Mental Health Bill [Lords]

Debate between Anna Dixon and Jen Craft

Report stage
Tuesday 14th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jen Craft (Thurrock) (Lab)]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker—I will be as brief as possible. I will speak to new clause 37, which stands in my name and which seeks to support the Government in ending the scandal of the inappropriate detention of people with a learning disability and/or autism. I declare an interest as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on learning disability.

Currently, a learning disability or autism, in and of itself, can be grounds for detention under the Mental Health Act. As we all know, this is an absolute scandal—something from a previous age that should be a source of moral shame to everyone in our community. The Bill seeks to address this by removing autism or a learning disability, in and of themselves, as criteria for detention under the Mental Health Act. That offers a lifeline—a light in the tunnel of darkness that a number of people who are detained under the current Act face.

However, the impact assessment for the Bill states that the proposed changes to the detention criteria in clauses 3 and 4

“will only be switched on when systems are able to demonstrate sufficient level of community support”.

The families and carers of those have a learning disability or autism and who are detained under the Mental Health Act, and the organisations that support them and people who advocate for them, know that too often this vulnerable group of people are pushed to the bottom of a list of competing priorities, and very often slide off it.

We know that this Government and the Department of Health and Social Care have a number of competing priorities to deliver on, and the concern for people who fall into this bracket under the legislation is that their concerns just will not be addressed and that this absolute scandal will continue in perpetuity. People who have a learning disability or autism will be detained because our community services just are not up to snuff; we have so categorically failed them that the only thing we can think to do is to lock them away from society.

[Anna Dixon]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Jen Craft]

I will not, because I am aware that I am almost out of time.

My new clause would ensure that the Government have to set out, within six months of this Bill receiving Royal Assent, a road map that engages in a co-productive way with people with learning disabilities or autism, their advocates and organisations that champion their rights. The road map will design what they need to support them to lead independent dignified lives in the community, and there will be a report every year to say how we are getting community services to a sufficient place so that these much-needed clauses in the Bill can be switched on.

This Bill updates mental health legislation and brings it into the 21st century. It is only right that it does so for everyone in our society, including the most vulnerable.

Mental Health Bill [ Lords ] (Ninth sitting)

Debate between Anna Dixon and Jen Craft

Committee stage
Tuesday 24th June 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Jen Craft]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The crucial purpose of the new clause is to ensure that the use of restraint is recorded at all times, as well as highlighting that quite often the restraint may be carried out not by a member of the medical staff, but by hospital security, for example. I think we can only imagine the real horror and force involved in that.

[Anna Dixon]

I thank my hon. Friend for drawing attention to this gap in the current law. Would she acknowledge that there is now evidence that the use of restraint and restrictive interventions can have serious long-term effects on a patient’s health and wellbeing? Indeed, there can also be an impact on those staff members who are required to carry it out, often with poor training.

[Jen Craft]

I completely agree. The long-term implications and impacts of restraint on health and wellbeing have been widely documented and acknowledged. It is vital, if a patient is subjected to these measures, that their use is recorded and the patient, in turn, can understand why.

The Committee has spent significant time talking about the importance of patient inclusion in their treatment plans. Earlier clauses, which I will not revisit at length, deal with the importance of enabling patients to select how and where they are treated, as well as advance choice documents. They are vital to the patient experience, because they involve and include them in how they are treated. We acknowledge that such involvement has a massive impact on the patient’s ability to heal, get better, recover from their mental illness and, in some cases, get well enough to go home. It is vital, if people are subject to restraint and the use of force, that it is recorded in an appropriate manner.

This new clause seeks to mandate the recording of its use by staff, as well as information such as the member of staff who applied the force, whether they are medical, and, vitally, demographic data. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend East and Leigh—I hope I have that right—