Issue - meetings

Purpose of the item: To outline responses received from Cabinet; the Children, Families, Lifelong Learning and Culture Select Committee; Frimley Health and Care ICS; Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust; and Surrey Heartlands ICS to recommendations made by the Mental Health Task Group and endorsed by the Adults and Health Select Committee at its public meeting on 15 October 2020.

Witnesses:

Sinead Mooney, Cabinet Member for Adults and Health

Key points raised during the discussion:

1.    The Chairman of the Select Committee set out the progress made on the recommendations of the Mental Health Task Group since they had been endorsed by the Select Committee at its October 2020 meeting. Since then, meetings had been conducted with officers and with the Cabinet Member for Adults and Health, to ensure the recommendations were put into effect.

2.    The Chairman of the Mental Health Task Group updated the Select Committee on the following points:

a.    The Task Group had asked for confirmation as to how the £2.3bn mental health funding provided nationally a few years previously was spent, and would keep the Select Committee updated on this.

b.    The Task Group had discussed at length its concerns regarding the Abraham Cowley Unit at St Peter’s Hospital with Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Trust.

c.    It was important that the Task Group liaised with the Children, Families, Lifelong Learning and Culture Select Committee with regards to transition arrangements.

3.    A Member praised the work of the Mental Health Task Group and suggested that a Task Group on health inequalities be convened at some point in the future, incorporating issues such as perceived ease of access to services in deprived areas.

4.    The Chairman of the Select Committee informed Members that further progress on the Mental Health Task Group recommendations would be reported on at the 3 March 2021 meeting of the Select Committee.

5.    The Cabinet Member for Adults and Health expressed her support for the recommendations of the Mental Health Task Group.