Leadership Board - Fifth meeting: update paper

3. Priorities – Alignment to Health and Social Care Reform

The Population Health Framework 2025-2035 (PHF) and Service Renewal Framework (SRF) are highly relevant when considering COSLA and Scottish Government’s ambition to ensure alignment of mental health and wellbeing and wider health and social care reform.

The PHF, published in June 2025, sets out the approach to improving health and reducing health inequalities for the next decade, promoting everyone’s right to achieve the highest possible standard of physical and mental health. It places particular focus on enabling all children, regardless of background, the right to enjoy good health.

The SRF, also published in June 2025, provides a high-level guide for change, to ensure the sustainability, efficiency, quality, and accessibility of health and social care services in Scotland. As a result, over the next ten years, people can expect faster and fairer access to care, with a particular focus on reducing long waits for planned treatment. By expanding capacity in primary and community healthcare, the SRF will help ensure that more people receive the right care, in the right place, at the right time.

These frameworks create the strategic platform to deliver transformation of mental health, and align well with our Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy, including the focus on:

• Ensuing prevention and early intervention is firmly rooted across our approach, including a focus on tackling the social determinants of poor health and early detection and intervention across the continuum of care.
• Taking a whole-system approach where people and communities are equipped to support their health and wellbeing, sitting alongside well-governed, person-centred services which provide care and support for people who need it.
• Ensuring services are sustainable and focused on delivering consistent outcomes for people, with a clear focus on reducing inequalities.
• Ensuring digital technologies are harnessed and integrated into models of care, whilst also helping to improve access.

Work will be undertaken with system partners over the coming months to consider how this work might be articulated within our next Mental Health and Wellbeing Delivery Plan.

Mental Health Leadership Board Priorities

To date the Leadership Board and wider stakeholders have flagged a wide range of potential actions that would help to progress the priorities of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy. It was widely recognised by stakeholders that the majority of work proposed was felt to be important and difficult decisions would have to be made with regard to what was prioritised. However, while all areas/actions require further exploration, a number have been noted of particular importance due to gaps or pressures on current provision and the need to support future improvement. This included:

• Accessibility of mental health services
• Tackling root causes and a stronger preventative approach
• Improving neurodevelopmental and crisis care support and pathways
• Stigma reduction