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Changing Minds: Tens of millions slashed from mental health budgets

A total of £85 million has been slashed from mental health budgets for children and teenagers across England in the past five years, ITV News can reveal.

Some £35m has been cut in the past two years alone, the figures show - with more than one in five councils freezing or cutting their budgets for young people every year since 2010.

Meanwhile, the vast majority - between 65 and 75 per cent - of local authorities, mental health trusts and clinical commissioning groups have frozen or cut their mental health spending since 2013.

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Extra £170m children's mental health care funding to be announced

The government is poised to announce more than £170 million of extra funding will be ploughed into mental health services for children and young people in England, ITV News understands.

Some £143m will be allocated to mental health care in the coming months, while another £30m - to be handed out immediately - will be dedicated to the treatment of eating disorders.

One in four British adults are diagnosed with a mental health problem each year Credit: Newscast/MIND

The money, expected to be officially announced on Monday, includes £15m on perinatal mental health care, a £24m expansion of the Children and Young People’s Improving Access to Psychological Therapies Programme (CYP IAPT), and a £19m nationwide programme of work including staff development and investment in 'innovation'.

Another £75m will go out to local authorities as soon as they have completed their Local Transformation Plans, expected to be around October.

Welcoming the news, NHS England director Dr Martin McShane said the extra money would mean more patients would be able to be seen sooner.

The number of children and young people with an eating disorder is on the rise and it is right that the government has made this a priority and that we now have a clear waiting time standard.

It is clinically proven that patients recover most quickly when we treat them as early and as close to home as possible. By prioritising our focus on doing this we can minimise the number of young people who end up needing more specialised in-patient care.

– Dr Martin McShane, NHS England
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