For those of us who yearn for a Labour government, the election of serial rebel and career backbencher Jeremy Corbyn to the leadership has been as depressing as it has been predictable. At a time when the Conservative government is divided and in total disarray, Corbyn is barely able to lay a glove on PM David Cameron. Some celebrate because the opinion polls have narrowed to the extent that the Tories and Labour are almost neck and neck, but let’s be honest: this is far more down to the problems of the government than the performance of HM’s opposition. But since his election, Corbyn has got one thing right: the appointment to shadow minister for mental health of Luciana Berger has so far been a resounding success.
Whilst I appreciate that the chaos in our mental health system does not attract headline news in the popular newspapers, nor indeed on the main TV channels, Berger has been rattling Tory ministers in parliament. She has exposed alarming gaps in our mental health treatment systems, pointing out the lie perpetuated by Cameron and health secretary Jeremy Hunt that they are working towards “parity of esteem”.
Since the Tories came to power in 2010, mental health services have been slashed. There are less doctors and nurses in the mental health sector, early intervention and prevention has been cut to the bone and the thresholds for accessing services are out of reach for many people but particularly children. Berger has also established that there are no statistics available for:
The number of people referred to consultant-led mental health services who received services within the 18 week target time
The number of children who have died in inpatient care
The number of specialist nurses and midwives working in mental health
How many people diagnosed with a mental health condition received a custodial sentence in each of the last five years
This is, in large part, a result of Andrew Lansley’s pointless and horrendously expensive top down reorganisation of the NHS which has heavily fragmented the very operation of the NHS and relegated mental health services to a Cinderella service, an afterthought.
Berger is exposing failings to the system every day for the next month, which tells you just how serious the situation is. By her excellent work inside and outside of parliament, she is showing what opposition parties are supposed to do, by concentrating on issues, by asking difficult, forensic questions and by constantly putting the ruling party on the back foot. And she is certainly showing the Islington set currently controlling the Labour Party how to lock on to an issue, to focus on it and to expose the government’s many failings.
Corbyn and the comrades could do worse than learn from Berger to see what proper opposition actually is.
