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Mental health support in schools to get £810,000 funding from Mayor

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September 16, 2025
3 min read

Mental health support in schools to get £810,000 funding from Mayor

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced a £810,000 to provide mental health support for up to 15,000 Londoners in schools across the capital. The programme, delivered in a partnership with charity Anna Freud will work with targeted secondary schools in nine boroughs to provide support where there is a high need for mental health support.

The Mayor’s investment is “designed to help young Londoners feel supported,” and will “focus on making sure that every part of school life actively supports the mental health and wellbeing of pupils, staff, and families.” This will include teaching stress-management techniques and introducing initiatives to make mental health more visible, including wellbeing weeks parent sessions, peer-support groups, or mental health training for teachers and support staff.

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“As young people continue to face increasing mental health challenges, this initiative will help develop a model for how this innovative approach can work across a range of London school and provide vital evidence for the future of children’s mental health support,” said a press release from City Hall. “Learnings will be shared with schools, the government and NHS partners as we work collaboratively to prepare for the full roll out of Mental Health Support Teams in schools by 2030.”

Data from NHS Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services reveals that NHS referrals to services have more than doubled since before the pandemic. There had been 81,575 open referrals to CAHMS in London in July 2025. In July 2019 the figure stood at 31,725. Across England these figures stood at 554,966 in July 2025 compared to 267,423 in July 2019. Data from NHS Digital also shows that children and young people with mental health problems are nearly seven times more likely to have had 15 or more days off from school in aa single term.

The new programme follows polling from YouGov, commissioned by Global Future Partners, that discovered that nearly a quarter of young Londoners regularly feel emotionally unwell, with nearly half of 16-24-year-olds feeling that their school did not teach enough about coping with mental health struggles.

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