More cash needed to meet PM’s vow to improve mental health care, experts warn

Mental health organisations welcomed the focus Mrs May had put on the subject, but said resources were crucial to dealing with the issue.

In a keynote address in London, the Prime Minister (pictured) said she wanted to make young people a priority with additional training for teachers as she said mental health problems cost the country £105 billion a year.

Mrs May said all secondary schools would be offered mental health first aid training, and that by 2021 no child would have to travel away from their local area to receive treatment.

Chief executive of the mental health charity SANE, Marjorie Wallace, said: “We welcome what Theresa May outlines, but it is a Utopian vision which may change attitudes in many years to come.

“However, without ring-fenced money now for the psychiatric services which are in breakdown, the stigma she seeks to reduce will remain, lives will continue to be lost for patients turned away from care, refused admission to depleted psychiatric units and left insufficiently supported and often un-visited by under-resourced community teams.

“We urge that these laudable ideas for education and work place awareness be matched by substantially increased funds to mental health trusts.”

The British Medical Association’s community care committee chairman, Gary Wannan, said: “Mental health services are in desperate need of investment, and despite the promises of more money there is evidence it is not coming through fully.

“Many young patients, in particular, have to travel hundreds of miles for treatment, when they would be better treated nearer home; many do not have any access to outpatient talking treatments for common mental illness such as depression or have to wait a year or more; others have tragically taken their own lives before receiving treatment. The NHS has let these patients down.

“Until we have the guarantee that extra funding will be provided, there are question marks over whether the measures outlined in this speech will have the necessary impact.”

Chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation, Jenny Edwards, said: “My concern now is that resources are placed where they are needed most; in communities that are surviving and not thriving.

“The prime minister has a real opportunity to lead a prevention revolution in our society – starting with those groups who need support now.”

Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said: “This speech sounds a lot like David Cameron’s before it. The Conservatives reheat these proposals more often than most people have microwavable meals.”

Labour’s shadow minister without portfolio, Andrew Gywnne, said: “Mental health is a case study in Tory failure.

“Repeatedly the Tories give speeches saying they will give mental health parity with physical health, but their record is dismal.

“Spending on mental health fell by £600 million in the last parliament, money intended for children’s mental health goes to other priorities and there are thousands fewer mental health nurses than when the Tories came to power.”