Mental Health, Learning Disability and Autism Overview Statistics, Quarter 1 2026-27

This page provides information and context around funding and workforce for Mental Health, Learning Disability and Autism services.

The Mental Health Investment Standard (MHIS) was introduced in 2015/16, requiring all local healthcare commissioners (now Integrated Care Boards or ICBs) to maintain or increase the proportion of spending on mental health services in line with their spending on all other health services.  Since its introduction, the NHS in England nationally has met its commitment to achieve the MHIS.  

Note that the MHIS does not include all spend that takes place in the sector, for example, it excludes capital funding, specialised commissioning, learning disabilities, autism and dementia services. 

Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) are required to submit data on their planned spend for the financial year as part of the annual NHS operational planning process – this is included in the publications for Quarters 1, 2 and 3.  Data on actual spend will be reported in the Quarter 4 publication.   

The dashboard includes national level data on a range of spending categories, some of which are available to view over time (e.g. time series data), and/or some of the spending categories are also available at regional and ICB level. 

Open the interactive dashboard 

A high-level summary of the latest data available is as follows: 

• Total planned spend across mental health services in 2026/27 is £21.376 billion (specialised commissioning and ICB combined, including learning disability, neurodevelopmental conditions and dementia).   

• This compares with £21.193 billion actual spend the previous year (2025/26), an increase of 1% (or £0.18 billion). 

• This continues the annual increase in spend achieved each year from £12.513 billion in 2018/19. 

• Planned spend on the MHIS in 2026/27 is £13.999 billion – if achieved this means that the MHIS will be met this year.    

  • On a like-for-like-basis, this compares with £13.739 billion actual spend on the MHIS last year (2025/26), an increase of 1.89% (or £0.260 billion).   

  • All 42 ICBs are planning to meet the MHIS in 2026/27. In the latest fully reported financial year, 2025/26, all 42 ICBs met the MHIS. 

• Planned spend on learning disability, neurodevelopmental conditions and dementia in 2026/27 is £4.694 billion.  This compares with £4.799 billion actual spend last year (2025/26), a decrease of 2.2%, although planned spend this year is higher than in 2025/26 (£4.33 billion).   

• ICBs are planning to spend 14.3% of their base funding allocation on mental health services in 2026/27.  On a like-for-like-basis, this compares with an actual spend of 14.6% of their base funding allocation last year (2025/26). 

Data on actual spend in 2026/27 will be available in the Quarter 4 2026/27 publication.