The Government’s mental health strategy for England call for evidence 

A guide from Centre for Mental Health

Foreword

The UK Government recently announced that it will be creating a mental health strategy for England this year and has issued a call for evidence. They are asking for submissions from both individuals and organisation by 10 July 2026. This is an opportunity to ensure those working on the strategy hear from people, communities and organisations whose lives are affected by mental health inequalities.

We at Centre for Mental Health will be responding to the call for evidence, drawing on our research and learning to share ideas and information with the Government. We have long called for a cross-government mental health plan, and our evidence will set out what steps can be taken to make it as effective, sustainable and equitable as possible.

We’re encouraging anyone who has knowledge about mental health to give evidence if you can. You don’t have to answer all the questions: you might have lots to say about many of them, or just one thing that’s really important to share. Either way, it will be valuable for the Government to hear from people first-hand about what’s needed to make the strategy impactful.

In this short guide, you’ll find the questions from the call for evidence, background provided by the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) and a summary of some of the areas that we’ll be including in our evidence, along with links to our reports. There will be limits to what the Centre can share in our final submission, but we aim for a response that will give a broad perspective on what the evidence and experience shows us works. We will follow this up through ongoing engagement with government to ensure the strategy is both comprehensive and implementable.

Andy Bell, Chief Executive, Centre for Mental Health.

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1. Hospital to community

Centre for Mental Health’s response

In our evidence submission, we will draw on our research and evaluation of a range of services and approaches that meet people’s needs effectively, and especially those that tackle inequalities in mental health.

We will share examples of community-based mental health services that meet people’s needs close to home, embedded in communities. Many of these are led by charities and community organisations, working alongside statutory sector partners. Some are providing support in community settings that can reduce reliance on inpatient services

We’ll highlight the need for culturally sensitive and trauma-informed mental health care

We will share evidence we have collected about the importance of adapting mental health support to the needs of neurodivergent people and how simple but effective adjustments to mental health services can make them more accessible, safe, relevant and equitable.

We will raise the needs of people in the justice system, including those in the children and young people’s secure estate, prisoners, and those leaving prison or on community sentences. Levels of mental ill health are significantly higher in these groups, and good quality, trauma-informed care is essential for their rehabilitation and safety.

We will also share evidence about the need to support the mental health of people living with long-term physical conditions. Physical health care services need to be better equipped to support people’s emotional wellbeing, and mental health support should be adapted to meet their needs.

Centre for Mental Health’s response

In our answer to this question, we’ll share evidence about the importance of meeting the social and economic needs of people with severe and enduring mental illness, for example by embedding high quality, tailored welfare advice in mental health services.

We’ll share evidence about the value and importance of Individual Placement and Support employment services.

We’ll also provide evidence about addressing people’s housing needs – for example highlighting local initiatives that connect housing and mental health services more effectively.

We will be sharing a wealth of evidence about meeting the physical health needs of people with a mental illness. We believe that reducing the life expectancy gap must be a core ambition in the strategy. Through Equally Well UK, we have brought together evidence about a range of ways that can be achieved, from addressing food poverty to improving opportunities for physical activity, and from annual health checks to cancer screening, immunisations, dentistry and smoking cessation.

Our evidence will also emphasise the importance of completing the implementation, in full, of the Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework. This is an anti-racism framework for structural change in mental health services, and as such it needs time, resources, commitment, and leadership to be sustained until the inequities experienced by racially minoritised communities are eradicated.

Centre for Mental Health’s response

Our evidence here will focus on the role and value of early support hubs for young people and young adults. Early support hubs using the Youth Access model are highly effective. They work with young people from ages 10 to 25, crossing the divide between childhood and adult life. For example, Centre 33 provides a range of types of support including talking therapies, peer support and much more without the need for bureaucratic and off-putting assessments or referrals.

We will also note the importance of other transitions, including for people who are reaching later life, whose mental health needs are too often neglected. We’ll share evidence about why mental health in later life must be taken more seriously, including prevention, access to talking therapies, and better connections with physical health care.

2. Analogue to digital

Centre for Mental Health’s response

We’ll share evidence about the importance of connecting face-to-face and digital mental health care, offering people a wider range of options that suit them and their lives, and ensuring this is done equitably.

Centre for Mental Health’s response

We’ll talk about the importance of using data to create learning and accountability in mental health services. This includes the importance of adopting equitable access and waiting time standards for mental health care, on a par with those for physical health care. And we’ll highlight the importance of addressing racial inequities in access, experience and outcomes from mental health services through the Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework.

3. Sickness to prevention

Centre for Mental Health’s response

We’ll be sharing some of the increasingly compelling evidence about the actions that can be taken across government (local and national), the NHS, business and civil society to promote and protect mental health and prevent mental illness. We know that there are evidence-based interventions for people of all ages that can prevent mental ill health.

We’ll share evidence about the importance of supporting mothers’ and birthing people’s mental health during pregnancy and after they have given birth, and helping new parents to bond with their babies, for example through parent-infant interventions.

We’ll provide evidence about the importance of a whole-school approach to mental health, the value of trusted adults to help children to understand and navigate their feelings, and the potential of creative and physical activity-based approaches to wellbeing for children and young people. We’ll also share about the importance of safe spaces for girls and young women to support better mental health.

Our evidence will also emphasise that public mental health is a matter for the whole of government. By taking a ‘mental health in all policies’ approach and adopting a mental health policy test, the Government and local and strategic authorities could embed decision-making for the long term.

For example, tackling poverty and the housing crisis can help millions of children and families to have a better chance of good mental health throughout their lives. Every government department can do its part to create a mentally healthier future. That includes the Government’s role in regulating the commercial determinants of mental health – how the actions of private companies affect people’s mental health.

We will also talk about the importance of protecting the mental health of groups facing the highest risks and poorest outcomes in society. That includes trans and non-binary people, for example, whose mental health is being hard-hit by the impacts of the Supreme Court judgement and proposed guidance on its implementation. A mental health strategy that puts equity and equality at its heart will benefit everyone in society and leave no one behind.

Centre for Mental Health’s response

Our evidence here will focus on how the Government can lead the way in preventing the loss of life from suicide. Tackling the social and economic inequalities that create the risk factors for suicide is fundamentally important, alongside the essential steps that can be taken to prevent deaths at the time a person is feeling suicidal. We will also point to the importance of supporting primary care services to prevent losses of life through suicide.

Centre for Mental Health’s response

We know that large numbers of people have poor wellbeing but not a diagnosable mental health condition. It is still helpful to offer wellbeing support to prevent escalation to mental ill health. We will share examples of initiatives that provide wellbeing support without the need for a diagnosis. These are often led by voluntary and community organisations, working with groups of people that have the biggest risk factors for mental ill health and the poorest access to early help.

There is another ‘missing middle’ in our mental health care system of people whose needs are poorly met between NHS Talking Therapies services and secondary mental health care. They are labelled ‘too complex’ for one, and ‘not ill enough’ for the other. This gap needs to be closed by providing support that meets their needs, often in primary care.

4. Factors enabling good practice

Centre for Mental Health’s response

Our evidence here will reiterate the importance of putting access and waiting time standards for mental health care on an equal footing with those for physical health services. Long waits for both routine and urgent mental health care are currently mostly ‘hidden’ and neither commissioners nor providers of services are held to account for reducing them.

We will note the importance of investing in mental health services and the workforce, including in the VCSE sector and local government – not just the NHS. There are opportunities to develop and transform the mental health workforce so that it meets the needs of the future, represents the communities it serves, and creates career pathways for a wide range of people.

We will emphasise the importance of developing outcome measures for mental health services that reflect what matters most to the people using them. For many people, social outcomes – such as being in secure housing, at school, in work, and with enough money to live on are just as important as clinical. And we’ll emphasise that mental and physical health outcomes need to be joined up, with a call for the strategy to set an ambition to close the life expectancy gap within a decade for people with a severe mental illness.