More than £8 billion a year could be saved

Scotland’s political parties have been told billions of pounds could be saved every year if the incoming Scottish Government invests in better mental health services.

The Mental Health Foundation, which campaigns for measures to prevent poor mental health and build and protect good mental health, estimates some £44 billion over the duration of the next Scottish Parliament could be saved,

It has called on whichever party forms the next Scottish Government to make decisive efforts to end the country’s mental health emergency.

Pathways to Prevention: Ending Scotland’s Public Mental Health Emergency, the Foundation’s manifesto for the 2026 Election, argues that the Scottish Government must put prevention at the heart of its policy agenda over the next five years to tackle rising levels of poor mental health. To help do that, the charity is calling for:

• A new strategic Improving Scotland’s Mental Health Fund of at least £20M for each year of the next Scottish Parliament.
• Allocation of at least 10% of NHS funding to general mental health services and 1% to Child and Adolescent Mental Health services (CAMHS) during each year of the next Parliament.
• Creation of a specific budget category for prevention, as part of the drive to embed a ‘mental health in all policies’ approach within the Scottish Government.

Recent research by the London School of Economics and the Mental Health Foundation (see notes to editors) found that poor mental health costs Scotland – on a conservative estimate - £8.8 billion in additional expenditure every year. That figure could be dramatically reduced by implementing cost-effective, evidence-based mental health prevention initiatives, such as those recommended by the charity.

These proposals form part of a wider set of calls for action the Mental Health Foundation is putting to all parties ahead of the Scottish Election.

The charity’s other proposals include increasing the Scottish Child Payment given to eligible low-income families from its current weekly rate of £27.15 per child to £55 per week by 2030; shared community-based support for parents and carers of children with neurodevelopmental support needs; fair funding to help support people living with long term health conditions; free public transport for refugees and asylum seekers to promote better integration, and development of a national strategy for arts and mental health.

Alexa Knight, director of policy & influencing at the Mental Health Foundation, said: “The next Scottish Government urgently needs to reduce the drastically rising levels of poor mental health in Scotland. The long shadow of the Covid-19 pandemic, an on-going cost of living crisis, and the poverty endured by our most economically disadvantaged communities have all intensified the scale of the public mental health emergency Scotland faces.

"It’s clear that we cannot simply treat our way out of this crisis, which is why we need to see significant investment in measures to prevent poor mental health from arising in the first place, and to improve the mental health of those already struggling.

“We need to see a decisive and irreversible shift in public mental health policy to focus on prevention, which can be achieved by putting mental health at the heart of all policies. The calls for action in our manifesto provide a strong platform for reducing mental health harms in Scotland and ultimately delivering billions of pounds of savings for the Scottish economy.

"We urge all parties to commit to our proposals in their manifestos for the 2026 Scottish Election as a matter of social and economic justice, to reduce the unnecessary suffering that poor mental health is causing people across Scotland."