Mental Health Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 43: 43: Schedule 3 , page 58, line 31, at end insert— ““In section 121 of the 1983 Act (Mental Health Act Commission), after subsection (4) insert— ““(4A) The Secretary of State shall, after consultation with the Commission and with such other bodies as appear to him to be concerned, direct the Commission to keep under review the care and treatment, or any other aspect of treatment, of all patients in hospitals, independent hospitals and in such other settings as he may decide who are subject to sections 4A and 4B of the Mental Capacity Act 2005. (4B) Where the Commission has good cause to suspect that a patient who is neither liable to be detained under this Act, nor subject to safeguards under sections 4A and 4B of the Mental Capacity Act 2005, is being deprived of his liberty as a consequence of admission to a hospital or an independent hospital, it may— (a) keep under review the care and treatment, or any other aspect of treatment, of that patient; and (b) raise any concerns with the appropriate authority.”””” The noble Lord said: I shall speak also to Amendment No. 44. Section 120 of the Mental Health Act 1983 empowers the Mental Health Act Commission to, "““keep under review the exercise of the powers and the discharge of the duties conferred or imposed by this Act so far as relating to the detention of patients or to patients liable to be detained under this Act””." The commission’s powers of visiting, interviewing patients in private and demanding access to documentation stem from this overarching remit. I should note for the benefit of noble Lords unfamiliar with the detail of this legislation that ““liable to be detained”” refers here essentially to patients who remain subject to the detention powers of the Act but who have been given leave of absence from the detaining hospital. Therefore, the commission’s monitoring remit and visiting powers are at present limited to patients who are subject to the detention powers under the 1983 Act. From the very start of the commission’s existence, the situation has thrown up uncomfortable problems for its visiting commissioners. In the course of undertaking their statutory duties in visiting hospitals to interview detained patients, Mental Health Act commissioners will frequently become aware of matters of concern relating to informal patients. Although aware that the Mental Health Act Commission remit does not extend to informal patients, commissioners are understandably loath to ignore unlawful, negligent or abusive practices that are apparent to them. Therefore, the practical problem for the MHAC and its commissioners is how legitimately and effectively to raise concerns about vulnerable patients who may be denied legal rights or protections, or are subject to abuse or neglect. The most frequently encountered cause of concern is that of unlawful deprivation of liberty of informal patients, sometimes called de facto detention. I will outline two of many examples that I could give to illustrate the sort of situations that commissioners encounter. First, on a visit to an independent hospital that predominantly cared for learning disability patients, a Mental Health Act commissioner found that many staff did not know which patients under their care were detained under the Act and which were informal. The commissioner met with and interviewed two patients at the unit who were not detained before she realised their legal status. Some 37 patients, of whom 21 were legally detained, resided at the hospital in locked apartments, either as sole occupants or in groups of up to six patients. Patients left these apartments, in some cases even to go to the smoking room, only under staff escort. It was apparent that the majority of staff were inexperienced and had received little training in the legal aspects of their role. The clinician in chargeof the patients’ treatment made it known to commissioners that he viewed detention under the Act as unnecessary and stigmatising for his patients. Yet those informal patients whom the commissioner had interviewed by mistake showed an alarming lack of understanding of their rights. One patient’s compliance with medication and general care was questionable, but he had little understanding of his rights regarding consent to treatment. Another patient, whose Section 3 detention had recently been rescinded after more than a decade of uninterrupted detention under the Act, said that she was ““excited”” that the section had been removed, yet the commissioner gained no sense that she appreciated how her rights might have been different, or that she was treated now any differently by the staff. My second example involves a commissionerwho walked past a locked area containing a single informal patient who was isolated from patients and staff, despite a risk assessment recommending that he receive two-to-one nursing care. The area in which he spent his time was without furniture or apparent means of stimulation or activity. He appeared to have been given a makeshift rattle for diversion. The commissioner noted that inside the room there was an open drain and neither a toilet seat nor soap, towels or even a door to the toilet area. The toilet and bedroom area were cold and smelt of urine and faeces despite, according to the ward manager, regular cleaning. The service manager reported that he was unaware of the situation until we brought it to his attention. This example is just over one year old. Those are just a couple of situations with which, according the commission’s remit, it has no business to be concerned. In such cases, commissioners may choose to raise their concerns directly with the clinicians or hospital management, who are responsible, although commissioners may not do so officially under Mental Health Act Commission powers. On a very basic level, it may be difficult for a Mental Health Act commissioner to ascertain the facts behind the situation that appears to be of concern. Many hospital managers welcome any comments or observations about their services and may be co-operative in clarifying the situation of patients when asked. However, a recent addition to the Mental Health Act Manual, a reference book to which every Mental Health Act practitioner regularly refers, states: "““Ward managers should be advised not to engage in discussions with commissioners about the circumstances of patients who are not detained under the formal powers of the Act””." So we have to walk past people such as those I mentioned in the examples. The Mental Health Act Commission has a concordat agreement with the Healthcare Commission to share relevant concerns and information, and the latter is empowered to visit and investigate. However, not only does that cause delay and duplication of effort; the Healthcare Commission staff are not as expert as commissioners on the workings of the Act. Furthermore, while the Healthcare Commission may choose to follow up on the limited information that a visiting Mental Health Act commissioner might be able to pass on to it, the Healthcare Commission is not primarily a visiting body in the sense that the commission is. The law currently prevents the Mental Health Act Commission, as a visitorial body, dealing on the spot with issues of basic human rights such as those that I outlined in my examples. Indeed, with a quite dreadful irony, the law at present appears to require Mental Health Act commissioners to walk past those patients who may be incarcerated unlawfully in dirty, cell-like rooms on the grounds that formal powers under the 1983 Act have not been applied to deprive that patient of his or her liberty in a lawful manner. I shall provide the Committee with a further example of this dreadful irony from the Healthcare Commission’s investigation into Merton and Sutton learning disability services, published today, which noble Lords may have seen reported on the front page of the Guardian. One of many examples provided states that, "““one man who had no speech, sight or hearing was tied to his wheelchair or bed for up to 16 hours a day””." The 2003 Mental Health Act Commission biennial report stated that learning disability patients, among others, might be most likely to be subjected to this kind of mechanical restraint. But the commission also pointed out that many of these patients are not formally detained and therefore are not subject to oversight from its visiting commissioners. The safeguard of the Mental Health Act Commission is therefore extended to those who are lawfully detained but not to those who are unlawfully detained. My amendment seeks to change that sorry state of affairs. My amendment is simple in its effect. First, it would extend the Mental Health Act Commission’s remit to cover patients whose hospital treatment is subject to the new legal safeguards proposed under the Mental Capacity Act by the Bill. This would mean that the commission’s visits to hospitals would be able to keep under review the exercise of powers and duties in relation to all patients who are formally deprived of their liberty, whether it is under the Mental Health Act or the new Bournewood provisions of the Mental Capacity Act. Secondly, it would allow that when the commission has good cause to suspect that a patient is being deprived of his or her liberty unlawfully—that is, without the use of either the Mental Health Act or Mental Capacity Act powers—it may also keep that patient’s care and treatment under review and raise its concerns with the appropriate authority, whether that is the hospital managers, the Healthcare Commission or any other body. For the purposes of keeping under review the care and treatment of all these patients, the amendment will specifically enable the commission to visit and interview patients in private and to inspect documentation. I should emphasise that the amendment does not propose that the Mental Health Act Commission’s visiting activity be widened to include care homes, although there would be scope for such widening of the remit within the discretionary powers given to the Secretary of State. The intention behind this amendment is, rather, that the commission would be able to concern itself with de facto detained patients and Bournewood patients encountered in the NHS and independent-sector hospitals that it currently visits. Finally, the Minister will no doubt know from his brief that the particular extensions to the Mental Health Act Commission’s remit called for herecould be achieved within the discretionary powers already provided to the Secretary of State within Section 121(4) of the 1983 Act as it stands. It is now over 20 years since the Mental Health Act Commission first requested that the Secretary of State exercise those existing powers. Over the past two years the Mental Health Act Commission has been in detailed discussions with the Department of Health, which has been broadly supportive, subject to legal advice, of widening the remit of the commission to include de facto detained patients. Unfortunately, this has not resulted in any change, as they have been unable to find the time to deal with the matter because of other pressing business. I understand that the Department of Health has been rather busy considering various changes to the 1983 Act over that time and that the Minister would want to consider my amendment in the light of other changes being made to the overall legal framework. My amendment may therefore serve as a model of one way to go about this. If the Minister prefers a different approach, the passage of the Bill is a good opportunity for that to be debated in Parliament and, if necessary, tested according to the will of this House and another place. I beg to move.