My Lords, I had not intended to speak on these amendments, but they present something of a dichotomy in one of the areas in the Bill, particularly Amendment 92ZFC from the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, on the powers of access. Last year I was invited by the manager of the local Bradford safeguarding social work team, a Mr Robert Strachan, who had already thought about this issue and had had extensive consultation with some of his colleagues, social work professionals and strategic managers in Bradford. He told me that opinions varied. At that time, no one had had a problem pulling together a protection plan for a vulnerable adult within the existing legislation, although people felt, when they were pushed to the limit, that such a power could be quite useful. I was gently persuaded by that.
However, when talking to Mind, the mental health charity, which has recently done an extensive consultation with its network, I found that it believes that this power is disproportionate and unnecessary. Its members have been clear that they would consider it intrusive and contrary to the European Convention on Human Rights, and that this would undermine the trust between social workers and service users. Mind has sought the views of its network of people with experience of mental health problems, and was clearly told that there is a mistaken but prevalent belief that people with mental health problems do not have the capacity to make decisions about their own safety. Because of that, many have had negative experiences of intervention, compulsion and detention, all of which reduce choice and control and can undermine trust in statutory authorities. Mind argues that introducing powers of access for social workers is likely to further undermine trust in statutory authorities and lead to extremely difficult working relationships between social workers and service providers. I am of course sympathetic to these views. However, I am also extremely sympathetic to the views expressed in the arguments from the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, so I am a little torn.
The only way in which I can look at this is by case example. Let us assume that an elderly lady is being cared for by her son, who has some behavioural problems, like the case that we recently had in Bradford where the grandson actually killed his grandmother. Neighbours report their concerns to social services, who dutifully go around and visit. However, they never get further than clacking the front door; the son tells them that everything is fine and he is looking after his mother. Further reports of shouting and banging reach the
authorities via the neighbours, but still they are refused permission to enter and see the older lady. What do you do? The police have no powers of entry but clearly there are some major concerns. How, therefore, to proceed and establish even that the lady is dead or alive? Powers of entry, in such extreme circumstances, would allow professionals to access the house and see the person, as in cases involving domestic violence or children. I would therefore be broadly inclined to support the powers, which would add something that is not currently in place.
However, the trick would be in the execution of those powers. For example, it would not be sufficient merely to gain entry. What would you do next—convey the lady to a place of safety or take the son away? If you did not, you would be exposing the victim to further and sustained abuse. This would need thinking through carefully. The question of how the powers would be controlled and executed would be difficult but not insurmountable. I look forward to the Minister’s arguments to persuade me either way on this one.