for mental health services in 2014/15. Estimates for 2015/16 are not available.