More funding is needed to provide community care for people with mental illnesses, a senior judge has today warned.

The warning came after it was revealed yesterday that 17 young people had spent an additional six years at Muckamore Abbey Hospital in County Antrim because the money was not available to provide them with community care.

Mr Justice Gillen said that more money was needed for an early warning system, ensuring cases of children with learning disabilities or mental health problems were treated properly.

He said: "Funding is obviously a fundamental element in this concept, together with the need to ensure that there is a monitoring system for early intervention methods to ensure that those cases which ought to reach the courts do so.

"The intervention of court welfare officers may be too late to provide this gate-keeping process and family mediation at an earlier stage in the proceedings is one of the keynotes now being discussed, with experiences from both Canada and Australia providing food for thought."

Patricia Lewsley, the Commissioner for Children and Young People, has expressed her grave concern at reports that there are children and young people being inappropriately kept in Muckamore Abbey Hospital.

She said: “I was shocked to hear that these very vulnerable children and young people have been denied the services they need and I have asked the Trust today to confirm the numbers of children and young people involved.”

NICCY will also be meeting consultant medical staff to hear their views and to meet the children and young people concerned.

Ms Lewsley continued: “My office has consistently raised with government the need for adequate resources for the Mental Health and Learning Disability Services as highlighted in the Bamford Review. I will now be asking the Minister, Mr Paul Goggins, why these children and young people have remained in hospital despite this being directly contrary to government policy”

The government has today said that it has set aside £1 million, which will be given over the next two years to improve the current situation.

(EF/SP)