Veterans mental health and wellbeing pathway: impact assessment

Background

Who will the policy affect?

Serving in the military is a unique experience, and although many veterans cope well, some may experience mental health issues that require a bespoke approach to treatment. This is in line with the Armed Forces Covenant, ensuring that the Armed Forces Community face no disadvantage when accessing services following military service.

Working with veterans, the third sector and statutory services, work is ongoing to develop the Veterans Mental Health & Wellbeing Pathway across Scotland which recognises the distinct circumstances around military life and the particular mental health needs of veterans. The core aim of the pathway being to ensure that all veterans living in Scotland are able to access timely, appropriate and person centred mental health and wellbeing support.

Current service provision

The Scottish Government and five local health boards continue to jointly fund the Veterans First Point Network (V1P) which offers a “one stop shop” for mental health and wellbeing support for veterans. The Scottish Government have provided over £5 million to support the network of Veterans First Point Services since 2017. Veterans First Point currently has locations in Ayrshire & Arran, the Scottish Borders, Fife, Lanarkshire, and Tayside. This is funded to the end of March 2027.

NHS Lothian withdrew from providing a V1P service in 2024/2025 following an internal financial review of mental health services. In financial year 2025/2026, the Scottish Government allocated £176,325 to support NHS Lothian’s redevelopment of its veterans’ mental health service, following the closure of the V1P service. The NHS Lothian Veterans Mental Health Service provides specialist mental health support for veterans, including assessment, treatment, peer support and wellbeing groups, while working with NHS and community partners to ensure timely, coordinated care and access to wider recovery services.

As well as the funding provided to V1P, Scottish Government currently provides funding to Combat Stress to provide mental health support for veterans in areas not supported by V1P or in Lothian. In line with their charitable objectives, Combat Stress provide support to veterans in all areas of Scotland with a particular focus on Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

We are aware that current service provision varies across Scotland depending on geographical location. The pathway will be designed to ensure that all veterans receive the appropriate support regardless of where they live in Scotland

Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing Pathway model

The Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing Pathway is designed to offer equity of access to timely and appropriate mental health and wellbeing services for veterans living in Scotland. The Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing National Framework (published March 2026) sets out the vision, values, and principles of high‑quality veterans’ mental health support, while the pathway will operationalise these principles by coordinating statutory and third-sector services to ensure veterans receive care that is consistent with the Framework.

The pathway is devised around a hub-and-spoke model, which is intended to blend national consistency while still enabling health boards flexibility on how services are provided to meet the needs of their population. A national digital hub is expected to act as the main entry point through a digital front door which will provide an online referral form, access to self-help resources, and some veteran-specific wellbeing and clinical guidance.

For those with mild to moderate mental health and wellbeing needs, it is anticipated that two regional spokes (most likely East and West which is aligned to the two new subnational NHS structures and proposed new 2 Board structure) will facilitate local, coordinated support, tailored to individual needs and preferences. They will also provide access to peer support from people with lived military experience.

For veterans with the most complex needs, local statutory services will provide care through routine core provision, but with the support of veteran specific supervision and training though specialist staff hosted in the regional spokes.