Health and Social Care Committee and Education Committee

Layla Moran Excerpts

Thursday 10th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Luciana Berger]

I thank my hon. Friend for her comments. A key concern we heard from education professionals in written evidence was how those designated mental health leads will be able to do their job. It was not clear from the evidence we heard from the Minister for School Standards that adequate resources will be in place to equip those teachers with the skills they need to do that role. That is why we recommend that there should be a specific payment and that it should be a senior role. That is also why we recommend that mental health professionals should not be a contingency; the first port of call should be those professionals in mental health, who have a fuller and wider training to be able to fulfil that role, rather than relying on teachers, who already have a massive burden.

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

I welcome this very valuable report, and in particular paragraphs 31 and 32 on building resilience against exam pressure and the effect on mental health of the narrowing of the curriculum. However, rather than building resilience against something that is likely to be causing part of the problem, did the Select Committee ever consider suggesting an independent root-and-branch reform of the assessment system, and in particular key stage 1 and 2 SATS, which we hear are a large cause of this problem up and down the country?

[Luciana Berger]

I thank the hon. Lady for her comments. Some people are keen to paint this issue as being just to do with social media, which is why I sought to address in my remarks the fact that, in the view of many who sit on the Committees, the No. 1 concern is the academic system. That is why one of our recommendations says that:

“the Government should gather independent evidence concerning the impact of exam pressure on young people’s mental health”.

We want to see that right through the entire education system, including the stages she mentioned.

We also need to look at the narrowing of the curriculum. We heard from young people about the pressures they felt that that put on them, which was exacerbating their mental health issues. We would like to see that addressed. We were disappointed with the response from the Minister for School Standards, who said that there was no connection or correlation between the two. We heard clear evidence that it has a very negative impact on too many young children in this country.