Mental health services will be cut further unless the government reforms the NHS funding system to give them a fairer settlement, the boss of an under-fire provider has warned.
Michael Scott, chief executive of Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust, told Community Care that the current NHS payment system drove commissioners to divert more funds into acute hospitals at the expense of mental health and community providers. Unless more funding is allocated to mental health, trusts will “simply have to reduce services”, he said.
Norman Lamb accuses mental health campaigners of trolling him
Liberal Democrat care minister, Norman Lamb, has accused mental health campaigners in his North Norfolk constituency of trolling him on Twitter.
Lamb, who promotes himself as a champion for mental health awareness, was responding to tweets from the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk & Suffolk which called him duplicitous and said it had encountered many people who were adversely affected by cuts to mental health services under the Liberal-Conservative coalition.
The MP for Norfolk North tweeted: “I am pursued by vicious, sometimes defamatory and totally cynical trolling by Norfolk/Suffolk Crisis campaigners!”
A training scheme to fast-track graduates into mental health social work will be backed by £1.6m of government funding next year, care minister Norman Lamb is expected to announce tonight.
The Think Ahead programme will use the money to fund its operational costs in 2015-16. Costs include recruiting students, designing the academic curriculum, and developing a leadership training element for the scheme.
