Autism and ADHD Assessments

Stephanie Peacock Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2023 Westminster Hall

[Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Angela, and to follow the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis), who made a powerful speech advocating on behalf of his constituents. I thank the Petitions Committee for granting this debate, and congratulate the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn) on leading it.

In the UK, as has been said, about 700 people have autism and about 3 million have ADHD. The average waiting time for a diagnosis is far too long, with some adults having to wait up to seven years for an ADHD diagnosis. Barnsley East is in the top 10% of constituencies with the highest rate of special educational needs. A number of local people have contacted me about their struggles to get the right diagnosis, especially for children, in an appropriate timeframe. They are frustrated with a system that seems to hinder access to support. In Barnsley, the average waiting time for an ADHD diagnosis for under-fives is 10 months, and the average waiting time for those aged five to 16 is among the highest in the country, at two years and four months. Until 2021, Barnsley had a funding black hole of more than £35 million for SEN provision. There is a desperate need for more resources and for the Government to act to enable local authorities to deliver for their communities.

The NHS suggests that the wait for an ADHD diagnosis can be damaging to children, as in the meantime they are likely to miss out on education due to wrongfully being punished for symptoms of undiagnosed ADHD. They also often suffer with anxiety, depression, dyslexia and even epilepsy. Those with undiagnosed autism are likely to struggle living independently, maintaining employment and creating interpersonal relationships. It is clear that the system for diagnosis is inadequate, and it is unfair that people are suffering because of it.

A number of people have been in touch with me over the past few years to share their experiences, especially as parents seeking support for their children. I and my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) recently held a meeting in Barnsley to speak with parents who are trying to navigate the system and secure support for their children. They told us that they experience difficulty in getting a diagnosis and in accessing specialist provision, and they also spoke of ongoing care issues. This included but was not limited to ADHD and autism provision.

NICE recommends that the maximum wait for the commencement of an assessment should be three months for autism. However, even if an assessment has begun, that does not mean that a diagnosis will be achieved quickly, as we have heard in this debate. Many are stuck in the system for months or years after the process has started. There is currently no advisory wait time for an ADHD assessment. The Government do not even include data on ADHD diagnoses and waiting times, and have expressed no desire to do so, even though, as has been said, there was a 34% increase in the number of people waiting for an ADHD assessment between 2021 and 2022.

For both conditions, there is a postcode lottery of assessment and diagnosis, meaning that access to much-needed services is effectively restricted depending on where someone lives. Most respondents to the Petitions Committee survey stated that waiting times for assessment for both ADHD and autism are inadequate.

This, of course, speaks to a larger issue of worsening regional inequality over the past 13 years. As the backlog of urgent healthcare cases gets longer, assessment and support for long-term conditions such as ADHD and autism are pushed further backwards. The majority of respondents to my local SEN survey said that it was either difficult or very difficult to access SEN provision. This must change. More data on waiting times for neurodivergent conditions needs to be collected. We need to end the postcode lottery of assessment and diagnosis. Most importantly, to achieve that, more resources must be committed so we can speed up diagnosis and provide the support that is needed for people with ADHD and autism.