Policy and influencing

The mental health social care workforce provides the aftercare for people to live independently, stay well, and participate in the community after a stay in a mental health hospital. Unfortunately, this vital service is not well understood and is frequently overlooked. We aim to raise the profile of mental health social care services and call for them to receive the long-term funding they need.

Maintaining good mental health without a place to call home is difficult. We want everyone severely affected by mental illness to live in safe, secure, stable, affordable, and high-quality homes in their community where they have choice and control over their space and support. We campaign tirelessly for better availability of supported housing and an improved vision for the future of housing for those living with mental illness.

Everyone should feel respected and cared for when they're in hospital for their mental health. But often this isn’t the case. We work with people living with mental illness, the government, and other charities, to improve the physical and psychological safety and quality of that care so no-one experiences fear or isolation at their most vulnerable.

Too many people severely affected by mental illness are unable to find employment. We fight to improve that access to work and training, and the opportunity for anyone living with a mental illness to boost their wellbeing through the sense of control, clear goals, and a connection with their community that employment brings.

The rights of people severely affected by mental illness is at the heart of what we do. The Mental Health Act means you can be detained and treated without your consent if your mental illness is deemed to be posing a risk to yourself or others. These laws are vital but outdated. Everyone with a mental illness deserves respect and the right to have a say in the support and care they receive. We have been campaigning since the 1980s to improve the Mental Health Act and do not intend to stop.

Everyone living with a mental illness deserves to access the right treatment at the right time. Medication, psychological therapies, and other NHS support plays an enormously important role in helping people recover and stay well. Our policy work aims to ensure that NHS mental health services are properly funded and staffed, and that important commitments are delivered.

Our mental health is about much more than support from the NHS. It is affected by, and affects, all areas of life, such as education, employment, housing and money. Rethink Mental Illness has long called for the whole of government to be fully on board with improving the nation’s mental health rather than just waiting until people are unwell enough to need NHS services.

People severely affected by mental illness often experience poorer physical health outcomes. Higher rates of conditions such as obesity, diabetes and COPD (chronically obstructive pulmonary disease) occur because of a complex range of causal and contributory factors, leading to a shorter average life expectancy. We work to make sure the signs of poor physical health are identified early and acted on with support that understands the relationship between mental and physical health.

Living with a mental illness can be difficult enough, nobody deserves to be judged because of their diagnosis. The mental health conversation has improved greatly over the years, but stigma and discrimination around mental illness still exists and we’re fighting to change that.

Financial security is essential to maintaining good mental health. From improving the social security system to addressing cost-of-living issues, our policy work aims to create a society in which everyone severely affected by mental illness has enough money to live the lives they want.

Rethink Mental Illness is a part of several policy groups including the Mental Health Policy Group, the All Party Parliamentary Group, and the Richmond Group. Together we work to study, debate, affect and recommend changes to the government’s approach to mental health in the UK.