Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of (a) the adequacy of funding for mental health services and (b) the potential impact of the level of that funding on waiting lists for such services.

Adequate funding for mental health services is important. While funding for reforms and improvements to mental health services will be decided at the Spending Review, the Autumn Budget provided an extra £26 million to open new mental health crisis centres, and funding to provide NHS Talking Therapies services for an extra 380,000 patients.

We remain committed to recruiting an additional 8,500 mental health workers to reduce delays and provide faster treatment, which will also help ease pressure on busy mental health services.