Mental Health Bill [Lords]

Jen Craft Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 14th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I call Jen Craft to make the final contribution. All those who have contributed to the debate should make their way back to the 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.