The BBC reports on a call to increase the number of child therapists by 1,000...
“Over a three-year period, his proposals would cost £35m, his [Lord Layard’s] report said. A Department of Health spokesman said officials would be meeting with Lord Layard to discuss his proposals. Experts welcomed them and said providing therapy early when needed could prevent problems in later life.”
I bet the experts welcomed Lord Layard’s proposals.
Disclaimer: there is no doubt in my mind that a small minority of children will always benefit from specialist mental health services. But is it really the case that 1 in 10 children have “diagnosable mental health problems” that are bona fide medical conditions? Did so many children with depression, anxiety and ADHD really fall through the net in years gone by?
Two questions spring to mind, which are probably inter-related:
- Are we causing mental health problem in children by ceasing to integrate them as responsible, functioning members of our communities from whom we expect and demand decent moral standards?
- Are we, paranoid society that we have become, consistently widening the parameters of what we consider to be pathological behaviours?
For what it’s worth, I believe that the basic principles of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT, the NHS’s evidence-based, talking therapy of choice) are sound. But this is because they are the default psychological position adopted by all healthy human beings before meddling do-gooders and arbirtrary authoritarians intervene and destroy rationality, independent thought and action, and personal responsibility – and then recommend that tens of millions of pounds are spend in building it all back up again, through further costly interventions.
It’s good work if you can get it, I suppose...
