Parenting programmes ‘can greatly aid children with mental health issues’

A new report has demonstrated the significant benefits that affordable parenting programmes could provide for mentally-ill children, if provided with the proper backing.

The analysis from the Centre for Mental Health has highlighted a number of major disadvantages faced by children with serious behavioural problems, such as the fact they are twice as likely to leave school with no qualifications, six times more like to die before age 30 and 20 times more likely to be jailed.

However, parenting programmes have been shown to improve the quality of parent-child relationships, children's behaviour and parents' own wellbeing. They can teach parents to manage their children's condition better and tackle problematic behaviour at the root.

The report also noted that the lifetime costs of conduct disorder are estimated at around 260,000 pounds per child, compared to the 1,300 pounds per child cost of parenting programme.

Sean Duggan, chief executive of the Centre for Mental Health, said: "Investing in cost-effective parenting programmes is not only the smart thing to do, but the right thing to do."

This comes after the government outlined a mental health action plan earlier this month, as part of an ongoing effort to ensure mental health issues are treated with the same level of priority as physical health.