BPS responds to Labour’s Child Health Plan

The seven-point plan includes a focus on ending the crisis in child mental health, tackling waiting lists and addressing public health issues.

A commitment to prevention, and ensuring that children can access services and support within schools, their communities and the NHS before they reach crisis point is vital to ensuring happy and healthy children who are given the opportunity to thrive.

Dr Roman Raczka, president-elect of the BPS, said:

"This plan from Labour has the potential to be a hugely important step to enable children to be happy and healthy, and to ensure we have properly functioning health, school and community services which have prevention at their heart.

"We know that half of mental health problems develop before a child reaches the age of 14, and we know first-hand the challenges experienced by children and their families to access the mental health support they need, with massive waiting lists and an overstretched workforce struggling to meet demand.

"Serious targeted investment is needed to tackle the huge waiting lists, the lack of properly funded and functioning community services, and to better support the transition from child to adult mental health services.

"Vital to delivering this plan will be the psychological workforce across the NHS as well as within schools and the community. They will not only be hugely important in providing services, care and interventions, but in designing preventative services to tackle public health issues.

"This plan is a very welcome start, as is the pledge to create a cross-departmental delivery board prioritising child health.

"However there must also be consideration of the other factors which affect children's health, including housing and education. As such this plan cannot stand in isolation; it must be complemented by a focus on cross-government child-centred policies."