It was just a few short weeks ago when the holder of the vainglorious position of deputy prime minister announced a large increase in spending on mental health. Oh how we cheered. At last a politician had recognised the effects of mental illness on our country.
But wait. Nick Clegg is a member of a government which has allowed mental health services to be dramatically reduced. Can we really take him seriously?
It turns out that the councils spend 1.36% of their budgets on mental health, the effects of which cost the economy an estimated £100 billion a year. In cash terms, across the whole of England in the current year they are spending less than £40m. Compare that with £108m on obesity, £160m on smoking and £671m on sexual health.
The comparison is purely for illustration and not a suggestion that money should be removed from these vital budgets.
The £100b estimate is fascinating in itself because represents something like 23% of what we spend to combat all illnesses so the amount we actually spend, invest I would call it, is trifling.
In my experience, mental health is dealt with in one of two ways. If you are suffering from relatively minor mental health problems, it’s prescription drugs and come back in a few months. If you are very seriously ill, you might be lucky to be admitted to hospital, often many miles away. For the vast majority in the middle, there’s almost nothing. Counselling and therapy work, along with prescription drugs can work, of that I have no doubt. That combination kept me in work without missing a single day during a most traumatic period, with the added assistance from a sympathetic and proactive manager at work. Not everyone, far from it, gets that lucky.
As the health service is gradually run down, with a view to its ultimate privatisation, I can only see a further deterioration of what few mental health services remain. Much therapy is available in the private sector but what use is that to the many who are in low paid work or, through no fault of their own, in no work at all?
I saw no strategy within Nick Clegg’s announcement on mental health but then given his track record with promising things he probably didn’t mean it anyway.
Of course, I am concerned about the enormous damage being done to our economy by the near epidemic of mental illness but I am even more concerned about the individuals concerned.
