Lord Boateng – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Boateng on 2016-04-28.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the guidance for commissioners of mental health services to people from black and minority ethnic communities on inequalities in access, experience and outcomes in mental health care.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The Department is committed to involving patients and service users in the development of national mental health policy. It does not monitor this engagement centrally.

The Department commissioned the Mental Health Providers’ Forum and the Race Equality Foundation to gather and review evidence of effective mental health service for Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) groups. The review Better practice in mental health for black and minority ethnic communities was published in May 2015.

The report found that organisations that were successful in providing mental health services that meet the needs of BME groups had developed local community-based approaches to service delivery which addressed cultural and linguistic differences and sought to actively engage hard to reach groups.

The Department has also supported guidance published by the Joint Commissioning Panel in 2014 A guide for commissioners of mental health services for people from black and minority ethnic communities. http://www.jcpmh.info/good-services/black-minority-ethnic-communities/

The guide set out 10 key messages for commissioners to improve services. These included: commissioning equitable access to mental health services for people regardless of ethnicity and identify and taking action to reduce ethnic inequalities; better local data collection to build understanding and competencies in commissioning services that meet the needs of BME groups; clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) and health and wellbeing board developing strategies for BME groups; and involving and engaging service users in commissioning decisions.

Copies of these reports are attached.

“