Rethink Mental Illness: £250 million for bin collections cannot be justified while services for the most vulnerable are cut

Friday, 30 September 2011 4:23 PM

Paul Jenkins, CEO of the charity Rethink Mental Illness commented on Eric Pickles' weekly bin collection plans as follows: 

"While regular bin collections are clearly very important to many people, it seems extraordinary that this is happening at a time when people with mental health problems have lost £50 million worth of vital support from local government in the last 18 months. They are some of the most vulnerable people in our society, the very same people the coalition Government promised to protect.

“For people who have recently lost services they relied on due to cost-cutting, the news that the Government has suddenly found a spare £250 million for bin collections will be a bitter pill to swallow.

“Mental health services have already been cut by nearly £50 million in the last 18 months. The priority must surely be protecting people. It may not have the same potential for headlines, but is undoubtedly more important."



-ENDS-

For more information, please contact Rachel Whitehead, Senior Media Relations Officer for Rethink Mental Illness on 2027 840 3138

Notes to Editors
Rethink Mental Illness, the leading national mental health membership charity, works to help everyone affected by severe mental illness recover a better quality of life.
Rethink Mental Illness helps more than 52,000 people each year through its services and support groups and by providing information on mental illness.
Our website www.rethink.org receives more than 500,000 visitors every year.

For information on our email policy, including confidentiality and viruses, visit http://www.rethink.org/emailpolicy

Tags:
• bin collections
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• cuts
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• eric pickles
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• mental health