Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many mental health trusts have signed up to pursuing a zero suicide ambition for mental health services.

Our Zero Suicide ambition, which we announced on 19 January, is not a target, but a call to create a culture in our country where everyone can talk about their mental health problems without fear or embarrassment. For this ambition to work it is essential that every part of the National Health Service commits to it.

This ambition has currently been adopted in Liverpool, the South-West and in the East of England. Health workers in these areas are re-thinking how they care for people with mental health conditions and a number of initiatives are underway.

Mersey Care in Liverpool has created a programme to eliminate suicide by 2017 to 2018 which includes:

- improved training for staff, focusing on the clinical skills needed to work with patients and their families to develop a ‘safety plan’ – a personalised care plan with clear ways to get help 24/7;

- working with other providers and stakeholders to share best practice – including CALM, Samaritans and the Cheshire and Merseyside Reduction Partnership; and

- a dedicated Safe from Suicide team will provide advice, support, assessment and monitoring.

As part of their ‘zero suicide’ ambition, South West of England is looking to:

- work closely with accident and emergency to better identify and support people who present with suicidal thoughts or attempts;

- explore ways of providing better mental health support for people once they have been discharged, regardless of which NHS service they’ve been in contact with;

- explore how to target high risk groups, such as middle aged men, with tailored support; and

- work with other agencies, such as the police and transport services, to identify ‘hot-zones’ – areas where higher than average numbers of suicides occur – and understand the reasons behind these figures.

In the East of England, the whole region has come together to pledge to suicide prevention, with 4fourpilot areas helping to improve care by:

- providing training to give police, paramedics, midwives and general practitioners (GPs) greater confidence in talking to people who are in distress and help provide the care needed to keep them safe;

- working to remove the means of suicide in local communities, for example erecting barriers at a ‘hot-spot’ at a shopping centre;

- setting up a website (led by the charity MIND) to help educate communities in Cambridge and Peterborough and raise awareness about suicide. This is now being rolled out in other locations across the region; and

- developing ‘safety plans’ – a personalised care plan developed with every person with risk factors, involving families and carers, with clear ways to get help around the clock.

We expect the health service to look at this work being done by these three pioneering areas. Adopting these approaches across the country could save thousands of lives.