Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to reduce waiting lists for talking therapies.

The latest data for July 2024 show 90.7% of people completing treatment for talking therapies waited less than 6 weeks for their first appointment, against a target of 75%.

More broadly people with mental health issues are not getting the support or care they need, which is why we will fix the broken system to ensure we give mental health the same attention and focus as physical health and that people can be confident of accessing high quality mental health support when they need it.

We will recruit an additional 8,500 mental health workers to reduce delays and provide faster treatment.

By cutting mental health waiting lists and intervening earlier with more timely mental health support, we can get this country back to health and back to work, helping to grow the economy.