Agenda item

To consider a report of the Director of Public Health.

The Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy for Stockport was agreed by Locality Board in July 2023, and presented to the Adult Social Care & Health Scrutiny Committee in September 2023. This report provides an update on progress with the delivery, including an overview of the new governance structures and highlights from each of the five ambitions included in the strategy.

The Scrutiny Committee is recommended to comment on and note the report.

Officer contact: Judith Strobl on 0161 474 2535 or email: judith.Strobl@stockport.gov.uk

The Director of Public Health submitted a report (copies of which had been circulated) providing an update on progress with the delivery, including an overview of the new governance structures and highlights from each of the five ambitions included in the strategy.

The Cabinet Member for Health & Adult Social Care (Councillor Keith Holloway) attended the meeting to respond to questions from the Scrutiny Committee.

The following comments were made/issues raised:-

·         Members welcomed the report, the ambitions contained and use of people with lived experience.

·         It was queried whether support was being provided through collaboration partner organisations such as mental health nurses with the police. 

·         In response, it was commented that through Pennine Care there was joint working with the police whereby a mental health nurse would accompany a police officer during a crisis or intervention with the aim to reduce the number of people who were taken by the police under a Section 136 of the Mental Health Act. It was noted that in Stockport, the service was currently able to cover 20 days out of 30 per month.

·         It was queried why the service was only available for 20 days per month and whether it would be appropriate for the Scrutiny Committee to recommend that further funding be considered.

·         In response, it was clarified that the service was fully funded for 30 days, however there were workforce recruitment issues that was preventing this from being delivered.

·         In response to a question of whether utilising a bank service had been considered, it was commented that the programme was offered jointly with bank and permanent staff, however there was a national issue relating to the mental health workforce.

·         It was stated that Members supported the programme and requested a better understanding of the areas that they were able to influence.

·         It was felt that the phrase ‘harder to reach customers’ used in the report should not be used as it insinuated that the blame lay with the person rather than the system and requested that the term be rephrased as appropriate.

·         In relation to people with a learning disability who required support with their mental health, it was noted that there had been some key person dependency issues with specialists in mental health and learning disabilities and queried how the strategy was approaching those areas of specialism.

·         In response, it was commented that, in line with the business planning for mental health and in the next 12 months, learning disability leads had joined the group to provide support in relation to the objectives for people with learning disabilities and reduce the gaps in delivery. It was noted that there were plans to deliver the Green Light toolkit which was intended to assess the gap in mental health services, learning around the delivery of joint working with learning disability colleagues and access to ensure that individuals with a learning disability were able to better use the services that were available.

·         It was noted that at the Joint Health Scrutiny Committee for Pennine Care it had been reported that waiting lists for mental health were in excess of two years, there was a 25% job vacancy and an increase in demand. As such, council services and voluntary sector support was imperative to supporting people with their mental health. 

·         In relation to the Connect 5 mental health literacy training, it was queried what the differences were in the three levels of training and how the service was accessing further funding to support the continuation in the delivery of the training.

·         In response, it was commented that the temporary funding was a positive investment in the last two years and partially carried forward, however there were ongoing discussions, exploring all options, in relation to sustainability with the intention for it to be a train-the-trainer programme. It was noted that the programme was a highly regarded course with each module taking half a day. The first level was for anyone who wanted to improve their own and others mental wellbeing, the second included the use of a supportive approach and covered suicide prevention and the third was a further extension into supportive conversations for people who were in more contact with individuals who require support.

·         In relation to ambition five, it was queried how the Mental Health Living Well Hub worked in practice.

·         In response, it was stated that the Living Well model was being developed as part of the long-term plan from the NHS and within Stockport there was joint working with a range of partner organisations including GPs and voluntary sector services to bring together the strength and experience from various organisations to offer a joined up service. As part of the Living Well programme there were six primary care nurses working within each localities primary care networks to bridge the gap between primary care and specialist mental health services.

RESOLVED – That the report be noted.