Ms Siobhan Thomas:

I will add one thought on the effect that having more funded places and dealing with this elitism might actually have. We all know how long it takes people to get mental healthcare in this country. Many people are being forced to go into the private sector. I have even heard of some people going abroad for assessments.

We have an able and willing cohort of people who could be trained to actually give these services. We have thousands of children now on waiting lists for private care services while we have thousands of psychology graduates who are completely discouraged from actually pursuing clinical practice as a career. It makes no sense. When young people are waiting in excess of three years for a learning or intellectual disability assessment, we know there is something seriously wrong with the funding and staffing in this country. Psychology graduates who want to pursue clinical training are now leaving the country because they cannot actually get training here. We are, therefore, sending highly-qualified and educated people abroad to pursue clinical practice while our mental health service is in a complete shambles and a state of crisis. While dealing with all of these, we could actually help to rectify the issues in our mental health system.