Children’s Mental Health

Antony Higginbotham Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Antony Higginbotham (Burnley) (Con)]

I welcome the general theme of the debate and recognise the importance of Children’s Mental Health Week. We have come an enormous way as a society on mental health. Although we have not erased the stigma of talking about mental health, we have come a long way. It was 10 years ago that the Health and Social Care Act 2012 enshrined duties on the Secretary of State for Health to improve physical and mental health, and it was a year later, in 2013, that the NHS constitution changed to bring parity to the two.

However, we have to recognise that the pressures on young people and children now are significant. Every generation has challenges, but this generation seems to be contending with more than most. First, there is the impact of social media. People can never switch off from Facebook, TikTok and Instagram—we know that—and platforms have to do much more to allow children and young people to take a step back. They have to do more to help children realise that unrealistic expectations are being put on them about body image, what relationships look like, and what careers and success look like.

Then we have to layer on top of that the impact of covid, and there has been an impact of covid on the mental health of children. It is not just the worry and anxiety that come from a pandemic, but the social isolation, the loss of learning and the loss of emotional development, whether children are four or five and just going to school for the first time, or 16, 17 or 18. These things are difficult to remedy, but that is what we must do.

Colleagues have spoken about the £500 million going into the mental health recovery action plan, and it is very welcome that £80 million of that is for young people. The long-term plan and the mental health leads going into schools are also very welcome, but I want to say a special thank you to Burnley FC in the Community, which does a really important job locally. Through its schools’ mental wellbeing project, working with the premier league, it puts mental health practitioners into local schools. They offer one-to-one sessions and group sessions. Between January 2019 and November 2021, more than 3,500 students were engaged. That helps to reduce anxiety, improve mood and build self-esteem. Lots of progress has been made and there are lots of schemes, funds and projects out there to make a difference, but because of social media and covid, now is the time to accelerate them.