As part of a wider project on mental health in OECD countries, a series of descriptive profiles have been prepared, intended to provide descriptive, easily comprehensible, highly informative accounts of the mental health systems of OECD countries. These profiles, entitled ‘Mental Health Analysis Profiles’ (MHAPs), will be able to inform discussion and reflection and provide an introduction to and a synthesised account of mental health in a given country. Each MHAP follows the same template, and whilst the MHAPs are stand-alone profiles, loose cross-country comparison using the MHAPs is possible and encouraged. The English mental health care system can be regarded as one of the clearest examples of a “community care” approach to mental illness, with relatively well established links and networks between mental health care providers and social care providers. Strong links between social support services, for example employment and housing services, and appropriate psychological and medical interventions, have been a priority. Recent developments in the system include the introduction of a programme of talking therapies, IAPT, rolled-out nation-wide, a commitment to introduce waiting times standards for mental health services, and early in 2014 a mental health action plan, Closing the gap: priorities for essential change, which sets out 25 areas for urgent action.