School-based Counselling Services

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) on securing this important debate. I rise to speak both as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on youth affairs and as the Member of Parliament for Stoke-on-Trent Central, which has significant challenges due to multiple deprivation factors in our city and the high levels of young people in care—more than 1,000—which mean that our schools and colleges have a vital counselling and safeguarding role. That underpins our ambitions to give our young people the best opportunities to achieve and fulfil their potential.

However, support for care leavers and those who live independently is inconsistent and a high-risk area. These young people are vulnerable, as well as being high-risk for mental health issues. Young people’s mental health issues impact educational outcomes and the ability to form friendships. Problems can last into adulthood, affecting life chances and physical health.

In Stoke-on-Trent, CAMHS is overstretched and cannot meet the demands across the city. Students do not see the same person for any follow-up appointments or long-term counselling treatment. In addition, a 17-year-old student is unlikely to be seen until they reach 18 due to the waiting list. Services are now focused on the reactive as opposed to the preventive at a time of wide recognition that investment must be focused on preventive actions to avoid the physical and mental—and financial—cost of waiting until a young person presents with a major trauma.

I welcome the recommendations in the national food strategy about the importance of access for every child to nutritious food and healthy eating, to address the causes of malnutrition in schools and to tackle eating disorders, which recently have risen significantly. Those issues are also probably picked up more by counsellors than by other services.

This year, City of Stoke-on-Trent Sixth Form College’s safeguarding, counselling and wellbeing team received a national award for its emotional wellbeing project. I am sure the House will join me in congratulating Jo Finn, Kirsty Cooper and Claire Gaygan on the superb work that they do, which was made possible by the opportunity area funding. The college looks after about 1,800 students, many of whom are from disadvantaged backgrounds. The funding enabled the team to devise a model to meet the needs of the young people of Stoke-on-Trent, rather than the other way round. The impact of that is measurable in clinical data, as well as other key performance indicators, including attendance, progression and retention. Young people have engaged with the service as it fits around their timetables, no travel is involved, they see the purpose and they are referred quickly internally to a mental health practitioner, an emotional wellbeing worker, or one of the many groups that they can attend.

Across the city, schools also take on the hugely important role of safeguarding. They act as a triage service that notifies other statutory services when they become aware of issues, as well as providing a safe space where children can open up to a trusted adult. I commend the excellent work undertaken in all our schools and colleges. I have the utmost respect for all the teachers and support staff who work so hard to provide not only quality education but pastoral care to our children and young people. I have heard many accounts of the daily challenges faced in providing such support as an unfunded or temporarily funded extra. I speak today in support of core funding for mental health counselling and safeguarding provision to ensure that those with added personal challenges and health issues have the best possible chances throughout our education system.

In Stoke-on-Trent, loss of early intervention across the city means more focus on higher-tier services that look at extreme cases involving, for example, domestic abuse, substance misuse or human trafficking. Schools and colleges are therefore having to deal with intermediate services. Locally, Stoke-on-Trent has lost essential services such as the school nurse service, which provided preventive support and guidance, and sometimes immediate referrals to A&E, particularly for mental health issues and eating disorders; “Hidden Harm”, a drug service supporting young people with parents with drug-related and mental health issues; and the STAR—sex teenagers and relationships—service that provided early intervention and support around healthy relationships. As a result, schools and colleges are having to pick that up.

The threshold for family services is extremely high, which means that schools and colleges are also picking up that early intervention work. They have the skills and experience to do that, but they have no allocated budget or time. It is an additional responsibility.

[Munira Wilson]

The hon. Lady is making some important points. When I tour schools in my constituency, mental health is by far the No. 1 priority that every headteacher gives me. I have been struck by the impact on staff, many of whom do not have the skills and experience to deal with the level of mental health problems that they face. I went into a secondary school a few days after a young person had taken their own life. Just recently, I saw a seven-year-old expressing violent behaviour and the teacher was shaken up and had to take time out of the classroom. That is why we need mental health support teams rolled out quickly. The Government’s catch-up funding must provide not just academic support but holistic support, including for mental health, because teachers and headteachers are really struggling.

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[Jo Gideon]

I thank the hon. Lady, and I agree with all she says.

The threshold for family services is extremely high, which means that schools and colleges are picking up early intervention work. The sixth-form college works specifically with 16 to 18-year-olds, which is a really challenging place to be. Legally, this age group is still classed as children, but accessing external support is increasingly challenging. There is a huge gap between children’s and adults’ services, and the threshold for adult services is even higher than for children’s services. At 18 someone will come under adult services, but it is almost impossible to have an adult services support worker for an 18-year-old.

The issue of funding counselling services spans both the Health and the Education Departments. Disappointingly the college approached the clinical commissioning group to share costs and provide additional support for both colleges in the city, which would have cost about £40,000, but the CCG declined. As we move to integrated care partnerships, I hope that it will take an holistic view of preventive mental health support, and that means working closely with education and schools.

I recognise that the cost of staffing counselling service provision across all the schools in England is significant, but I truly believe that it is a key element of levelling up. If areas such as Stoke-on-Trent are to level up our educational achievement, the things that hold us and our children and young people back must be addressed by having extra counselling services. We cannot raise standards without recognising the real barriers that most vulnerable young people face and putting in place core funding for essential school and college-based counselling services. I believe that that will address these issues, particularly in the most disadvantaged areas—there is a need for these services in every area, but those areas need disproportionately more, and any help that the Government provide is most welcome. We need to recognise that some areas need more help than others, and I hope that the Minister is listening.