Youth Mental Health Support

Gordon McKee Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd June 2026 Westminster Hall

[Anna Dixon]

I would love to join my hon. Friend in thanking his local organisation, and I thank him for being such a great champion for sport in this place.

I will focus specifically on three areas: the NHS and access to CAMHS—to which I hope the Minister will reply—and youth services and action to tackle online harm. As of late 2025, more than 550,000 children and young people were on NHS mental health waiting lists in England, and more than half had waited for over a year. The Royal College of Psychiatrists has warned about how harmful that is, recently declaring that a lack of prioritisation to treat children with mental illness in England is turning treatable conditions into lifelong recurring illnesses, and that as many as 75% of children and young people who experience mental health problems are not getting the help they need.

[Gordon McKee (Glasgow South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an important speech about the state of child and adolescent mental health support in England. I will just make the point about what is happening in Scotland, which is also very poor. In January to March this year, almost 40% of referrals to CAMHS support were rejected by the NHS in Scotland. I think that is ultimately a way of managing waiting lists so that they seem like they are meeting their target, even though young people are being failed. Does my hon. Friend agree that supporting young people in Scotland is critical, and will she join me in calling on the Scottish Government to get a grip of that?

[Anna Dixon]

I happily join my hon. Friend in calling on the Scottish Government to address this issue. I believe that waiting lists are too long UK-wide, and that too much rationing is happening. My constituent Joseph, a young man due to start secondary school in September, is an example of that. He has been unable to get assessments for ADHD and autism for 18 months, and his mum is incredibly worried about his ability to cope if he does not have the assessments and appropriate support. I will speak some of her words:

“This delay is already having a significant impact on Joseph”,

his emotional wellbeing has deteriorated,

“he has started to pull out his hair and eyelashes, his ability to sleep, educational functioning, peer relationships, and ability to…interface with healthcare providers has been extremely challenging and traumatic to the point where he has refused treatment.”

It is not just about the waiting list to get an assessment; after a diagnosis has been received, children may still need to wait for long periods to get medication and other support. GPs are severely overstretched. One of the GPs at Grange Park surgery in Burley in Wharfedale in my constituency shared their concerns with me about the pressures they face. Again, I will read a short extract from her letter to me:

“The mental health services are not working. They are massively under capacity. It’s easy to say we can’t afford more staff but these children are waiting throughout most of their secondary education to be assessed and then helped. It is not acceptable.

I no longer can make a difference. I write to everyone I can think of. I complain. I personally find it distressing. I have decided that the only people who can institute a change is the government. There needs to be urgent money put into children’s mental health services. A wait of 2 years for a teenager to see someone is just unacceptable. Think about the effect on the family and on the whole life outcome of the child themselves. We cannot give up on these children.”

Community Pharmacies

Gordon McKee Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2026 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Care (Stephen Kinnock)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Tiverton and Minehead (Rachel Gilmour) on raising this important issue. The number of hon. Members present shows how vital community pharmacy is right across our country.

Since coming into office, this Government have continued to reverse the decades of cuts to community pharmacy, and have frozen prescription charges for the second year in a row to help our constituents with the cost of living. Wherever they live in the country, women can now get emergency contraception from their local pharmacy free of charge on the NHS. That work has only been possible thanks to the tireless efforts and dedication of pharmacy teams in supporting patients in their communities, delivering a wide range of NHS services, not least in the west country. In fact, just last week, I was in Bristol visiting the fantastic Concord pharmacy, which is at the forefront of our efforts to shift care from hospital to community. I thank Saeed and his team for the warm welcome they gave me. I saw how they are delivering blood pressure checks, vaccinations and Pharmacy First services to the people of north Bristol.

For too long, community pharmacies such as Concord have been held back from realising their true potential. It is why the Government have given them a central role in our 10-year plan to shift the focus of the NHS from sickness to prevention, from hospital to community and from analogue to digital.

[Gordon McKee (Glasgow South) (Lab)]

An excellent example of community pharmacies in England embracing innovation is their interaction with the NHS app. My constituents in Scotland do not have access to a similar app because the Scottish Government have not got on with fixing it. Will the Minister join me in calling on the Scottish Government to produce a proper equivalent NHS app, so that constituents in Scotland can benefit in the same way?

[Stephen Kinnock]

My hon. Friend makes a vital point. It appears that the Scottish Government are stuck in the analogue age, and we need digital solutions. I join him in encouraging the Scottish Government to get with the programme, get with the NHS app and get moving on some of these important initiatives.

We all know that we simply cannot make the shift from hospital to community without our community pharmacies. I am not the only one to see that—I am sure that all of us have made use of community pharmacies in our constituencies, and that colleagues will know the importance of the accessibility of pharmacies in towns and villages across the country. There are over 10,000 pharmacies in England. They are busy dispensing medicines, offering advice, and delivering care and services to support our communities. Patients across the country can also choose to access over 400 distance-selling pharmacies, which deliver medicines to patients’ homes free of charge, playing a vital role in reaching the most isolated members of our society. However, I acknowledge that access is not the same in all areas of the country. Rural areas often have fewer community pharmacies, so people have to travel further to access a pharmacy as well as other services.

Colleagues have also been right to raise concerns about pharmacy closures in the past. Local authority health and wellbeing boards are responsible for assessing whether local needs are adequately met by the existing providers, and what improvements are needed to ensure that people can access services. Those assessments inform integrated care boards’ commissioning decisions. In areas where there are fewer pharmacies, our pharmacy access scheme provides additional financial support to eligible pharmacies. The scheme helps pharmacies that are critical for patient access to stay open and provide local communities with continued access to medicines and excellent healthcare advice. In certain rural areas where there are no pharmacies, dispensing doctors can supply medicines to patients directly without the need for a pharmacy.

The hon. Member for Tiverton and Minehead will be aware that there are currently 14 pharmacies in her constituency. I am aware of the closure of two pharmacies in her constituency since 2017, and that the local population instead get their medicines from the neighbouring dispensing GP or from one of the over 400 distance-selling pharmacies available nationally. I also note that the latest data shows that there are 199 pharmacies in Devon, with 914 across the south-west. The Government are committed to supporting the critical role that they play in serving their communities.