North Wales Assembly Member Mark Isherwood has called on the new Health Minister to make addressing the mental health needs of Wales’s veterans a priority of this Welsh Government. Speaking in this week’s Business Statement, Mr Isherwood called for a Welsh Government Statement on support for Wales’s armed forces veterans, following the ‘Call to Mind: Wales’ report, published at the beginning of this month, which showed that much more needs to be done to support the mental health needs of veterans in Wales.
Speaking in the Chamber, he said: “Only a fraction of the estimated 10,000 Welsh veterans living with mental illness of some form are being referred to NHS Wales. The report was commissioned by the Forces in Mind Trust, but based on interviews with veterans and their families and people working in the voluntary and independent sector.
“It called for increased Veterans’ NHS Wales capacity; improved data to inform commissioning and service provision; more to support family and carers; and it highlighted the work needed to progress and to identify the need for involvement, liaison and action with people in the armed forces, serving and/or at transition into civilian life, and proposes that veterans and family members’ mental and related health needs are considered in the new legislation introduced at the end of the last Assembly, such as the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 and Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015.
“We need a Statement detailing the Welsh Government’s proposals and the new Health Minister’s proposals to make assessment of, and provision for, the mental health needs of Wales’s veterans a priority of this Welsh Government.”
The Minister Jane Hutt agreed to “progress with a Statement.”