Spending in real terms on mental health has declined for the first time in a decade, a report for the Department of Health has found.
Although one of the coalition’s first big policy announcements was to declare that mental health ought to have “parity with physical health in the NHS”, investment in mental health for working-age adults dropped by 1%, once inflation is taken into account, to £6.63bn. For the elderly the recorded fall in real terms spending was 3.1% to £2.83bn.
In total, spending on mental health services in England dropped by £150m, the first fall since 2001. However this drop comes after a decade of rising investment: in 2001 just £4.1bn was spent on working-age adults mental health.