Mental Health Services in Schools and Colleges

Lord Addington Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, this is one of those debates when you realise that just about everything that you were going to say has been referred to and that, in the case of my noble friend and the noble Earl, much of the heavy lifting has already been done. So I simply say that it is quite clear that this is a real problem which we have probably underestimated for generations. The linkage between failure in life and education and mental health problems is absolutely clear but we really have not brought the two together.

Much of my interest in education has been driven by the problems for certain groups in the special educational needs sector. We have established that these groups are even more vulnerable than the rest of society to mental health problems, almost certainly due to the greater stress that having these problems can cause within the education system. Take dyslexia, the one that I know best. If a child with dyslexia is placed in a classroom, they are placed in a situation where they are bound to struggle with the basic building block of our education—that is, the acquisition of written language. We then wonder why they acquire a greater stress level that leads to problems. Those problems might have been there anyway, but they are exaggerated and exacerbated by the entire system—it is almost inevitable. However, as was referred to by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, if a parent intervenes early and does something about it, everything is great.

How does this relate to mental health problems? Here, once again, the parent is the linchpin. If a parent identifies problems and moves around between services, they will, at the moment, get a reasonable outcome. The problem is that most parents do not know. We then come back to who else might spot this—it will be either a doctor or a teacher. However, when we go to the doctor, do they look for mental health problems? They are probably better than they were, but I imagine that the average GP will look to physical problems first. Can teachers do this job? Teachers become the poor bloody infantry of every problem facing the under-18s. They are required to intervene, know, get on with everything, identify and bring together. The least we can do is give them some form of basic training about the recognition of problems. This applies to special educational needs and will apply equally to this sector. If experts are built in to the education structure, teachers—when I say teachers, I mean every educational professional, right up to university level; it would not hurt—can refer young people on to the expert. If we do not do that, we do not have linkage points and are relying on the good luck of the parent involved being prepared to admit that their child has a problem. How many parents want to admit that? How many will try just about anything to avoid that? They have to be given support.

Basic awareness packages do not take for ever to implement and are not the most expensive thing ever to be placed in schools and colleges, but there is always room for another one. We must look at increased amounts of time for training for those involved in the process. If we do not, we will build up an expectation that cannot be delivered.

Legally, that duty is already there. The Children and Families Act is almost a year old now. I hope that, when looking at the implementation of the Act, we will get some guidance on special educational needs and the accessing of plans. It is something that was almost universally accepted, if not universally praised, when it went through. Have we identified where the problems are in getting the plans that call for all these bodies to work together? There will be problems; it would be ridiculous if there were not. We would not have passed the legislation if there was not the potential for problems—at least I hope we would not have. I hope that, when she answers, the Minister will give us some idea how the Government have looked at and indentified these problem areas. How do the pockets of expertise and excellence relate to the rest of the system? How do the various bits go together? It is quite clear that this is about linkage and moving through because, to refer back to my original point, if somebody fails in education, it is very likely that they will fail in the rest of their life.

The Children and Families Act says that anybody with special educational needs or problems should be educated until the age of 25 to catch up. Once again, that was almost universally accepted. What are we doing to make sure that, in those extra few years, we actually are doing this? Are we making sure that we are bringing people together and making those links? Without it, we are wasting that person. We are turning them from someone who is an economic good for society to someone who is a drag on it, and making their own life just that little bit more unpleasant—if not, in some cases, unbearable. We have to do something here; it is about bringing the points together.

If we fail, we are making our own lives that little bit worse. If we succeed and bring together those people who have shown a great interest in this field to look at the system, we make things a little bit better. We do not want to waste the people; we do not want to waste the time; we do not want to waste the money. Surely just by making sure that those services are co-ordinated and that people are a little better prepared to do what they are told by law they have a duty to do, we will make things a little better. I hope that the Minister will give us a good example of how we are co-ordinating services and developing models of good practice. Without those, I can see us having to address this issue again in legislation and having another long and boring battle over making sure that those services implement this. I hope that we do not have to, because I have a nagging suspicion that my life is far too short.