National Suicide Prevention Advisory Group minutes: December 2024

Attendees and apologies

Members

• Prof Christine Goodall (Chair), Professor of Oral Surgery and Violence Reduction/Honorary Consultant Oral Surgeon, University of Glasgow
• Dr Douglas Hutchison, Executive Director of Education, Glasgow City Council
• Peter Kelly*, Director, Poverty Alliance
• Catherine McWilliam*, Nation Director for Scotland, Institute of Directors
• Brendan Rooney, Chief Executive, Healthy n Happy Community Development Trust
• Prof Andrea Williamson, Professor of General Practice and Inclusion Health, University of Glasgow

Apologies

• Dr Linda Findlay, Royal College of Psychiatrists Scotland
• Louise Hunter, Chief Executive, Who Cares? Scotland

In Attendance

• Prof Rory O’Connor, Chair of Scotland’s Suicide Prevention Academic Advisory Group (AAG)
• Haylis Smith, Suicide Prevention National Delivery Lead
• Dave Morris, Samaritans (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 1)
• Dan Farthing*, Scottish Action for Mental Health (SAMH), (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 2)
• Phil Hand*, Scottish Action for Mental Health (SAMH), (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 2)
• Issy Murray, Penumbra (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 3)
• Jonny Cobbold*, Change Mental Health (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 3)
• Shirley Windsor, Public Health Scotland (Strategic Outcome Lead, Outcome 4)

Agenda Item 4

• Lorraine McGrath, CEO, Simon Community Scotland
• Gillian Ferguson, Co-ordinator, Glasgow Alcohol and Drugs Partnership

Secretariat

• Morag Williamson, Scottish Government
• Hilary Third, Scottish Government
• Craig Wilson, Scottish Government 

(* Attended online)

Items and actions

Welcome

This was Prof. Christine Goodall’s (“the Chair”) first meeting as Chair of the National Suicide Prevention Advisory Group (NSPAG) (“the Group”). She welcomed everyone to the University of Glasgow for the sixth meeting of the Group. The Members made introductions and the Chair shared her desire to be involved with the work to help reduce suicides in Scotland as she knew people who had sadly been bereaved by suicide.

The Group welcomed the suicide prevention National Delivery Lead and Strategic Outcome Leads to the meeting.

Apologies

It was reported that Sheriff David Mackie, Scottish Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders, had stood down from the group due to time commitments. The secretariat undertook to pass on the Group’s thanks for his contributions.

The Chair highlighted that the secretariat would support her to review the Group’s membership, with a view to inviting a small number of new members to join the Group in 2025, to boost its understanding and expertise in specific areas. 

Other apologies were noted.

Minutes

The Chair noted that the minutes from the Group’s meeting in September had been circulated for comment and requested that any further comments be sent to the Secretariat to enable the Chair to sign them off for publication.

Academic Advisory Group update on International Trends and Gone Too Soon Project

Prof. Rory O’Connor delivered a presentation on international trends in suicide and the Gone Too Soon project.

During a discussion around men’s mental health, it was noted the UK Government recently committed to a men’s health strategy, in partnership with Movember. There has also been active engagement between Movember and the Scottish Government, including with the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care. 

This governmental engagement follows Movember’s research ‘The Real Face of Men’s Health’ which calls for men’s health strategies to be developed across the UK nations. It was noted the Scottish Government were actively seeking opportunities to improve men’s health within current policies and programmes, including through its work on suicide prevention and population health.

It was suggested that an intersectional approach is taken to suicide prevention work, and more work is undertaken around preventions. It was suggested that this should be considered in the recommendations in the Group’s next annual report.

During the presentation on the Gone Too Soon project, Prof. O’Connor highlighted the overarching risk factors that lead to early death associated with poor mental health, and the project’s priority actions to prevent this. Prof. O’Connor suggested that the key question to consider is what are the drivers that lead to the behaviours set out in the Integrated Motivational-Volitional Model of Suicidal Behaviour.

Prof. O’Connor undertook to share a further paper on Gone Too Soon with the Group. Action 6.1

Strategic Approach to Tackling Suicide Inequalities in Delivery of Creating Hope Together Action Plan

It was highlighted that the Group’s first annual report welcomed Creating Hope Together’s clear focus on addressing the inequalities that lead to suicide, and recommended that the inequalities work moves from engagement to ‘measurable action’ to reduce the risk of suicide for specific groups and communities most at risk of suicide.

A paper had been circulated to the Group setting out how the work to address inequalities was being developed and delivered, both by national and local government through the ‘whole of government’ work, and by Suicide Prevention Scotland as the delivery vehicle for the action plan. 

It was highlighted that there were three ‘categories’ of actions reflected in Annex A of the Creating Hope Together Action Plan, and that each category had a key role to play in delivering our inequalities approach. These were: actions that require deep policy collaboration; those that set out specific and clear activity; and those that are about mainstreaming suicide prevention activity into existing policies and programmes. 

The Group were asked to share their views and advice on where our current approach to tackling inequalities might be strengthened; what ‘measurable action’ might look like in current and future years’ work; and whether the prioritisation framework developed by Samaritans in relation to the whole of government policy work on suicide prevention should be adapted so that it can be used to direct future work and resources of Suicide Prevention Scotland, recognising that this may impact on prioritisation of actions in local contexts, and future allocation of resources.

During discussion, it was highlighted that Annex A was produced at a certain point in time and that other pieces of work had been picked up since it was published. The Policy Team undertook to give updates on what work had been done around the actions set out in Annex A. Action 6.2

The importance of data being better utilised and joined up to measure the impact of work was discussed.

Brendan Rooney suggested that setting up a focus group to look at future years’ work involving particular communities would be valuable in addressing the work on inequalities, from the perspective of people living in communities. The Group supported this suggestion, and Members undertook to discuss it further. The policy team would contact Mr Rooney and Members to take this forward. Action 6.3

It was highlighted that work was already underway under Outcome 3 of the suicide prevention strategy involving community led action research, and the policy team would update the Group as work progresses. Action 6.4

Deep Dive: Suicide Prevention and Severe and Multiple Disadvantage: understanding overlapping risks and taking action to reduce preventable deaths

Lorraine McGrath, Simon Community Scotland, and Gillian Ferguson, Glasgow Alcohol and Drugs Partnership, joined the meeting to share work undertaken by frontline services supporting people experiencing severe and multiple disadvantage (SMD), who are at high risk of suicide. It was noted that the indicators of SMD, such as homelessness and substance use, are significant social determinants of suicide and other preventable deaths.

There was a discussion on the Group’s views on the value of placing SMD at the heart of our work on suicide prevention. The Group were asked to consider the following questions:

• Do they endorse the deep policy collaboration on severe and multiple disadvantages as a key suicide prevention activity (recognising this will involve other national and local partners in due course)? 
• What would be the best way to focus & frame this work so that it gains traction and leads to measurable change for people affected by severe and multiple disadvantages?
• Is there any specific issues that need considered to ensure the work leads to a decrease in preventable deaths (including suicide)?
• In what ways can NSPAG members, and their organisations/ networks/ communities, help support this work?

Discussion points included:

• Homelessness in society is too easily accepted and more needs to be done to highlight the harm that it leads to.
• The system is not working for people in higher risk groups as they are not understood or presenting as they should. Prof Andrea Williamson undertook to share a recent blog on “missingness in healthcare” with the Group. Action 6.5
• Working with health boards and mental health networks to improve the support provided to people experiencing SMD could help our work to reduce preventable deaths including suicide (as well as drugs related deaths, and homelessness deaths).
• Policy work should not be undertaken in silos as this leads to disjointed service responses for people with severe and multiple disadvantages, and often don’t meet their needs. This contributes to high risk of preventable death and consideration needs to be given to how this is addressed.
• Addressing stigma should be a key focus.

The Group confirmed that it would support placing a greater emphasis on suicide prevention work with people experiencing SMD, and would like to be kept informed of emerging opportunities to do this. Action 6.6

Update on Delivery of Creating Hope Together Action Plan

It was reported that templates had been developed by the policy team for potential use by the Group. These would help track the NSPAG recommendations; progress across the action plan outcomes; and member activity and interests. The Secretariat undertook to ask Members to populate the template on their activities and interests, including any upcoming events, for the next meeting. Action 6.7

Haylis Smith highlighted that the Outnav system had been designed to help monitor and track progress across all the outcomes and would produce reports on this which could be shared with NSPAG rather than develop additional reporting templates. The group agreed this was a sensible approach to reporting and helped to focus on progress towards achieving the outcomes set out in Creating Hope Together.

Ms Smith also suggested it would be helpful to understand what the Group would expect good to look like in one, five, ten years / by end of strategy as this would help the Strategic Outcome Leads and Delivery Leads focus on key issues to address. 

Any Other Business

The secretariat would issue future meeting dates, and the Group were asked to provide suitable venues.

Shirley Windsor undertook to arrange for Members to receive Suicide Prevention Scotland’s newsletter which is shared via Public Health Scotland. Action 6.8

Prof. Christine Goodall thanked the Group for their contributions.