Queen’s Speech

Lord Etherton Excerpts

Wednesday 12th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Etherton (CB)]

My Lords, I congratulate the two maiden speakers and offer my good wishes to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth.

I will focus on the proposals for mental health reform in the Queen’s Speech. No details were provided, but it seems clear that any proposals will be based on the White Paper that was published in January of this year. As a former chair of Broadmoor high-security hospital, a former chair of the West London NHS Trust, which incorporates high, medium and low-security facilities and also provides local services, and a former chair of what was then the mental health review tribunal, I agree with many others that there was much to be welcomed in the Government’s reform of the Mental Health Act 1983, set out in their White Paper.

The White Paper was followed by a consultation, which ended last month. No details have yet been published of the views of consultees on that White Paper, or of the Government’s response. Would the Minister please confirm whether, and if so when, the results of the consultation and the Government’s response will be published? It will not be possible to examine properly any proposed new legislation without knowledge of those matters.

It is noteworthy that some important matters in the White Paper were said to be more appropriately contained in a revised Mental Health Act code of practice rather than in legislation. It is important that the House has the opportunity to consider revisions to the code at the same time as considering proposed revisions to the Act. This would enable the House to be satisfied that the appropriate vehicle is used for any revisions to law and practice and that nothing slips between new legislation, on the one hand, and the revised code on the other hand. Can the Minister confirm when the revised code of practice will be made available and how it is proposed to co-ordinate revisions to the code and consideration of the new legislation?

This is important because, to take one example, the White Paper does not address at all issues relating specifically to high-security facilities. The chief executive of the West London NHS Trust and clinicians there say, for example, that the proposed increased frequency of automatic referral to tribunals—which is a government proposal—may have a deleterious and traumatic impact on the well-being of Part III secure patients. This point was also made a week ago by some patients in a meeting with Rethink, the mental health campaigning organisation. Another feature of ongoing significance for patients who have come through the criminal justice system is the perennial difficulty and delay in obtaining places in prison to which they can be returned on completion of in-patient treatment.

There are other matters relating to children and young people that are said to be better placed in the code of practice rather than in legislation, illustrating the importance of the code and why any revisions to it must be read alongside proposed legislation. Will the Minister give the assurance that that will be possible?