Councils not spending enough on public mental health, says Mind

Mental health charity Mind has criticised local authorities for spending too little on preventing mental health problems.

A freedom of information request by the charity revealed that local authorities in England spend an average of 1.36% of their public health budget on mental health. Mind estimates that this adds up to an annual spend of less than £40 million.

In contrast, the total annual spend by local authorities on preventing physical health problems is considerable, including increasing physical activity (£76m), anti-obesity (£108m), smoking cessation (£160m) and sexual health initiatives (£671m).

Furthermore, when reporting on spend for different public health priorities, local authorities file public mental health under ‘Miscellaneous’.

This comes despite that fact that mental health problems cost the country an estimated £100 billion each year through lost working days, benefits, lost tax revenue and the cost of treatment, and account for 23% of the total burden of disease in the UK.

Mind is calling on the next Government to introduce a national strategy for prevention to ensure local authorities and public health teams use their budgets to prevent mental health problems developing and reduce the numbers of people becoming unwell.

Paul Farmer, Chief Executive of Mind, commented: “With demand for mental health services increasing, antidepressants on the up and more people accessing talking therapies, we are beginning to see the scale of the unmet need for mental health services in England. As a society we must start looking at what we can do to help prevent people from developing mental health problems in the first place.”

Councillor Izzi Seccombe of the Local Government Association told the BBC that the organisation welcomes a discussion about public mental health, but described the focus of Mind’s report as “too narrow”.

“There are many things that councils do that impact positively on mental health but might not come with a mental health ‘badge’,” she said. “We would support the development of a national strategy that gives greater attention and focus to promoting mental health but would caution against any approach which dictates to local authorities and public health teams how to use their health promotion budgets.”