Policing and Crime Bill

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard - part one): House of Lords
Wednesday 2nd November 2016 Lords Chamber

I acknowledge that huge progress has been made, but I remember talking at a conference held in the West Midlands where in the previous year police cells had been used as places of safety 4,000 times. After proper consideration of the issue along with dialogue between all the relevant agencies, in the year that I was there the incidence had dropped down to six times. That is what can be done given the will and the commitment. If we put an emphasis on this programme, the final part of it can be achieved, but in the meantime I worry that without proper protocols the default position is to use, for example, A&E departments as places of safety. They are totally the wrong environment for people in crisis and not the right place to make a proper assessment of their needs. There is also no clear view about what the next steps should be for those vulnerable people when they leave the A&E department. So we must and can do better by using liaison and diversion and street triage, along with the progress that has been made on places of safety as the building blocks to ensure comprehensive coverage in the period ahead. I hope that the Government will consider my proposal and be positive in their response. If they want to consider it further, we can discuss this again on Report.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, as has been said, the Bill bans the use of police cells for those aged under 18 in a mental health crisis, and for those aged 18 and over it states that they may be held in a police station,

“only in circumstances specified in the regulations”,

made by the Secretary of State. As I understand it, in 2015-16, 43 children and some 2,100 adults in a mental health crisis and covered by Sections 135 and 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 ended up in police cells rather than at an appropriate health-based place of safety.

Amendment 190 in the group provides that no person of any age in this situation should be held at a police station as a place of safety, and that is an objective with which no doubt there is widespread agreement. The question that has to be asked, though, is what would happen if the provision in line with this amendment was introduced relatively soon and there were still insufficient non-police-cell appropriate places of safety available and police cells could no longer be used. What would happen to the vulnerable people concerned in those circumstances?

The Bill’s objective in relation to children not being kept in police cells is clearly considered to be achievable by the Government, no doubt because, as I understand it, we are talking about fewer than 50 children. However, the figure for adults appears to be some 50 times higher. Can the Government say how the figure of 2,100 adults in police cells in 2015-16, or whatever alternative figure they have, compares with the total number of adults in a mental health crisis who were placed in an appropriate health-based place of safety? I believe that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, mentioned the figure of some 28,000. Can the Government also say how quickly they estimate that the terms of Amendment 190 could be met through the provision of the necessary additional places of safety, what the costs would be, and within what timescale they currently intend to meet the objective of this amendment, since I assume that this is a Government objective too?

Why are there wide variations, as has been said, in the current extent of the use of police cells for people in a mental health crisis, and why do some areas appear not to need to use police cells at all in this situation, but others do? Is it due to poor management, the inadequate provision of suitable health-based places of safety, or a lack of suitably qualified staff? Can the Government also set out in what circumstances they expect to specify that an adult can be kept in a police station as a place of safety under the regulations that can be made by the Secretary of State under Clause 79(6) of the Bill? Finally, along with my noble friend Lord Bradley, I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to the proposal put forward by my noble friend in relation to a fresh and independent review.

[Lord Thurlow (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to support the amendments tabled in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Hamwee, and my noble friend Lady Howe. They mark important steps across the board to bring the treatment of mental ill-health in line with our 21st-century understanding of that arena. I have, perhaps regrettably, close personal experience of dealing with and attempting to cope with people suffering a mental health crisis. I bring to bear that experience as well as the advice offered by the Mental Health Alliance and specifically the charity Mind, both of which have been referred to, in my endorsement of these amendments.

The amendments regarding the use of police cells and homes as supposed places of safety—neither are appropriate, I agree—and concerning the period of detention in those places awaiting a mental health assessment are most important. I acknowledge the positive steps that this Bill in its original form recommended in both of these areas, but they do not go far enough. Perhaps I may reflect for a moment on who it is that these clauses are designed to protect. It is the vulnerable, the needy and those less able to help themselves. We have a special duty to those people in our society. These amendments are an important step of progress in improving their treatment at the hands of the police in times of crisis. That said, I am not criticising the police. I have seen at close quarters the awkward circumstances of the police having to enforce the rules. I admire the sensitivity and empathy I have seen displayed.

When a person is in a mental health crisis there is a very high risk of private anxiety, emotions of distress, confusion, aggression and perhaps threatening behaviour. What is required is probably support and compassion. Confinement in a cell is bound to add to this distress. Surroundings matter.

As we have heard, the Government have begun to dedicate funds to mental health services, improving the provision of suitable places of safety and achieving parity of esteem between mental and physical health. These are important steps and this work must continue. We must step up to this challenge on the behalf of those affected. This disadvantaged group, unlike most in our society, seldom makes its own case for better care. The reality is, of course, that they cannot—they are confused and they are not organised—but we can. They rely on us, and on the charities and other groups that work with them.

We must be sure to try our best to legislate so that the trend continues and relevant investment goes toward providing for those in need. The amendments tabled by the noble Baroness would do exactly that. This is legislation that will help bring the Mental Health Act 1983 into the 21st century. If we think for a minute, that Act was enacted more than 30 years ago. The quantum leaps of progress in medical understanding of mental health issues have been huge. Yet, the Act on the statute book is more than 30 years old. We must take every opportunity we can to improve the terms of the Act wherever we can.

I thank the noble Baronesses for their work in tabling the amendments and request that the Minister accepts them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Dear]

My Lords, I echo the words that we have just heard. I have considerable sympathy with the emotions and reasoning behind the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. I make no comment about staffing in psychiatric wards—I have no knowledge of that—but as I speak against this amendment, we should remember that the Taser was introduced as an intermediate stage. It is intermediate between the use of batons, pepper sprays, CS gas and so on the one hand and firearms on the other. A Taser is not a firearm. It is something akin to it—it looks rather like one—but it is not a firearm within the definition of the Act. It does a different thing altogether. There is a violent interaction; of that, there can be no doubt. It brings immediate incapacity and some discomfort when it is fired but, as is sometimes said, in fact it knocks down the individual completely. That has to be the object of the exercise.

Perhaps I can give the Committee a circumstance which has already been alluded to. On a psychiatric ward a patient, for whatever reason, has become exceedingly violent and probably caused serious injury. They may even have caused death. The police are called; what are they going to do? If this amendment is passed into law, the police cannot use a Taser. They will use either the original, which is the pepper spray and so on, or a firearm. We need to remember that the use of a firearm in those extreme circumstances is justified in law, because there is a threat to life. By taking the Taser out we will in effect open the door, in extremis, to somebody being shot with a real lethal barrelled weapon.

I am all for looking at practice directions and reviewing the use of Tasers. Mission creep has been mentioned and perhaps there is mission creep—I do not know that and have not looked at the figures. However, to have something as extreme and prescriptive as this amendment within statute will certainly expose patients in psychiatric wards to the risk of death rather than anything else. In speaking against this, I am all for looking closely at the use of Tasers and for counselling officers using or thinking of using them to exercise extreme caution, but I would not go so far as the amendment stands.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, my name is attached to Amendment 194 and to a further amendment in this group, Amendment 201SB. As far as Amendment 194 is concerned, as has been said, it provides that a police officer may not use a Taser or electroshock weapon during deployment on a psychiatric ward. The purpose of adding my name to this amendment is to raise concerns that have been expressed to us about what is, in effect, a police response to what one might have thought was a clinical emergency but which has the potential effect of appearing to criminalise highly vulnerable people. I accept, though, that there could be very exceptional circumstances where a police officer might have to use a Taser during deployment on a psychiatric ward.

In response to this debate, perhaps the Government could provide figures on the extent of the use of Tasers or other devices by the police on psychiatric wards over the last 12-month period for which figures are available, and on the varying extent to which the trusts concerned called in the police and why there are such variations. The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, clearly has similar information to that which I have been given. I have been told that there are trusts which call in the police literally hundreds of times a year. It would be helpful if the Government could say in response whether they accept that that is true and why they think it happens. If the police are called in on frequent occasions, is the heart of the problem that results in them being called in in that way either inadequate numbers of staff on duty to cope with situations that arise, or is it due in any way to inadequate or insufficient training of staff?

The second amendment which I have in this group calls for a review of Tasers, including in places of custody, and the extent to which there is or is not a disproportionate use of Tasers against black and minority ethnic groups. Once again, this concern has been raised with us—hence the amendment—and it was highlighted following an incident which led to the death of a former well-known footballer. I simply ask: what procedures exist to ensure that there is transparency and scrutiny over the use of Tasers? What information is kept of the details of those against whom Tasers are deployed, including age, gender and ethnicity? What requirement is there for the use of Tasers to be reported immediately and to whom?

Like the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, I have just seen the letter sent yesterday to Charles Walker MP from the Minister of State for Policing and the Fire Service on the use of Tasers in mental health settings. No doubt in her response the Minister will seek to place on record in Hansard the thrust of the terms of that letter and the circular that has been sent to police and crime commissioners, chief constables and the chairs of local mental health crisis care concordat partnerships in England. Nevertheless, I hope that the Government will seek to respond to my questions insofar as they can, bearing in mind that the circular states that at present there are no reliable data on the frequency or scale of any Taser use in mental health settings.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I find myself in total agreement with the words expressed by the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, and the noble Lord, Lord Dear. When I first saw this amendment I could see what it was trying to achieve: a laudable objective, based on the fact that many mental health units are incapable of dealing effectively with some of the patients they have on their wards, and that the police are called to deal with incidents in an unacceptable number of instances. Quite frankly, I suspect that whatever is going on in some of those mental health settings, they are not finding all the appropriate ways of dealing with and de-escalating violence which one would expect their specialist training to deliver. The number of times that the police are called is of concern.

However, when I saw the amendment I thought it was a silly—fatuous was the word that first came to mind—response to what was proposed. The point is that if there is a very serious incident and a major crime of violence is being committed, the police have to be called. It is then a question of what the most appropriate response is. A few months ago, a mental health nurse was murdered by a patient in a Croydon mental health unit. Is the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, suggesting that it would have been inappropriate in the circumstances in which the police were called to that unit not to have found ways of restraining the patient concerned, given that it was necessary to deal with them? Then there was a mental health nursing assistant who was murdered by a patient in Gloucester in 2014, because the patient had returned from authorised leave with a 10-inch kitchen knife. These are serious incidents that require an appropriate and proportional response. What does the noble Baroness think should have been done in those incidents? The situation was that they had got out of hand in both instances and individuals died, presumably as a consequence of the mental health unit not being able to manage the incident. The effect of Amendment 194 would be that had there been a police officer equipped with a Taser in the immediate vicinity, he could not have discharged it. The noble Baroness may think that something other than a Taser should be used.

The argument about where Tasers sit in the spectrum of potential uses of force by the police is one which will no doubt continue. But although there have been instances where someone has died perhaps as a consequence of repeated Taser use, it is also the case that people have died because of the use of other forms of force. Hitting somebody across the side of the head with a baton is also potentially likely to cause death. Indeed, it may be better for the patient or individual concerned to be tasered.

The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, talked grandly about the UN saying that these were weapons of torture. The UN definition of the term “torture” is:

“any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official”.

I fail to see how that UN definition of torture could be applied to the circumstances we are talking about of an emergency in a mental health ward where the police have been called. I understand that the use of the word “torture” related to the particular way in which Tasers—I think we are supposed to call them conductive electric devices or something equally opaque—were issued in a particular unit of the Portuguese police force. I have no idea under what circumstances that particular unit of the Portuguese police force was planning to use Tasers, but I assume that the use of the word by the UN was very specific, bearing in mind its definition of torture.

If we pass this amendment, the only alternative when the police have been called because of a major incident—an assault, somebody at the risk of losing their life or somebody already having lost their life and a danger to others—when a Taser cannot be used would be the use of a real firearm, which would be likely to kill the individual concerned, or a baton, which can be just as damaging, particularly in restricted and difficult circumstances. I do not think that makes any sense at all.