A new position has been created between the region's mental health trust and Suffolk County Council, with the aim of bring social care and mental health work closer together.

The post of Operations Director Mental Health and Learning Disabilities is reportedly the first of its kind to jointly lead the mental health and learning disabilities services across the county on behalf of Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) and Suffolk County Council.

It is hoped the new role - which will be taken up by Pete Devlin on July 1 - will focus on making sure service users and patients receive seamless services, regardless of who is providing them.

Mr Devlin will lead the transformation of health and social care services for people with mental health and learning disabilities, while being operationally responsible for overseeing the running of all of NSFT's community and inpatient services across the county - with the exception of the Waveney area, Suffolk Wellbeing and secure services.

He will also lead and manage all of the county council's services for mental health and learning disabilities, together with the commissioning budget for these services.

A joint statement from NSFT Chief Executive Michael Scott, and Suffolk County Council's Director of Children's Services, said: 'Pete will build on and strengthen the existing partnership between our two organisations, which sees social workers from the council operate as part of integrated mental health teams.

'This opportunity comes as a result of a lot of hard work within both organisations, and we firmly believe it will help us to provide, better, more joined-up services for the people we serve.

'Over time, we hope that we can integrate mental health and social care even more closely so that we can further improve the quality of our services while making them easier for people to navigate.'