Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many Mental Health Support Teams there were in (a) Hitchin constituency, (b) Bedfordshire and (c) North Hertfordshire in each year since 2010.

Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs) have three core functions. Firstly, to deliver evidence-based early interventions for emerging and actual mental health issues, 1 to 1 and in groups. Secondly, to support a school or college’s mental health lead to embed an effective approach to promote and support mental health and wellbeing. Thirdly, to advise school and college staff, and liaise with external specialist services, to help pupils and learners to get the right timely support and stay in education.

Data specifically on how many MHSTs there are in Bedfordshire, Hitchin constituency and North Hertfordshire is not currently available.​

However, data published by NHS England shows that since 2018/19, when the first wave of MHSTs were commissioned, 11 MHSTs have been established across Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes. For the first 9 MHSTs established up to 2022/23, this equates to MHST coverage of 43% of pupils and learners and 40% of schools and colleges in these areas

A link to the data can be found here: https://www.england.nhs.uk/mental-health/cyp/trailblazers/#_Mental_Health_Support and https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.publishing.service.gov.uk%2Fmedia%2F6642052bf34f9b5a56adc5dd%2FTransforming_children_and_young_people_s_mental_health_implementation_programme_2024_data-tables.xlsx&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK.