Longfield calls for action on 'shockingly poor' children's mental health treatment

A report published by Longfield to coincide with World Mental Health day today found that more than half of local areas fail to meet standards on crisis care, and highlighted a lack of information on how many children are referred and accepted for mental health treatment, or the outcomes achieved.

The research also found disparities between the treatment adults receive and the treatment children receive, with local areas spending an average of six per cent of their mental health budget on children, despite children making up around 20 per cent of the population.

Meanwhile, six out of 10 local areas were found to fail to meet NHS England's benchmark for local area improvement in treatment for children's mental health services.

The government has been attempting to improve children's mental health services in recent years - promising £1.4bn in funding up to 2020, while in January Prime Minister Theresa May announced plans for a review of child and adolescent mental health services followed by a policy green paper setting out plans to improve services.

However, Longfield said children's mental health problems are still too frequently being ignored by the NHS.

She has called for the government's forthcoming green paper on mental health to ensure that proper support is made readily available for all children who need it.

She also wants a "wholesale shift" in the scale of ambition across government and the NHS on children's mental health care, urging ministers to set out what local areas should be providing.

"The government needs to be bold, brave and uncompromising in its strategy for improving treatment for children with mental health illnesses," Longfield said.

"If changes aren't made urgently, not only will there will be severe consequences for the hundreds of thousands of children who are failing to receive the support they need now, but we risk leaving an adult mental health care ticking time bomb with a generation of children entering adulthood with untreated mental health problems."