Mental Health Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 58A: 58A: After Clause 37 , insert the following new Clause— ““Places of safety (1) Section 135 of the 1983 Act (warrant to search for and remove patients) is amended as follows. (2) In subsection (3) for ““72 hours”” substitute ““24 hours””. (3) In subsection (6) for ““residential accommodation provided by a local social services authority”” substitute ““any other suitable place the occupier of which is willing temporarily to receive the patient””.”” The noble Earl said: I want very briefly to raise a couple of additional points about places of safety. Section 135 of the 1983 Act is concerned with the situation where a person with a mental illness is living somewhere where he is being ill-treated or is neglecting his own care. A power is given to the police to obtain a warrant to enter the premises and remove the person to a place of safety. As in Section 136, a period of 72 hours is specified as the maximum time in which a person can be so detained. For the reasons I gave earlier, I believe that this ought to be a much shorter period. I am suggesting 24 hours. However I also want to flag up what appear to be rather odd provisions in Section 135(6). A place of safety is defined here as, among others, "““residential accommodation provided by a local social services authority under Part III of the National Assistance Act 1948"." That description is one which is normally applied to care homes for the elderly. A care home is not the right environment for someone experiencing an acute psychotic episode. I therefore wonder whether it is time to look again at this provision. Similarly, I have doubts about the catch-all description at the end of subsection (6): "““any other suitable place the occupier of which is willing temporarily to receive the patient"." That also does not seem appropriate if we are trying to cater for someone with an acute health need. Those are purely probing points at this stage. I should be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about them. If he has nothing say now, I would of course be willing to accept a letter from him in due course. I beg to move.