 I call on the Minister for Health and Sport, Claire Hawke. Our 10-year mental health strategy paints a clear picture of the kind of Scotland I want to live in, a Scotland where people can get the right help at the right time, expect recovery and fully enjoy the rights free from discrimination and stigma. The strategy's guiding ambition is that we must prevent and treat mental health problems with the same commitment, passion and drive as we do physical health problems. I was honoured to be appointed the Minister for Mental Health in June of this year to build upon the work of my predecessor, Maureen Watt. Although I have only been in post for a short time, I know from my experiences as a mental health nurse the commitment and dedication of the people who make a difference in mental health care every day across Scotland. Today sees the publication of the first progress report on the mental health strategy. In the first period of the strategy, many of its actions have already been implemented. Out of 40 actions in the strategy, 13 are complete or nearly complete and 26 actions are in progress. There remains only one action to carry out a progress review of the strategy in 2022 that, for obvious reasons, is yet to get under way. However, there are three particular actions in the strategy that I will single out for attention now. Under action 16 of the strategy, we invested £175,000 to establish a perinatal-managed clinical network. The managed clinical network's expertise and diligent work has directly informed a commitment in our 2018 programme for government to deliver a stronger network of care and support for the one in five new mothers who experience mental health problems during and after pregnancy. That equates to 11,000 women per year. That will see £50 million of investment in perinatal and infant mental health over the next five years. In addition, more than 1,000 people have already received a distressed brief intervention in Aberdeen, Lanarkshire, Borders and the Highlands. The distressed brief intervention programme is funded by £3.4 million from the Scottish Government and provides the offer of a next day contact with a trained worker from a third sector background to anyone presenting in distress to A&E, police, ambulance services and primary care. We also announced in the programme for government that this initiative will be rolled out to under-18s in 2019. Last month, on 29 August, I had the pleasure of launching our new transition care plans, which will help young people to move more smoothly from CAMHS to adult mental health services. The transition care plans have been entirely designed by young people in dialogue with clinicians, and they are a shining example of what can happen when we listen to the views of our young people and act accordingly. Those are just three of the headline achievements that are summarised in the report. They are examples of where specific actions in the strategy are already making a real and tangible difference to people's lives. It is important to say that the 40 actions contained in the strategy will not in themselves completely deliver on our central vision. They act as valuable and necessary levers to create the change that we want to see, but getting to our ultimate vision and achieving our ambitions requires work beyond this set of commitments. There are five pieces of work that I want to mention specifically, and I think that they are all fundamentally important. Firstly, there is the Children and Young People's Mental Health Task Force, chaired by Dame Denise Coya, and supported by £5 million of additional funding. Dr Coya has dedicated her summer to talk with children and young people, their families, services, agencies and practitioners, and she published her initial recommendations earlier in the month on our whole systems approach to mental health services. Her work will help to implement the recommendations from the rejected referrals report, which was published earlier this year. Dr Coya has already started work on a blueprint for how services can better meet the rapidly changing need that we see across Scotland. The task force will convene its first meeting next month. Secondly, there is the Youth Commission on Mental Health. Young people are spending 15 months on an in-depth investigation of children and adolescent mental health services. They will do their own research, identify issues that are important to them, speak to the experts, policy makers and service providers about the solutions. More than that, the youth commissioners have been invited by Dr Coya to be co-chairs of the task force. I think that this is an inspired move and will keep the voices of children and young people at the centre of this work. Thirdly, there is the suicide prevention action plan, which will be published on 9 August. It sets an ambitious target of reducing suicides by 20 per cent over five years and contains 10 actions. It is backed by an additional £3 million. We have already established the national suicide prevention leadership group, chaired by Rose Fitzpatrick. That group will meet for the first time tomorrow. Fourthly, there is the CMEs national campaign launched on 18 September. That is the biggest conversation that we have ever had with young people in Scotland on what mental wellbeing means to them, harnessing the power of music to hear people across the country talk about how they feel. I am sure that the results are going to be especially valuable to Dr Coya's task force. Lastly, our 2018 programme for government has mental health at its very heart. It contains a package of measures to support positive mental health and prevent ill health. Those new actions build upon the mental health strategy and will be backed by a quarter of £1 billion of additional investment. That investment has a clear focus on children and adolescent mental health services, including school counselling. All of that is reflected in the report, which demonstrates progress on the strategy's 40 actions and towards achieving our central vision. It is the framework set by the strategy, together with other work that I have mentioned, that has helped to create the current sense of purpose and momentum on mental health that we see across Scotland. Across society, we see a constantly evolving understanding of good mental health, mental distress and mental ill health and wellbeing. In the past, many people were unwilling or unable to discuss their mental ill health and to seek appropriate support and treatment. That is thankfully changing. However, I want to go further in working to overcome the stigma that can be associated with poor mental health. We also need to ensure that the public's understanding and expectation of mental health services is accurate and appropriate. The services that are being delivered must also better reflect need. We know that there is a gap between how services are currently configured and some of the overall needs of the population. There is often too great a focus on crisis and specialist services. For both adults and children, there need to be new models of support that are less specialised, available for more people and that are delivered across different settings and services. We know that changing the location and nature of services and support requires the development of skills and capacity of the workforce that will deliver those services. That means giving staff across health and other sectors the skills and confidence to ensure that they are sensitive and responsive to emerging need and ways of delivering services. We also need to put in place approaches that are preventative and deliver early interventions where we can. It means ensuring that access to mental health professionals is straightforward and easy to navigate for the individual, so that the right help is available at the right time. Related to that, we also know that the workforce must grow. Through action 15 of the strategy, we are committing significant investment to delivering an additional 800 mental health professionals by 2021-22. We are doing that in partnership with integrated authorities, health boards, local authorities and key sectors, recognising the different services and settings where people can present while in distress. Finally, the role of data and information is another area where there is significant scope for improvement. We need to move away from the current focus on waiting times and workforce statistics and instead use evidence to identify areas for improvement, what works and what hasn't. Measuring patient outcomes and experience will also be important. Action 38 of the strategy, the launch of a quality indicator profile and mental health data framework, will be key to that. As I said at the start, we've come a long way since March 2017 when the strategy was published. The report laid before Parliament today summarises that progress and does so by looking at what is happening across the whole system. Of what the report describes is making a contribution to what will be a fundamental change, ensuring parity of esteem between physical and mental health, and meeting our vision for the strategy will require us to work together to reduce stigma around mental health, to develop innovative and new ways of working and in doing so see that Scotland's mental health services are among the best in the world. I commend the report to the chamber and I'll be happy to take questions from members. Thank you very much and our first question comes from Annie Wells. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and I thank the minister for advanced sight of her statement. I welcomed the commitments made by the Scottish Government in its recent programme for government. We all want to see mental health receive the focus it so desperately needs. However, I feel that that statement is missing the point somewhat. Since the strategy was introduced last year, we've seen CAMHS waiting times at their worst on record. We've seen an audit into rejected referrals highlighting a consistent rate of 1 in 5 children and young people being rejected for treatment and an audit Scotland report describing children's mental health services as complex and fragmented. We've heard many warm words, particularly when it comes to early intervention and prevention, but things don't seem to be moving in the right direction. When I've asked about additional mental health workers, community-link workers, school councillors and nurses, I haven't got anywhere fast. Detail seems to be lacking. Interestingly, the minister states that we need to move away from the current focus on waiting times and workforce statistics, but surely those figures are necessary so that we know the strategies heading in the right direction. What is she suggesting is an alternative measure of progress? When will we see the delivery plans for the recruitment of additional school nurses and councillors? If she truly believes that the commitments that are made in the programme for government will see a real step change, particularly when it comes to early interventions and preventions? I thank Annie Wells for her question. I think that it's rather disappointing that she's not able to welcome the progress that has been made in the 18 months. Stakeholders involved in ensuring that progress have been NHS, social care workers, third sector organisations and other stakeholders. She wasn't really listening to what I was saying in my statement. When she asked about CAMHS services, she will be aware that we have set up a task force under Denise Coyer, which has been working over the summer. The task group will meet next month, and that will be looking at wholesale changes within the CAMHS services. Mary Feed, who is followed by Alison Johnstone. I begin by thanking the Minister for Mental Health for Advanced Notices of her statement. Everyone wants to see mental health on an equal footing to physical health, and the reality for the Scottish Government is that they are nowhere near achieving that parity, regardless of their war on words. We welcome the appointment of Dame Denise Coyer in chairing the Children and Young People's mental health task force. However, the recently published Audit Scotland report of Children and Young People's Mental Health tells us that services for young people are complex and fragmented. With CAMHS featuring so heavily in the programme for government, can the minister ensure the chamber that funding for mental health workers in our schools will not be met from existing mental health or education budgets? Can she also give us assurances of how the transition care plans will be monitored, given the already existing problems with the CAMHS service? We also welcome the treatment that 1,000 people have received thus far in Aberdeen, Lanarkshire, the Borders and Highland to tackle the mental health of drug and alcohol abusers. Given cuts to alcohol and drug treatment over the last decade, when will the distressed brief intervention programme be rolled out across Scotland and will funding be increased year on year to tackle areas of high deprivation and poverty, which result in higher levels of drug and alcohol addiction? I thank Mary Fee for her answer. I hope that I will be able to answer most of your questions. Yes, it is additional funding that was announced in the programme for government. I am pleased to hear that she welcomes the transition care plans that were launched last month. It was certainly a piece of work that was done by young people themselves with the support of clinicians. When I was at the launch, they were extremely proud of the work that they had done. I have written to all of the health boards expressing my expectation that they will be using those care plans in that transition period from CAMHS to adult mental health services, but they can also be used at other points of transition. On the distressed brief interventions, we will be evaluating that programme. It has been extremely warmly welcomed. My own local police force has spoken to me on several occasions about how well received it has been in Lanarkshire. As Mary Fee will be aware, we are rolling that out to under 18. More than 1,000 people have benefited from having those interventions. The feedback that we have been collecting has been extremely positive. Once there has been an evaluation, we will obviously be looking at how we take that programme forward. The minister spoke of the delivery of an additional 800 mental health professionals to support A&E, GP practices, police station custody suites and prisons, but have training places been increased to allow for the further 430 counsellors now committed to schools, colleges and universities? Is the commitment to provide a further 250 school nurses also being reflected in extending the number of training places? I thank Alison Johnston for her question. We have made a commitment to the additional mental health workers. We are currently working with chief officers of the integrated authorities on developing that commitment. That includes obtaining detailed workforce plans that will provide information on workforce allocation, the location of the workforce in 2018-19 and details of the trajectory towards the 800 total by 2021-22. We expect to receive those plans for further analysis by the October recess. Integrated authorities have been devolved responsibility for health and social care for their areas. Therefore, they are key in playing their part in the plan and to take into account local needs. We are working in collaboration with other relevant partners to ensure that it is the best use of the workforce. Localised plans will need to be made to meet the local population and make sure that we are working effectively with partners to ensure that we have those workers in place. We have increased nurse training. There will be an additional 2,600 extra nursing and medwifery training places over the next four years. That is part of a wider package of measures to accelerate the supply of newly qualified nurses and midwifes. We are focusing on priority areas that include mental health, maternal and child health, and on remote areas, particularly in the north of Scotland. Alex Cole-Hamilton will be followed by Emma Harper. Liberal Democrats are grateful to see the 800 mental health workers begin to be recruited. Can the minister specify exactly what role they will fulfil? Are they talking therapists or are they signposting people into interventions? Will the minister also take this opportunity to tell Parliament how she intends her Government to respond to the call by Sir Harry Burns in his review of NHS targets, which said that we should be routinely capturing adverse childhood experiences so that we can direct support to those children? As I said in my previous answer to Alison Johnstone, we are currently working with chief officers of integrated authorities on delivering this commitment and making detailed work plans, which will include where the workforce will be. I think that it is really important that we work to local plans, because that is not going to be a one-size-fits-all. As regard the adverse childhood experiences, the Government is investing in perinatal mental health services and infant mental health services to try and support families so that we reduce the risk to children. We have rolled out the family nurse partnership, which is also working with vulnerable families to reduce the risk of ACEs. Emma Harper will be filled by Donald Cameron. I welcome the minister's statement today. Can the minister give a commitment that the Scottish Government will continue to engage with organisations such as the Rural Mental Health Forum and Rosabie to ensure that we can further explore options of tackling social isolation and loneliness in rural parts of Scotland? The Rural Mental Health Forum has been established to help people in rural areas maintain good health and wellbeing. That forum will help to develop connections between communities across rural Scotland so that isolated people can receive support when and where they need it. The forum has been provided with £50,000 of funding this financial year, and the funding has been jointly provided by the mental health and rural portfolios demonstrating the cross-cutting nature of the forum's work. Since 2016, membership of the forum has grown from 16 to 60, and the forum has agreed upon three outcomes to deliver one being a much-improved understanding of the need and unmet need for mental health support in rural Scotland, evidence of how to better overcome barriers to accessing and seeking support, and therefore enhancing people's mental wellbeing in rural Scotland, and better informed rural and health policy due to specific evidence and support from the forum members. Donald Cameron will be followed by Fulton MacGregor. Recent figures show that more than a fifth of CAMHS patients in the Highlands and Islands region have not been seen within the 18-week target over the past year. Given the issues around mental health provision in rural Scotland, what more can be done to improve such dire statistics in Scotland's Highlands and Islands? As I have said earlier on, this Government recognises that it is not acceptable for people to be waiting for a long time to be seen by mental health services. That is why they took action to set up the task force under the chair of Dr Denise Coyer. We got her initial recommendations last week, and her task force will meet next month, and she will be looking at how we revise and change CAMHS services so that people can get access to services that they need quicker, and those who need specialist services can be fast tracked to be seen by those specialist services. Fulton MacGregor will be followed by Anas Sawa. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Just this week, we have been given more stark reminders about the devastating impact that bullying often of our young people can have on lives, families and communities. Let's be clear, bullying in any forum, in person or online is not acceptable. Can the minister outline what support has been given to schools to be able to recognise and support young people whose mental health has been impacted by bullying? I agree entirely with Fulton MacGregor that bullying of any kind is totally unacceptable and must be dealt with quickly and whenever and wherever it happens. Education authorities and all those working in our schools have a responsibility to identify, support and develop the mental wellbeing of pupils with decisions on how to provide that support, taken on the basis of local circumstances and need. Local authorities will be using a range of approaches and resources to support children and young people with their mental and emotional wellbeing, in line with local needs and circumstances. Since 2014, the Scottish Government has provided £6,000 per year to the Education Scotland to roll out mental health first-aid training for children and young people to local authorities. The aim of that is to train staff within secondary school communities in order to increase their confidence in approaching pupils who they think might be struggling with a mental health problem. That training will complement the range of mental health strategies that are already in place within local authorities. John Mason will answer that. The mental health minister unbelievably said in her statement that we need to move away from the current focus on waiting times and workforce statistics. That, in the face of the worst CAMHS waiting times on record, the highest suicide rate across the UK, a sky-high vacancy rate and with the desperate need to recruit hundreds of more staff, does the minister not understand that the way of moving the focus away is by meeting the standard, treating patients on time and employing more staff? I recognise and this Government recognises that mental health services are not good enough for our young people, which is why we have set up a task force under Dame Denise Coyt, as I have already said. The previous Minister for Mental Health met a number of NHS boards where the current delivery against standards continues to fall short, and the latest statistics show that five of those boards show some sign of improvement, but we need to go further. Our mental health strategy is investing £150 million into services over five years, and it sets out clearly how we can reshape service delivery to benefit patients. That includes £54 million to help boards to improve their performance against waiting time targets by investing in workforce development, recruitment and retention and service improvement support. We are already funding Health Improvement Scotland to work with boards on improvement with ISD analysts embedded in the boards and NHS Education Scotland's programme of investment in workforce capacity building. John Mason, to be followed by Brian Whittle. I think that some people with mental health issues find it quite difficult to ask for support, for example, face-to-face with their GP. Can the minister say if there are other ways that people can access these services? Thank you, Mr Mason, for his question. There are many ways that people can access services. We have breathing space, which is run by NHS 24, a confidential telephone line and access services online. We have rolled out a computer ICBT programme to all NHS boards, so there are various ways that people can access services. There are also a great many third sector organisations where people can access health, such as Samaritans, if they feel that they are in mental health difficulty and do not feel able to approach their GP. However, I encourage anyone who feels like that to try and go to see their GP because they are the best place to be able to signpost them to services locally. Brian Whittle, to be followed by Stuart McMillan. Similar to the suicide strategy, the Scottish Government seems to be focused on trying to deliver a service to those caught in that poor mental health spiral. As vital and crucial as that is, the minister recognises that, unless a whole system approach to health is adopted, which looks at the root causes of poor mental health, such as poor nutrition and inactivity, chronic pain, obesity, isolation and alcohol and drug addiction, with all the evidence from Mental Health Scotland and Sam H, the system is ultimately going to crash. It is interesting that Mr Whittle left poverty off of that list, considering what the UK Tory Government is doing in terms of rolling out universal credit and putting a lot of people into debt and poverty. People having access to food via food banks, but he chose not to mention that. However, what I will say is that the mental health strategy looks at physical health. It looks at things such as smoking cessation, screening and activity. There have been programmes set up under the mental health strategy committing to improve physical health inequalities of people with mental health problems. Smoking cessation, for example, NHS Lothian, and I have a tobacco control action plan that was published on 20 June, which contains commitments to raise awareness among medical professionals and healthcare staff of the significant impact that smoking can have on mental health medications. There are two projects currently running on screening. The first is by NHS Dumfries and Galloway to improve the uptake of breast, cervical and bowel screening in people, experiencing homelessness or with mental health problems through gaining an understanding of their barriers. In NHS Lanarkshire, they are reviewing options to increase the uptake to cervical bowel and breast screening services for the homeless population in Lanarkshire. The act of living becomes achievable. ALBA is a new and unique behavioural change project that links in with existing physical activity provisions to enhance sustainable individual physical activity engagement through behaviour change. The aim is to increase physical activity levels for people living with mental and or physical health conditions in order to improve their mental and physical health and wellbeing. The results of that in the ALBA intervention will be available in September 2019. Stuart McMillan I provide an update on action 33 of the mental health strategy that relates to the needs of people with learning, disability and autism. Yes, I can. The review to consider whether the provisions of the Mental Health Care and Treatment Scotland Act 2003 fulfills the needs of people with learning, disability and autism chaired by Andy Rhoam is under way. There is a strong emphasis on reaching a broad range of stakeholders and seldom-heard groups so that the real issues can be fleshed out and considered. That will mean that several stages of engagement, as well as providing the right supports for people so that it will be able to record a range of views and experiences making the review truly accessible. It is therefore crucial that the review is truly inclusive and that this work is open and transparent. We want people to see and understand and participate in the work of the review. The first of the three public engagement phases commenced this month. I apologise to Mr Stewart and Mr Lyle. I cannot call any more speakers. We will move on now to the next item of business, which is a debate on motion 14059, in the name of Ivan McKee, on Scotland role in the development of future UK trade arrangements. I invite all members who wish to ask a question of Mr McKee—oh no, sorry—to speak of the debate. I might wish to ask a question of Mr McKee, too. All members who wish to participate in the debate to press their request-to-speak buttons now.