THE Welsh Liberal Democrats are calling for mental health to be given “‘parity of emphasis”’ with physical health.

In their Welsh Assembly debate today (WEDS), the party will outline steps they say could improve the quality of mental health services in Wales, particularly for young people.

In Wales, Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) and all mental health hospital services aren’t subject to the same rigorous “‘referral to treatment”’ time targets as other NHS services, leader of the Welsh Lib Dems, Kirsty Williams said.

“It’s been more thanover 10 years since the Children’s Commissioner described Welsh youth mental health services as being in “‘crisis”’, yet we’ve seen little improvement since then.

“Children are being put on adult mental health wards, shoved on medication when all they need is a talking therapy, and in some cases having to wait more than over 40 weeks just to start treatment,” she said.

“Liberal Democrats in gGovernment have made mental health a priority, by investing record amounts in mental health services and legislating to ensure parity of esteem with physical health.

“We want to bring some of this ambition to Wales during our debate this week.”

A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “Mental health services already have parity of esteem in the Welsh NHS.

“We have ring-fenced mental health spending for a number of years and increased the mental health budget from £389m five years ago to £587m in 2014-15.

“Child and adolescent mental health services – a specialist service designed to care for young people with serious mental illnesses – has seen a 103 per cent increase in referrals in the last four years.

“We continue to work with health boards to address increased demand to ensure those who need specialist services receive prompt access.”