Issue - meetings

Report of Councillor D Ruff, Elected Member Champion for Mental Health

Members received an update report from Councillor D Ruff, the Council’s Elected Member Mental Health Champion, on the work of the Mental Health Action Group and what it had done to promote mental health. 

Council discussed the report. In particular, Members considered the role of the newly-trained Mental Health First Aiders. They also discussed how Councillors might contribute to the Mental Health Action Group by sharing their own experiences of dealing with people with mental health issues.

Members considered how the Council could work with other organisations to ensure greater support, especially on more complicated mental health issues, to both its own staff and to the wider community. Members were keen to explore how they and might be able to help identify potential problems, so that appropriate support could then be provided. They noted that this would be similar to the role which Members already played in identifying safeguarding issues involving adults and young people.

At the conclusion of the discussion, Council made clear that it welcomed the work of the Mental Health Action Group in promoting and addressing mental health issues and looked forward to further progress.

RESOLVED – That Council noted the progress of the Mental Health Action Group (by acclamation).