Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to widen the availability of counsellors for young people on the NHS.
The Five Year Forward View – One Year on was published on 1 March 2017. The report states that ‘the expansion of services anticipated by 2020/21 requires a parallel increase in the number of skilled staff able to provide care and treatment. National investment has begun in 2016/17 to deliver the 1,700 new therapists who are estimated to be required within five years. In line with the new all-age workforce strategy for mental health, the first 150 training places have been made available this year for newly-recruited therapists. Most of these courses will complete within 12 months’.