Debate contribution: Community Crisis Intervention Service: Closure

Debate contribution by Mr Mark Durkan on 14 October 2025.

MLA

Mr Mark Durkan

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

14 October 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Community Crisis Intervention Service: Closure

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5181198

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I beg to move

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

Those of us who have experienced the heartbreak of suicide know that it never leaves you, with sleepless nights spent wondering what more you could have done, the guilt that gnaws away, the lives shattered and the families who are changed forever. We tell people who are struggling to reach out and seek help, but what happens when that help is not there, when people in crisis are told that they cannot access services for another six weeks at least or when the system that should catch them when they fall simply is not there? In the Chamber — more so than outside in the real world — we often see and hear division over the daftest of issues, and sometimes over fundamental political ideology. Suicide prevention and saving lives should unite us all, however, and it does. It united us five years ago, when we all stood here making the same argument to fund the critical community crisis intervention service (CCIS) in Derry, an area with a shamefully high suicide rate. It is shameful that we have a fight on our hands once more to reinstate a service that literally saved lives but that was forced to close a couple of months ago when funding from the mental health support fund ended. How can its closure be justified at a time when a mental health crisis is engulfing our communities? Where was the forward planning from the Department? From its establishment in 2018, the CCIS provided more than 3,400 one-to-one crisis interventions, many of which took place out of hours, which are the very hours when people are at their most vulnerable, at their darkest and alone with their thoughts. It was community-based and person-centred, and it worked. Do not take my word for it, because we have heard from service users who say that they would not be here today were it not for the service. The council led the way in securing the service. I recall, however, that we had to drag the Department and the Western Health and Social Care Trust to the table. We even had to get a significant financial contribution from Foyle Search and Rescue, a wonderful local charity, to make ends meet.

It is ironic that, on World Mental Health Day last week, the news broke that 80% of the mental health strategy has been shelved, basically — 80%. That did not, however, come as news to my party and others who have been raising the alarm for years. The problem is not a lack of knowledge: it is a lack of political will. Only a handful of the 35 flagship commitments that were made when the strategy was launched in 2021 have seen any tangible progress. Initiatives on early intervention, crisis response and workforce expansion have all stalled. If the strategy had been delivered properly, fewer people would be hitting crisis point and, in turn, the need for crisis services such as the one in Foyle would be reduced. As I said, the community crisis intervention service has been a success. It has been a success despite uncertainty over its future and staff's uncertainty over their futures. That is not the way in which to run any service, and especially not a service of that nature. The closure of the community crisis intervention service alongside the defunding of other vital supports in Derry — removal of the Northlands Addiction Treatment Centre's core funding and defunding of Men's Action Network — have left a dangerous void in the community, which is already struggling under immense pressure. The Western Trust, as we established during Question Time last week, has amongst the highest waiting lists for mental health support in the North and the fewest psychiatrists per head of population. The community crisis intervention service actually helped to cushion that system. It took pressure off emergency services. It gave people hope when all else had failed them. Now, they have been failed again. Now, where do people go? Who catches them before they fall? If we are serious about tackling mental health, every Department must be part of the solution, as is called for by the motion. Those community-based services are not optional extras; they are literal lifelines. I urge you, Minister, and your Executive colleagues, to give that lifeline a lifeline.

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

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 13:36 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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