Two students made a personal appeal to councillors and persuaded them to look into school and college-based counselling in Brighton and Hove schools.
Varndean College students Matilda Barrowman and Konstantinos Mytafidis shared their personal experiences at a Brighton and Hove City Council meeting.
And they spoke about struggling with mental health as well as the long waits that young people face before receiving treatment.
The teenagers made their plea at a meeting of the full council at Hove Town Hall last Thursday (15 December).
They had the backing of Brighton and Hove Citizens – an alliance of schools, colleges, faith and community groups working with the council and the NHS on mental health issues.
Mr Mytafidis said that every £1 spent on school and college-based counselling saved an estimated £8 in the wider system.
He said that reducing the waiting list for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) would reduce pressure on emergency services, improve school and college attendance and ease the strain on SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) departments.
Mr Mytafidis said: “It will be easy to look at what is going on beyond our city and suggest that it is the responsibility of others – too easy.
“While it is clear that the current crisis is rooted in many of the mistakes made in Whitehall, we also know that solutions can be found locally.
“Local leadership and local solutions should be celebrated as beacons of hope in such dark times.”
Miss Barrowman, who uses a wheelchair, shared her experience with mental illness related to bullying and “internalised ableism”.
She said that teaching assistants often made her feel worse by treating her as someone with a cognitive rather than physical disability.
And she highlighted NHS data indicating that young women, people with disabilities, people of colour and LGBTQ+ people were those who suffered the most.
Miss Barrowman said: “We must rise to the challenge and do all we can to make things better. If we hope to address what is going on locally, here in Brighton and Hove, it will take courage.
“If we do not meet this crisis with the courage it requires, my generation is at risk of becoming a lost generation. I do not want to be part of a lost generation.”
Councillors unanimously asked for a report to be prepared for the council’s Health and Wellbeing Board, which also includes NHS representatives, to explore options for introducing school and college-based counselling.
They also asked the council’s chief executive Geoff Raw to write to the Education Secretary Gillian Keegan seeking the resources to help schools, colleges and universities to tackled poor mental health among students, teachers and staff.
And they asked for an update on funding for mental health first aid training before the annual “budget council” meeting in February.
The council also agreed to a second report, to the Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee, which includes representatives from Healthwatch and the voluntary sector.
The report would look at mental health training for education providers, the police and frontline public service staff and mental health emergency response.
Labour councillor Carmen Appich said that she had gone to meetings with Brighton and Hove Citizens about mental health services in the city, particularly for young people.
She said that the new Sussex “integrated care strategy” would create healthy environments for children, young people and families, linking health and care with education and schools.
Councillor Appich said: “The words are all there. We just need to fill in the action plan now. This is why we are calling for specific actions to be taken and reported to the Health and Wellbeing Board.
“This follows a series of conversations with young people whose lived experience indicates how invaluable early intervention can be and also with their teachers, who indicate that training existing staff is not the solution, but that resources should be additional to staff complements in schools.”
Conservative councillor Vanessa Brown said that government funding had increased to try to reduce CAMHS waiting lists which were “still far too high”.
She said: “We desperately need more funding to provide the wraparound support increasingly needed by children, including community services, Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services and inpatient provision.
“These often show themselves as anxiety, self-harm, eating disorders and suicidal thoughts. Very sadly our need for mental health services in Brighton and Hove are particularly high.”
Green councillor Sue Shanks, who chairs the Health and Wellbeing Board, said that mental and physical health were linked and determined by social and economic circumstances.
Drawing on her experience as a youth worker, she said that young people needed interaction with others.
Councillor Shanks said: “We need to look wider at what we are doing as a society to our young people and in terms of the cuts that we’ve had in services in the last few years.
“I think it should also be a national priority. Let’s look at how we can help people in our communities.”
