Mental Health

Debate between Chris Ruane and Andy Burnham

Thursday 14th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I completely agree. I do a lot of work shadowing, and I recently shadowed a GP. What amazed me was how many of the people coming through his door were the people who also come through our doors on a Friday and Saturday. They are not necessarily looking for something to take to the chemists; they are actually just crying out for help, in one way or another, with a problem they are struggling with. That GP was very good and did not prescribe, but referred lots of people to the IAPT service, as I sat there with him. However, he said that across Coventry, where he was based, many others were not doing the same.

[Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)]

The Minister mentioned the number of prescriptions that have been issued. I received a parliamentary answer a couple of days ago which said that in 1991 there were 9 million prescriptions. The Minister mentioned the figure of 42 million, but from 2010 to 2011 the number went up by 4 million. In the years before that the increase was usually 2 million a year, but in one year the figure increased by 10%, or 4 million. When I asked the Minister what his assessment was of the reason for those increases, there was no conclusive answer. We must get to the bottom of why these prescriptions are being issued and why they have gone up by 500% in a 20-year period.

[Andy Burnham]

We must. Perhaps I am about to make more of a political point, but as has been mentioned so eloquently today by my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham, as well as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), although the trend is upwards—that is happening come what may: I mentioned the financial crisis, during which the rate has jumped up, including in our time in government—the cumulative effect of some of the benefits changes on some of the most vulnerable members of society, coupled with the withdrawal of social care support by councils, means that, right now, some people out there are suffering very badly indeed. That is part of the explanation for the worrying figures that my hon. Friend has just given the House. The Government need to have a look at what is happening out there and whether or not some people are struggling with mental health problems because of the extra stress that other factors, particularly financial, are putting upon them.

I welcome the Minister’s commitment to the improving access to psychological therapies programme, but I hear that waiting times for it are increasing in parts of the country where GPs face much longer referral times. Indeed, a Mind survey of 2011 said that 30% of GPs were unaware of services to which they could refer patients, beyond medication. That tells us that we still have quite a long way to go. IAPT needs protecting and nurturing; it needs to come with a national direction in the operating framework. In the new and changing NHS world, we cannot allow it to be simply whittled away. More broadly, we need to look carefully at commissioning and find out whether GPs have the right skills to commission properly for mental health. We need to consider what the precise commissioning arrangements for mental health are, as there is still some confusion out there about them.