Ian Brady

Lord Thomas of Gresford Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord McNally]

In this particular case, the entire process took almost three years and culminated in an eight-day tribunal hearing. This is a legal process and the trust had no option other than to comply; neither did the Legal Aid Agency.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)]

My Lords, I was present at the trial of Brady at Chester Assizes in 1966, where he was represented by my noble friend the late Lord Hooson. He did not plead insanity at his trial. Indeed, he served some 19 years in an ordinary prison. It was a decision of the prison authorities to send him to Ashworth hospital, where he tried to commit suicide by starving himself to death. He was force-fed, and the purpose of his application to be transferred back to an ordinary prison was so that he could starve himself to death without being force-fed. Since the cost in Ashworth was well over £250,000 a year, was not the money well spent even if the decision went the other way?

[Lord McNally]

My Lords, it is very difficult to find much sympathy for Mr Brady, although it has to be said that he has been judged to be medically ill. Our law says that in those cases the mental health review tribunal is part of the process of our legal system and that a patient is entitled to a tribunal hearing, as set out in Part V of the Mental Health Act 1983. We cannot have one law for those we find worthy and another law for those we do not like. In some ways, it is the fact that Mr Brady has the protection of the law that should give reassurance to the rest of us.