Queen’s Speech

Baroness Massey of Darwen Excerpts

Thursday 9th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak today about the importance of support for the mental health of children: that is, those aged up to 18, and for their parents. I shall focus in particular on teenagers and the significance of brain development. Many of us have had teenage children and, indeed, we ourselves were teenagers once, albeit some time ago. I taught teenagers for many years and I survived them and loved them. We know about the turbulence of the teen years, which are not necessarily turbulent but are often so. However, for some young people and parents, they are more than turbulent because they can be traumatic and dangerous, with mental health crises caused by a variety of factors, some internal and personal such as stress, and some external such as poverty, abuse and cruelty, which can create challenges.

Thankfully, over recent years a great deal of emphasis has been put on mental health and initiatives such as consulting children and other service users, as well as improving mental health care, but the situation is now urgent. The Royal College of Psychiatrists points out worrying facts. Since 2010, the number of children and young people being admitted to A&E and diagnosed with a psychiatric condition has increased by 330%. That figure is astronomical and calls for measures to prevent and treat such disorders. Prevention is of the utmost importance. It is not just about money, it is also about thoughtful strategies.

I am aware that in the NHS long term plan there is the intention to put mental and physical health on an equal footing by guaranteeing that the proportion of the NHS budget spent on mental health increases each year until parity is reached. This will take time, but I suggest that we have a crisis that needs urgent attention.

I want to talk briefly about the potential support to help prevent or alleviate mental health problems in teenagers. Much is now emerging about the importance of understanding how the teenage brain develops and of the impact of such development on behaviour in teens such as risk-taking, stress and confusion. The distinguished psychologist Dr John Coleman has produced a useful booklet for adults and teens, and I read it again the other day. He emphasises that teenagers are experiencing major upheavals, perhaps more so now due to external influences such as worry about the future of the world, online activity and stress in schools.

Meanwhile, dramatic readjustments in the brain are going on in the pre-frontal cortex and the amygdala, the first associated with thinking, planning and problem solving and the second with emotion, sensation and arousal. This enormous readjustment can be distressing. Dr Coleman suggests that adults can help teenagers address uncertainties by providing routines, such as encouraging good sleep patterns by limiting use of digital devices before bedtime, learning to talk constructively with teens and providing a rich environment with a wide variety of activities. Adults can learn how their own negative behaviour might affect their children. I wish this booklet had been available to me, and I wish it were available now to every parent, teacher and adult dealing with teenagers.

There is so little comfort for parents, who are often desperate to help their children. There can be such delays in getting help. I have met parents so desperate that they have resorted to private consultations they can ill afford because of the waiting lists in child and adolescent health services.

Can the Minister take away with him and share with other government departments the notion of being creative in empowering parents, carers and others to help and support teenagers to understand and deal with the confusion of adolescence? Can he also suggest that strategies to improve the resilience of young people, such as programmes in schools, are given high importance and high priority, with training for teachers and parents?

I return to the horrendous statistic I quoted at the beginning, the increase of 330% in the last 10 years of children and young people being admitted to A&E with a psychiatric condition. Will the Government act with imagination and firmness?