Meeting of the Parliament 28 May 2025
It is clear that we are facing significant challenges in how we support individuals with neurodevelopmental conditions in Scotland—challenges that demand not only honest recognition, but bold and compassionate action.
We are all acutely aware of the profound pressures on our mental health services. Those pressures were hugely intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic. Many individuals, such as my own loved one, became unable to mask their neurodiversities when the world went back to normal, and their whole lives were impacted. Believe me—total burnout and withdrawal from life for more than a year is horrendous.
Demand has risen sharply, not just for CAHMS but for adult services as well. More people are seeking answers, assessments and support for neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism and ADHD, and they are not wrong to expect timely, effective care. We as a Parliament cannot shy away from the fact that there are far too many people being left to wait, too many families struggling to keep their heads above water and too many GPs and educational settings bearing an unsustainable burden.
I fully recognise the distress that is caused by the current situation. I have heard from many constituents about the subject. I have heard from parents who are battling for a diagnosis and from adults who are coming to terms with a new understanding of themselves but who face years-long waiting lists for assessment and treatment—or, indeed, who have no way to get on to those waiting lists because they are closed to patients unless there is a demonstrable, co-occurring, severe and enduring mental health condition.
One of my constituents has lodged a petition with the Parliament, entitled “Improve access to ADHD diagnosis and treatment across Scotland”. Our constituents should not have to lodge petitions to get access to healthcare.
Despite my own child’s four-year wait for assessment, I consider my family to be lucky—unlike the family who came to see me in my office last Friday. They have a child who is experiencing acute mental distress, but despite being told that their child is most likely autistic, they have no way to seek assessment as their GP’s multiple referrals are being knocked back. They are pushed between services: the school is trying to support through decreasing attendance and a GP is recognising the mental distress that is being experienced, but a system that rejects all the evidence is saying that it is all down to their suspected, but as yet undiagnosed, neurodivergence. That is not acceptable. We cannot have a system that sees people’s mental health spiral down due to unmet neurodevelopmental needs, nor a system that requires such deterioration in order to access the pathway.
The Scottish Government has committed to delivering the national neurodevelopmental specification and we are all avidly watching to see its manifestation. The specification is vitally important because it aims to ensure that children and young people can access timely, co-ordinated support regardless of whether they have a formal diagnosis. I know that that is supposed to be what is happening now—it is a fundamental shift, from waiting to identify need to responding to it early and holistically.
We must also ensure that services in local areas are resourced, supported and trained to undertake that work. That is what was supposed to happen for my own family, but there was no support on the ground. It is one thing to say that no diagnosis is needed and another thing to have services responding to the real and urgent need that all our inboxes tell us is there and that requires it.
We cannot overlook the reality of the workforce pressures, the structural complexity of services or the trauma that delays can cause. We also cannot pretend that private diagnosis is a viable option for most families—and, when it is used, we need a transparent, clinically safe, shared care framework that allows for collaboration with NHS professionals, not the blanket refusals that we are all hearing about.
We cannot shy away from the scale of the challenge. I acknowledge that progress is being made in the background but it is yet to be felt on the ground by my constituents. Let us work together across the chamber with a cross-party summit being convened to ensure that every Scot—whether diagnosed or undiagnosed, child or adult—gets the support that they need to thrive.
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