Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps the Government is taking to phase out the practice of out-of-area placements across England, as recommended by the Commission on Acute Adult Psychiatric Care.

The Government set a national ambition in April 2016 to eliminate inappropriate out of area placements (OAPs) for adult acute inpatient care by 2020/21.

A bespoke data collection has been commissioned to capture details of OAPs in mental health services, and has been reporting data since December 2016. This collection was introduced in order to establish a reliable national baseline of OAPs, and understand where and why OAPs are happening. The collection will support the development of a clear national trajectory for reducing OAPs over the next four years, in order to achieve the ambition by 2020/21. NHS England and its arm’s length bodies are aligning levers and incentives across the system to ensure that the elimination of OAPs is reflected as a clear system-wide priority.

NHS England plans to publish an evidence based treatment pathway for acute mental health care by the end of 2016/17, including clear response times, quality guidelines and benchmarks. The accompanying implementation guidance will support local service capacity assessment and improvement programmes. It will advocate whole-system and partnership working across housing, social care, and the voluntary sector. NHS England is investing more than £400 million over four years from 2017/18 in crisis resolution and home treatment teams to provide an alternative to admission when it is safe to do so, reducing pressure on inpatient capacity and supporting more people to access care locally and in a timely manner.