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19-21 Broad Street | St Helier Jersey | JE2 4WE
Deputy Geoff Southern Chair, HSS Panel
BY EMAIL
03 November 2022 Dear Chair
Re: Health and Social Security Scrutiny Panel: Government Plan 2023-2026 Review (Letter to the Director of Mental Health and Adult Social Care)
Thank you for your letter dated 27 October 2022 addressed to the Director of Mental Health and Adult Social Care. I have since liaised with the Director and he has provided the following response.
"Thank you for your letter of 27 October inviting me to comment on the commitments in the proposed Government Plan 2023-2026 in relation to mental health and adult social care.
I was, of course, particularly pleased to see that mental health and social care have received specific additional funding in the Government Plan. This very much reflects the increase in demand – and costs – for mental health and social care services, both within Jersey and where we need to commission these from elsewhere.
The Scrutiny Panel will be aware that over the last 9 months we have commenced a redesign and modernisation of our mental health services, commencing with a redesign of the core community mental health model. A business case was developed to support the implementation of the new model, which included funding a number of required posts, and this led to the allocation within the Plan. These essentially include a number of posts that were non-recurrently funded in 2022 but required recurrent funding (including the new Consultant Pharmacists role, a medicines optimisation technician, 2 additional psychiatrists, our new Peer Support Worker role and my own role) and a number of new planned roles. The latter includes additional Consultant level psychiatry and psychology roles, a Consultant Nurse and a non-medical Approved Clinician role, along with peer support and carer support workers.
These roles will support us to modernise and develop our range of services, building on mental health workforce developments that are already successfully in place elsewhere. In particular they will increase senior clinical capacity, as well as creating new types of roles that will provide an improved career pathway for our staff (and will therefore increase the attractiveness of Jersey as a potential place of employment to mental health professionals). Most importantly, this funding will also support us to further implement and embed peer support roles and employment opportunities for people who use our services and expand our offer to carers of those with serious mental illness.
In relation to the allocation of £5m for tertiary care, off island placements and domiciliary care, £2.7m of this is allocated to mental health and social care provision. We have significantly improved the processes for both authorising and monitoring placements off island' within the last year but continue to experience a significant demand for specialised hospital placements that cannot be provided in Jersey, alongside increased demand (and increased costs) for complex social care placements here in Jersey. Further work will be undertaken in these areas during 2023, but it is positive that the actual level of cost (and therefore resultant current budget pressures in 2022) have been recognised within the Government Plan moving forward. Therefore, in summary, I can confirm to the Scrutiny Panel that the financial allocation within the proposed Government Plan is consistent with the business case that was developed for mental health services for 2023. The proposed use of the monies very much reflects the planned developments and improvements for mental health services, building on our work to date, but also helps 
to address a number of current budget pressures and gaps within our service models for both mental health and adult social care."
I trust that the above response from the Director of Mental Health & Adult Social Care is of use to the Panel and their review and if you require anything further, please do not hesitate to write to me directly. Alternatively, my officers and I can make ourselves available for any further briefings you require.
Yours sincerely
Deputy Karen Wilson
Minister for Health and Social Services D +44 (0)1534 440540