October 10, 2018
Long waits for mental health treatment lead to life changing problems, RCPsych study finds
A quarter of people (24 percent) with a diagnosed mental health condition reported waiting more than three months to see an NHS mental health specialist, a poll for the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych) has found. Some (6 percent) say they waited more than a year to see an NHS mental health specialist – one man interviewed following the poll said he waited 13 years to get the help he needed. Where respondents’ mental health got worse, these waits led to relationship problems including divorce (36 percent), financial troubles (32 percent) and work problems including job loss (34 percent).
Almost half (49 percent) of UK workers are in jobs they are either under- or over-skilled for, according to new research from the CIPD. Its report ‘Over-skilled and underused: Investigating the untapped potential of UK skills’ surveyed 3,700 UK employees and found that more than a third (37 percent) of workers have the skills to cope with more demanding duties than they currently have. At the opposite end of the scale, one in ten (12 percent) employees said they lacked all the skills needed to carry out their job effectively. This means that as many as half (49 percent) of UK workers could be in the wrong job, based on their skill level. The UK has one of most skilled workforces in the world, with 42 percent of workers qualified to degree level, yet it also has the highest proportion of jobs within the OECD which require no qualifications at all.
Last year John Cridland 
