Debate contribution: Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services: Waiting Times
Debate contribution by Mr Mike Nesbitt on .
- MLA
- Mr Mike Nesbitt
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 5 May 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services: Waiting Times
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5524678
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Improving access to child and adolescent mental health services remains a key focus for the Department. The information provided by trusts demonstrates that average waiting times have fluctuated over the past five years. The average wait was 49 days in the 2021-22 financial year. It then dropped to 46, increased to 60 and improved again to 47. The data for 2025-26 shows a further reduction, with an average wait of 42 days. The use of regional averages as a performance metric does not reveal the degree of variation across the trusts. Each trust has encountered challenges in meeting the nine-week target for initial assessment in CAMHS. There have nonetheless been significant improvements in some areas: for example, in the Northern Trust, the average wait time of nine weeks in 2021-22 fell to six weeks in 2025-26. Despite ongoing pressures associated with workforce, rising demand and rising levels of clinical acuity in the children referred, the data returned by the trusts demonstrates progress in recent years. I remain committed to supporting trusts to reduce waiting times for children and young people across Northern Ireland further.
184 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Awaiting analysis
This record has not been analysed yet. It is not counted in any total until it has been assessed.
Disagree with this assessment?
Classifications can be challenged. A person reviews every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.