The Government issued its green paper on children’s mental health – “Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health’ on 4 December 2017. This green paper set out proposals for a new approach to helping children with their mental health with a greater focus on support in schools. Measures include training a designated senior lead for mental health in every school and college, teaching children about mental health and well-being and piloting the idea of mental health support teams who would work with a number of schools and other mental services in the area to deliver improved mental health. As the new support teams are rolled out, a four week waiting time period for access to specialist NHS services will be trialled in number of trailblazer areas. The green paper was also seeking views on the impact of social media on children and young people’s mental health.
As part of Barnardo’s response to this green paper, we visited our services and asked the views of a number of children and young people we support on what they thought of the government proposals. We talked to over 40 young people in five focus groups held around England. The young people we spoke to were aged between 11 and 21. They were supported by a variety of different Barnardo’s services and had a range of mental health and well-being needs and some had disabilities including autism or special educational needs. A number had experience of accessing mental health support through child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS). We made the questions slightly more young person friendly and this report details the feedback they gave us in response.