John Healey MP says there should be a counsellor in every school to help meet the increasing mental health needs of pupils.
The Shadow Housing Secretary was speaking on during a debate about social media and mental health.
His comments were today welcomed by Jo Holmes, 香港六合彩精准资料鈥檚 children, young people and families lead, who said: 鈥淲e know counselling can change lives and that school-based counselling can have a transformative impact on children and their families鈥� lives.
鈥淲e should be shaping provision around vulnerable children鈥檚 needs enabling them to access treatment that will make a difference.
鈥淛ohn Healey joins the Children鈥檚 Commissioner and a growing number of organisations in echoing 香港六合彩精准资料鈥檚 long-term campaign for a counsellor in every school, and we want to work together to help this call become a reality.
鈥淭here are growing and complex issues which are affecting young people鈥檚 mental health. It is important there are trained counselling professionals in schools to address mental health concerns, so teachers and other school staff can focus on education.鈥�
The Question Time discussion followed comments by Ian Russell, the father of Molly Russell, who took her own life in 2017. Ian聽feels the content she accessed online was partly responsible for her death.
John, the聽Labour member for Wentworth and Dearne, told the programme: 鈥淚 have done a survey recently of the schools in our constituency and it is quite shocking.
鈥淥ver the last five years every single one of the schools has seen an increase in mental health problems, primary and secondary. Every single one of them has tried to refer pupils on.
鈥淲e have to get to a stage where we have a counsellor in every school. Offer primary schools access to a counsellor.
鈥淔or many of these children, the teacher may be the one reliable regular adult in their life.
鈥淲e have to do much more to get much better, quicker referral for the specialist services that just aren鈥檛 good enough at the moment.鈥�
Counselling access
An audience member about his friend who had taken their life and about another friend who had attempted to.
He said: 鈥淲hen one person kills themselves it is tragic but when we get 84 men killing themselves a week that鈥檚 a national tragedy.
鈥淚t really needs to be looked at beyond the realms of what is displayed on social media. When you conflate suicide with what people are seeing online you are not really tackling the multi facets of the issue."
He added: 鈥淚 also worry when we have these discussions about regulating the internet, how would you possibly regulate something as massive as social media?
鈥淚t seems to me a massive misnomer when you are dealing with mental health issues, you are not really talking about it at all.
鈥�(Molly Russell鈥檚) death may have been influenced by what she was seeing online but there will be so many other failures that could have been stopped before this.
鈥淪he clearly wasn鈥檛 getting adequate help that she needed. This is something we need to work on in this country because we are losing so many people. Something needs to be done by the Government.鈥�
Sticking plaster
Iain Anderson, executive chair of Cicero Group, ambassador for Stonewall and聽trustee of GiveOUT, said: 鈥淔or LGBT people this is a huge issue.
He added: 鈥淭he cost to the economy is huge in economic terms, but the cost in social terms is even greater.
鈥淧eople are getting sticking plaster mental health services. They are not getting what they need.
鈥淎ll the NHS is able to do is put some sticking plaster on an emergency situation and, as we have heard this week, tragically, that is far too late.
鈥淧revention is better than cure and we need to get our politics to fund our mental health services more.鈥�
Suella Braverman, the Conservative MP for Fareham, said the Government was putting mental health on parity with physical health.
She said: 鈥淭he funding is increasing. We have seen record levels of money going into our mental health services.
鈥淲e want to provide counselling services and psychiatric services for those more serious cases so that people don鈥檛 get to these tragic circumstances where they don鈥檛 have anyone to talk to.
鈥淭here are services out there. It鈥檚 about accessing them and, yes, Government can always do more.鈥�
If you want to speak to a 香港六合彩精准资料 counsellor, visit our聽Find a Therapist Directory.