Debate contribution: Mental Illness: Reducing Stigma

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 21 January 2025.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

21 January 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Mental Illness: Reducing Stigma

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4749895

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I thank the Member who moved the motion. There is no doubt that we, as a society, need to change our attitude towards mental health. Mental ill health is nothing to be ashamed or embarrassed about. If mental health was destigmatised, more people would speak up and more people would realise the struggles that are faced by many — unfortunately, too many — across the board. It is also vital that we look at the structural issues that affect people's mental health. Mental ill health is not a personal failing. Viewing the issue as a personal failing ignores structural oppression, especially that faced by women, people from ethnic minority communities, people with disabilities and many others. Issues like anxiety and depression are 25% more common among young people who live in the North than they are among their peers across the water, and we need to listen to the voices and experiences of the people who are impacted by those issues.

Anti-stigma and anti-discrimination public awareness and education campaigns are important and worthwhile. We should destigmatise mental health issues, but we cannot normalise the mental health epidemic, and that is what it is. Poverty, debt, income inequality, discrimination, loneliness and climate breakdown have a devastating impact on mental health. The North has some of the highest levels of multiple deprivation in the UK and across these islands, as well as the highest prevalence of mental illness. That is no coincidence. We cannot solve the mental health crisis without challenging capitalist ideology and reality, which has created the conditions for mental ill health to thrive. Our social security system is supposed to support people who are experiencing illness, including mental health issues, but instead the system is causing its own mental health crisis. Too many people experience anxiety when attending jobcentre appointments and personal independence payment (PIP) assessments. They experience depression when they are sanctioned and forced to live below the breadline. Our housing crisis is also driving our mental health crisis. Poor living conditions, such as damp and mould, overcrowding and hidden homelessness massively impact on a person's mental health. A 2023 survey by Depaul and the Simon Community shows that, of all the people experiencing homelessness in the North, a shocking 70% have a diagnosed mental health condition. Again, those connections are not coincidental. It is one thing to talk about the issues but another to act and create a change. Unfortunately, the North spends less per head of population on mental health than other regions across these islands. That reflects a systemic and repeated failure on the part of the Executive to take the mental health epidemic seriously. Funding needs to go directly to services that help people who need it most. Services, such as West Wellbeing in my constituency of West Belfast, which provides essential care to the community, are constantly battling for funding so that they can keep their doors open, pay workers and keep delivering services to people who desperately need them. Where the state has failed to provide mental health services for people in need, charities such as West Wellbeing and many others are often left to pick up the pieces. Mental health services —.

I agree with the Member and thank him for raising that point. Community and voluntary services do a vital job, but they need to intervene when the state has failed to treat mental health as a public health issue and an emergency. Therefore, I agree with the Member's point. Mental health services need sustainable, long-term funding. Without that, all the positive sentiments in the world from here and elsewhere will make no difference. The Executive need to be held responsible for not prioritising funding to support the mental well-being of working-class communities and communities across the board. There should be no economic barriers to accessing mental health services. It is frankly inhumane to allow those with wealth to access the services that they need via private healthcare whilst working-class people are left behind.

I thank the Member and agree with her. We must tackle health inequalities, and the Minister should proceed with that. We also need to tackle wealth inequality in our society. There are too many rich people and too many poor people. That is often not talked about or addressed in this Building or by the Executive. It is inhumane to allow those with wealth to access the services that they need via private healthcare whilst leaving working-class people just to deal with it or to get on with it, as if that is a normal way of running life and society. I support the motion, but it was important to air those points in the debate.

780 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:48 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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