The Welsh Government has published its draft budget, the first in many years to provide revenue and capital increases to every department, backed by an extra £1.5 billion of investment.

Health and social care budgets see the biggest increase - of more than £600 million on last year. The big focus of this budget will be cutting NHS waiting times as well as improving mental health services and strengthening women’s health services. As a result of these increases, the protected amount for mental health funding will stay at more than £820 million for the year.

Further significant increases which will impact our members in Wales were to the education budget, which receives over £100 million more than last year, and the local government settlement, which will increase by 4.3%.

The draft budget will need to be approved through a vote in the Senedd in March 2025 after further scrutiny from the other parties.

Hope for counsellors and psychotherapists

Speaking after the draft budget announcement, our Four Nations Lead Steve Mulligan said:

"This budget will hopefully provide some hope to many counsellors and psychotherapists working in statutory and third sector services who've faced a challenging few years of cuts and uncertainty, with a welcomed focus on improving and enhancing mental health services for the people of Wales.

"We're very pleased to see this much-needed focus and investment to help tackle growing mental health waiting lists. We urge the Welsh Government and Health Boards to better utilise the expertise and capacity of our members across health, community and education settings to provide an expanded offer of support which addresses increased demand.

"We'll continue to engage with the Welsh Government and all parties to ensure that any plans to further expand and improve mental health services fully takes account of the expertise of the counselling professions."