Recommendation 24

The Department acknowledged the fall in clinical psychiatrists and mental health practitioners and agreed that services needed access to the full set of professionals.54 The Department noted that it had already committed to securing an additional 800 mental health and clinical professionals in the drug strategy.55 It assured us it was working with Health Education England on a workforce strategy to set out training requirements and focus on attracting professionals back into these roles. The Department told us it would ensure it is training the right numbers of people but recognised that this training 47 C&AG’s Report, para 3.3 and Figure 12 48 C&AG’s Report, Figure 15 49 Qq 79, 100–101 50 Qq 108–112 51 Q 10; ATS0003 52 Q 2; ATS0003 53 ATS0003 54 Qq 103, 125 55 Q 27; HM government departments, From harm to hope: A 10-year drugs plan to cut crime and save lives, 6 December 2021 16 Alcohol treatment services takes a very long time.56 In the meantime, it said it was looking to make it easier for people to specialise in addiction psychiatry later on in their training by adding additional modules and was also looking to persuade former addiction psychiatrists to return to the profession.57