PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Schools: Mental Health Services (18 January 2017)

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of school-based counselling services in Wales and Northern Ireland in improving young people's educational attainment and attendance in schools; and what her policy is on whether such services should be established in England.

Asked by:
Judith Cummins (Labour)

Good mental health and wellbeing are a priority for the Department.

Schools are best placed to make decisions on the most appropriate support to provide for their pupils, including school-based counselling, based on their individual circumstances. We know that many primary and secondary schools already provide counselling services and we want to encourage all schools to make these services available to their pupils. To help them to do this, we have published a blueprint for school counselling services which provides schools with practical, evidence-based advice on how to deliver high quality school-based counselling to all pupils, including vulnerable children who have a higher prevalence of mental health issues. This was drawn up with experts in the field and took account of the evaluations made of practice in other countries, including the devolved administrations.

We are currently conducting a large-scale survey of schools and colleges about what they offer to support the mental health and wellbeing of their pupils and students. The results should be available in the Spring and will provide the first nationally representative estimates of the different types of support available in schools and colleges, including school-based counselling, as well as information about how this support is provided and how effective schools think it is. This will inform the new green paper on children and young people’s mental health that we are developing with the Department of Health.

Answered by:
Edward Timpson (Conservative)
25 January 2017