Tony Blair says we need a national conversation about MH as its costing too much

[B0xes]

Tony Blair said recently on Jimmy's Jobs of the Future Podcast (clip available on youtube) that we need to have a national conversation about mental health. Why are we spending so much on it. Why are people self diagnosing. He believes people are being encouraged to view everyday challenges we all face as mental health issues.

Is he being unreasonable? In one sense, I'm inclined to agree to an extent, in the other, I believe he led the charge for so many of the social changes that have made us less resilient and many of these issues are due to individualism which led to atomisation and loneliness and being encouraged to see the market as the entity that fulfills our needs rather than strong families and robust social networks.

YABU - Blair can do one.

YANBU - He might have a point

I agree with others, that he's partially right. He's not wrong to suggest we need a national conversation about this, and to identify how/where money is being spent. But one of the problems with isolating a single element of healthcare and saying, 'this is a problem we should fix', is you'll never come up with an effective solution without looking at the bigger picture (and solving the bigger problem). Mental healthcare will not improve without improvements to the general healthcare service. The two go hand-in-hand and a problem with one creates/exacerbates problems with the other.

I'd be more impressed if he actually suggested having a conversation about how to bring everything under one health or social care banner i.e. physical healthcare (including physio and occupational therapy), mental healthcare, elder care, support for the disabled, carer's support etc. All these things relate to one another and deserve to be part of a connected strategy.

Excellent post@Quercus30 .

I would be impressed if he said we need more funding into MH.
But he wont, like others on this thread, will just blame the people that have MH issues like it is their fault the welfare bill is so high (and isn't it pensions that cost more anyway).

Yes and all these things have particularly negatively affected the young. No coincidence that the so called ‘snowflake’ generation face significant financial hurdles at the outset of their adult lives, as well as fragmented academy schooling, an unstable world and climate change to boot. I’d be falling apart if I was young and it would be quite a rational response

Did Tony Bliar have anything to say about the lockdowns which were dragged out for months and months, which threw a wrecking ball the size of his massive head at the mental health of a whole generation of young people? If he cared about mental health, he would have had something to say then. (If he had been prime minister at the time of covid, I suspect he would have been delighted to lock down for years on end, his government was the pioneer of the nanny state.)

If he had spoken out about the damage such lockdowns were doing, I might now have a smidgeon of respect for him (I lost all respect for him after his illegal war, giving himself a massive pay rise in 2001, and other acts of hypocrisy, such as taking his children out of school for holidays while his government was cracking down on this). But he chose to remain silent.

I'm sure he also once said "I want every household to have the internet", because not so many did when he became prime minister. Make of that what you will, especially concerning mental health. I don't think he was being altruistic.

I think he's right simply on two grounds, whatever else we might attribute the increase of mh issues to:

1. We can't afford the number of people who are not working due to mh issues.

2. We also probably can't afford to run the health system in the way we've become accustomed to - it will need some hard conversations around what constitutes essential care.

We will face these realities whether we have a national conversation or not, and trying to get a handle on the whole thing is probably the better option.

@MistressoftheDarkSide well said, you have articulated the vital missing piece in the arguments of anyone here who just shouts "be more resilient!" There's a very significant element that they conveniently fail to acknowledge. When futures in a country are as full of possibility as they were for so many in the second half of last century and the first few years of this century, economically speaking, resilience can be measured according to certain criteria. But increasingly now, and rapidly, prospects for economic (and hence social) stability are shrinking, and the evidence and impact of that is apparent in various areas of life. What it means to be resilient now is a far cry from what the same quality demanded during the boom years of that long post-war period, and it is gaslighting to pretend otherwise. Resources, both material and social, have shrunk, largely because they have been bought and are owned and by that process the pool has dwindled dramatically.

But there are lots of young and otherwise disenfranchised swimmers who need resources from that same pool to stay afloat. Expecting them to "be resilient!" is, in certain respects, a quite monstrous retort to their plight.

Agree on lockdowns. Not many spoke up about that damage at the time

Maybe if we dealt with the actual basic needs of people we wouldn't have such a "MH" epidemic on our hands. Ever heard of Maslows hierarchy of needs? When you deal with a person's physiological needs (food, water, shelter, clothing etc) then help someone deal with their safety needs (personal security, health, resources, property/housing etc) only then can you deal with self esteem, friendships, connection, love, belonging, respect and freedom - which drives people to want and be more.

It's fine saying people need to be more resilient, what if they have never learned how? What if they've suffered abuse? Sometimes it feels like a race to the bottom in this country. Maybe we should be focusing more on building a kinder society? A one which takes care of its vulnerable. A one which means no one should be left behind. The government should not be looking at mental health as a cost cutting exercise.

@Elseaknows I agree about ensuring basic needs are met. But it is not the governments job to help you meet needs such as friendship and connection.

Starts with parents never wanting to say no to their kids, letting them do what they want, can't even get them out of nappies before they go to school.
School then can't discipline children, parents go ape shit if they try.
Kids (and parents) addicted to social media, where everything for everybody else is perfect.
Lack of youth clubs, brownies, scouts etc etc.

Sick of reading on here about MH ... cant go to work because of anxiety etc etc. Get your backside to work ... its good for your MH.

@ByQuaintAzureWasp is a zero hours contract "good for your mental health"? And that paired with very real universal credit sanctions if you don't work enough hours?

Was it like that for so many in your day?

The government does not provide that. I am not sure what point you are making.

I agree with the fact that PIP is extremely difficult to get for a mental health problem and for all you doubters out there I was a disability outreach worker for many years and this is my experience. You can’t just rock up at an assessment and expect to get benefit for anxiety and depression treated by your GP with standard medication. You have to provide evidence of second line consultant led treatment by a second line mental health team.

PIP for mental health alone is extremely difficult to obtain and the government yet again muddies the waters by basing their rhetoric on figures which include PIP claims for combined mental health problems alongside physical conditions - considerably easier to secure.

Where I disagree is on the question of PIP and work. PiP doesn’t assess work capability. That’s down to the work capability assessment, and the assessment criteria for the two benefits are totally different.

A lot of nonsense being talked on this thread - based in ignorance about disabilty and its’ effects, and the eligibility criteria for various benefits. Disability benefits are nothing to do with the ability to work. They are assessed on how well you manage your condition on a daily basis. There’s no excuse for some of the ignorance shown here because all of the information needed for people to familiarise themselves with the requirements is easily available online. But it seems that as ever, it’s easier to listen to government rhetoric demonising claimants and inflating actual statitistics.

I think the reduced opportunities are affecting the younger generations MH. Getting a decent paying job can be tricky, but if they do cost of housing is so high and they can only get rental help for shared housing levels which barely touch the surface of the real costs. This delays them growing up as they need to be home longer. The savings they need for a deposit increase yearly. They feel stuck and unable to have a family of their own.

It was like it in my parents’ day. They both grew up in the 1920s and early 30s. I know life’s hard now but it’s crazy to pretend it’s the hardest it’s ever been. Previous generations had much harder lives.

Please can this "work is good for mental health" go away?
I am on benefits, and not working is what keeps me well. I have tried to work (lots, and in different roles), and it made me very unwell. For some people, work makes us sick.

And work now is more than just showing up for your shift and getting paid. Zero hour contracts - where you are expected to wait around at home just in case there is a shift for you. If there is not? Tough.

I think there are perception issues at play when talking about 'mental health'.

Genuine mental illness can be disabling and can get out of control and difficult to manage particularly when poverty, housing issues, bad employers, physical illness and disability and runs of bad luck are in the picture.

The issues that perfectly made up Instagram girls and boys complain about aren't mental illness, (pet gerbil died, snapped fingernail etc.) just the normal ups and downs of life, yet they label themselves as mentally ill which means the first group aren't taken seriously. Also, adult grifters who jump on the pip bandwagon and don't see why they should be expected to work. They're making things hard for genuine claimants. This was talked about on that channel 4 documentary the other week. There is no objective measure of mental health problems.

People do need to work on their resilience, but there needs to be a way of identifying genuine illness (as opposed to normal, transient emotional distress) when it occurs.

If anyone else other than your employer was doing this it would be called coercive control

And people in other places still do now, and persevere.

I don't think it's the fact that things are hard that is causing the problems.

what he really means is 'stop complaining all you poors, get back to what you should be doing, working to make the rich richer'.

At last someone has articulated the facts clearly.

Previous generations had excessive drinkers and women were given “mother’s little helper”. Let’s not pretend this was a mentally healthy generation.

There is an enormous difference to being mentally well and being mentally ill so you can not work or need benefits.

The Channel 4 doc you speak of? Was is the Dispatches one?
It was shown at the beginning of December last year, so not sure why it is being talked about now.
I watched it, and I didn't see anyone on it "taking the piss". The last guy on it, the taxi driver, who the presenter said was the most shocking thing he had seen. Total bollocks. Taxi driver was on benefits and wanted to tell DWP he was fit for work and come off them. He made out that they said no, and had to wait for a re-assessment (which is paused due to Covid backlog). He made out he was still getting all the money.
He could close his claim. No one would stop him doing that. And if he was in the LCWRA/LCW group, he can report his earnings and his benefits be reduced to little/zero. He would still be on the UC books, but not getting anything.
Total non issue, and something to get people frothing. Looks like it worked.