Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the role of the designated senior lead on mental health in schools will cover child obesity.

It will be for schools to decide whether to put a designated senior lead for mental health in place and what responsibilities they should cover. The Government is not introducing new responsibilities and is not planning to stipulate what the role should be.

The ‘Supporting Mental Health in Schools and Colleges’ survey published in 2017 suggested that around half of schools already have a mental health lead in place. The Government will provide all schools with the opportunity to train a lead in how to put in place a whole school approach to mental health. Given the links between obesity and both physical and mental health, whole school approaches can include activity to tackle obesity such as that set out by the Government in the attached document, ‘Childhood obesity: a plan for action’.

The qualitative research accompanying the survey indicates that some schools already include both physical and mental health in such approaches, and make links to the teaching of personal, social, health and economic education. On 19 July, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State launched a consultation on proposals to make health education compulsory in schools. Under these proposals pupils will be taught about the benefits of a healthier lifestyle for both their physical and mental wellbeing. We expect that many schools will choose to make the teaching of health education part of a whole school approach to mental health overseen by a designated senior lead.