The Social Care News blog joined our esteemed events & visits and policy colleagues at the very first Mental Health Crisis Care Concordat Summit, held yesterday at the Grand Connaught Rooms in central London.
This was an opportunity for Care and Support Minister Norman Lamb to join leading voices from NHS England, MIND, the police, service users and the wider sector to review progress made since the Concordat's launch in February. It also served as a reminder that the deadline of 15 December for local crisis care declarations is fast approaching.
Many areas have already declared. You can see if your region has an action plan in place using this map. A commitment to rolling out or expanding street triage services has been a welcome and recurrent theme.
Leaders in mental health policing have been particularly positive about street triage, seeing it as a stepping stone to the ideal of 365 days a year joined up crisis care - as expressed by one of the guest speakers, Chief Inspector Daniel Thorpe, Mental Health Lead for the Metropolitan Police.