Tips to create change in Scotland

How to work through your MSP to advocate for better eating disorder care in Scotland

You don't need to wait for others to drive change.

You don't need to wait for thousands of people to sign a petition.

Ultimately a government minister has to understand what's needed and to care enough to make it happen. Right now, with the current government, there seems to be a genuine desire to review and improve services. See the main work here. It's going to give Scotland a good set of standards, and my guess is there will be a need to campaign to make them all happen.

If you're not sure how to work through your MSP or a minister, you're on the right page.

If you want to know more about what's going on and what needs improving, I write about this here. But it's also really useful to 'just' tell an MSP about your experience of using services, asking them to table a parliamentary question about how the government plans to prevent this sort of thing happening again.

Tell a minister the changes you want to see

Each of us can write directly to a minister. Most likely the minister for mental  wellbeing, or one level up from them, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care. Writing to a minister may be effective. The downside is there is no guarantee that they will personally read your letter. The reply you get may be written by one of their officials.

Tell an MSP the changes you want to see

But don't despair – through any one of our MSPs (we each have eight of them) we can get a response from the minister and have confidence they have personally attended to the matter.

How is this done? The easiest way is to email one or more of your MSPs with a request. (Or write a letter or meet them.) If an MSP agrees that your issue matters, they will 'put down a parliamentary question' to the relevant minister. This minister then has to answer publicly within 10 working days. The answer may not satisfy you. It may be vague and devoid of action. (This happened a lot with a previous minister, but things may be a lot better now). So you keep the process moving by asking your MSP to put down another question, and on and on.

The format of your letter can be:

• I'm writing to you about eating disorders because … (include your personal experience if relevant)
• I'm requesting …. (accompany this with any facts you have about the problem or the proposed solution)
• "Please would you table ['table' or 'put down'] a parliamentary question, asking the Scottish Government [or the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport, or the Minister for Mental Health ] to do xxx / when they will xxx / how they plan to xxx / what considerations they have made of xxx
• Thank you, and I'm looking forward to your reply once you've received a response from the relevant minister.

Tips: what you can ask your MSP in order to improve eating disorder services

To help you phrase a request for your MSP so that they put down a parliamentary question, you can use my list below for inspiration.  (My emphasis is on child and adolescent services because that's what I know most about.)

But your own personal experience is extremely valuable. Government can't ignore anecdotes that show where the system is just not good enough.

My understanding is that it's better to make just one or two requests at a time. You can ask all your MSPs the same thing, or spread out loads of requests between all of them. Don't worry about perfect wording, as the MSP will know how to word it to turn it into a parliamentary question.

Petitions

Another route to getting change is through petitions. BEAT is the obvious body that creates petitions, but any of us can create a petition to the Scottish government.

Groups working on change in Scotland

BEAT is active in Scotland. Sign up to their newsletter.

Read their excellent Campaigners Toolkit. They explain what routes to follow to get change in Scotland. They offer great guidance on writing or talking to your MSPs. Although I offer you tips of my own here I do recommend you check out this toolkit as well.

Regarding under-18s, the Scottish CAMHS eating disorders steering group had parent representatives to help the clinicians keep priorities in mind. I was on it for a few years, then handed the baton on. It's gone very quiet and I'm not sure if it still operates.

Onwards:

* Back to the main Scotland page*