Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s speech at the Labour Party Conference yesterday included an important ambition: that young people should not face long waits for mental health support.

That is an ambition we strongly support.

Through Metanoia’s Here4You counselling service in schools, we see firsthand the need for children and young people to be able to access psychological support early, in places that are familiar and accessible to them. Early access matters,  both for the young person experiencing difficulty now and in helping prevent problems becoming more entrenched.

But improving access also requires sustained investment in the people who provide that support.

At Metanoia Institute, we educate and train the next generation of counsellors, psychotherapists and counselling psychologists, alongside delivering therapeutic services within communities. We see both sides of the challenge: the demand for accessible psychological support and the need to develop and sustain a highly skilled professional workforce capable of providing it.

Building a resilient mental health system means investing in both: accessible, timely support for children and young people, and the workforce needed to deliver it.

The principle of investing earlier in people’s wellbeing, rather than dealing with the human and economic consequences when support comes too late, is one we wholeheartedly support.