To ask the Minister of Health to detail any steps he is taking to ensure a consistent approach to the delivery of mental health services across all Health and Social Care Trusts.

Action 31 within the Mental Health Strategy commits to the development of a Regional Mental Health Service, operating across the five HSC Trusts, with professional leadership across the region that is responsible for consistency in service delivery and development. The intention is to achieve these objectives by putting appropriate structures in place rather than altering existing organisational boundaries.

A key priority for the RMHS is the development of a blueprint for a regionally consistent community mental health service model, addressing existing unwarranted variation in provision and further expanding area and local collaboratives to enable local providers to better collaborate to address mental needs within communities. A significant scoping exercise is currently underway to establish a baseline of existing community mental health provision across all Trusts. The findings from this exercise will inform the components of the developed blueprint. To inform this work, the RMHS team has undertaken a programme of engagement with Trusts.

Whilst the initial focus has been on secondary care, the team is now also engaging with both primary and secondary care stakeholders to gather input and perspectives. It is anticipated that the blueprint will be developed by Autumn 2026. The RMHS also has an appointed a Regional Service User Consultant, to ensure that the views of service users and carers are proactively sought, consistently represented and incorporated into the decision-making processes.

Working Together: A Pathway for Children and Young People through CAMHS (2018) sets out the standards that are applied regardless of whatever level of service is required in response to children and young people presenting with emotional and mental health difficulties. The Pathway describes the services available within Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services, (CAMHS) for all children and young people up to the age of 18 and uses the stepped care model as an operational framework designed to ensure that young people gain access to services aligned to assessed need and delivered in a timely manner.