Wesselys Mental Health review could also replace Mental Capacity Act

Modernising the Mental Health Act – final report from the independent review
Independent report - gov.uk. 6 Dec 2018
https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...-act-final-report-from-the-independent-review

Government commits to reform the Mental Health Act
News story - gov.uk. 6 Dec 2018
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-commits-to-reform-the-mental-health-act

The government will introduce a new Mental Health Bill to transform mental health care, following publication of the final report from the Independent Review of the Mental Health Act 1983. The government is accepting 2 of the review’s recommendations to modernise the Mental Health Act.

Those detained under the Act will be allowed to nominate a person of their choice to be involved in decisions about their care. Currently, they have no say on which relative is contacted. This can lead to distant or unknown relatives being called upon to make important decisions about their care when they are at their most vulnerable.

People will also be able to express their preferences for care and treatment and have these listed in statutory ‘advance choice’ documents.

In October 2017, the Prime Minister announced an independent review of the Mental Health Act 1983 to make improvements following rising detention rates, racial disparities in detention and concerns that the Act is out of step with a modern mental health system. The review team was also asked to consider how to improve practice within the existing legislation.
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Ugh first item on BBC news at one report by James Gallagher with his mate Simon.

Had to switch over when Lord W popped up. Before that they were highlighted a woman with an eating disorder who had been sectioned over a number of years sedated force fed. Don’t know if anything will actually change but supposedly patients rights will be strengthened.
 
Mental Health Act review ‘falls significantly short on human rights’

A government-commissioned review* set up to modernise the Mental Health Act has been criticised for falling “significantly short” of recommending full human rights for people in mental distress.

The review, published today (Thursday), includes 154 recommendations for improvements to the Mental Health Act 1983 that its chair, Professor Sir Simon Wessely, says would make it easier for mental health service-users to say how they want to be treated and harder for those requests to be ignored.

The prime minister this morning welcomed the report, announced plans for a new mental health bill, and said the government would respond formally in the new year.

But nearly 150 user-led organisations, allies and individual campaigners – led by the National Survivor User Network (NSUN) – have previously warned that the review appeared to be backing away from the need for fundamental reform of the act.
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https://www.disabilitynewsservice.c...ew-falls-significantly-short-on-human-rights/

 
Am I being mistaken that Wessely also lead the last review, which by all accounts has lead to a massive unsustainable crisis? So they put the guy who caused the problem in charge of fixing the problem he helped create?

Or did he lead an earlier version?

But I'm not sure what people can expect here. Anything Wessely does will make the problem worse, which as far as I can imagine from the last decade of austerity politics in the UK is probably the whole point. He is exactly the worst person for the job, as his ideological beliefs are the problem, by overloading mental health services with medical patients, which degrades the delivery of all services in every way.
 
Basically the outcome of the review is that people have the right to a say in their care and police should stop locking up black people in jail for suffering from schizophrenia.

Did this really need expert review?

Nothing will change except Wessely will receive more notoriety and probably get a feature in the Guardian showing him in his study wearing chinos, with rolled up sleeves on his shirt and books in the background.
 
rvallee said:
Am I being mistaken that Wessely also lead the last review, which by all accounts has lead to a massive unsustainable crisis?
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You are indeed mistaken. The last review was led by Professor Genevra Richardson. The 1983 MHA was reviewed in 1998-1999, which led to a Green Paper in 2000 and the full amended act (after many further revisions) arose in 2007. Here is the Kings Fund briefing on the 2007 MHA [pdf].

It is always going to tricky dealing with any legislation which involves temporarily taking away rights and freedoms from members of the public, but it's also important to keep a distinction between the MHA and the Mental Capacity Act, which although it seems similar, actually deals with a different set of issues - namely the provision of care when someone is incapacitated and unable to provide their consent for something other than the thing that incapacitated them in the first place (if that makes sense).
 
Theresa May’s mental health act reform: Warm words but scant action

His report came out earlier this month. Frankly it is full of warm words but proposes scant action and dumps the problem of better treatment for mental health patients on the NHS.
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My conclusion is that both Theresa May and Simon Wessely are speaking from the same song book. They are prepared to speak warm words about the problem but are not prepared to take radical action to solve it. No wonder he can calmly state that no political influence was brought to bear on the report. It wasn’t necessary given its tame conclusions.
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full article:
https://davidhencke.com/2018/12/29/...ealth-act-reform-warm-words-but-scant-action/
 
My conclusion is that both Theresa May and Simon Wessely are speaking from the same song book. They are prepared to speak warm words about the problem but are not prepared to take radical action to solve it. No wonder he can calmly state that no political influence was brought to bear on the report. It wasn’t necessary given its tame conclusions.
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Hardly surprising, given that Wessely's behaviour always comes across as that of a highly ambitious political animal first and foremost, with everything else secondary to that. I doubt people reach such politically influential positions unless those in power are confident they are highly motivated to toe the required political line; in this case is far more about saving money whilst dressing it up to sound altruistic.
 
Wessely is above all else a political animal. Indeed, that is all he is.

Patients have never been more than expendable cannon fodder for his fantasies and ego. He doesn't give a flying fuck about us. He has never delivered on what he promised or claimed, and never will. He has delivered nothing more than a pseudo-scientific, pseudo-compassionate excuse for the powerful to kick the people down the bottom even harder.

And for that he is lavishly rewarded with money, prestige, power, and apparently endless immunity from accountability.

But in the end just a glib hollow man, with a head stuffed full of himself.
 
The review itself might be good and needed but it was galling to see wessely able to be involved in such a thing, to great acclaim and praise , solidifying him further as untouchable in the establishment and medical profession and almost adding savior status on working on behalf of the vulnerable. We, who know his history, influence and slithery behaviour in other fields view him entirely differently. There’s been all the commendable talk of putting patients at the heart and listening to them etc, since when did he do that in CFS ?
It’s also a bit ironic that a psychiatrist who through half his career chose to work outside mental health essentially in CFS and GWS should have risen so high in psychiatry,...
 
Barry said:
Hardly surprising, given that Wessely's behaviour always comes across as that of a highly ambitious political animal first and foremost, with everything else secondary to that. I doubt people reach such politically influential positions unless those in power are confident they are highly motivated to toe the required political line; in this case is far more about saving money whilst dressing it up to sound altruistic.
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I think it's just missing a dimension. Political influence usually means someone with political power exerted influence on the process to achieve an outcome over someone who would have done things differently.

Wessely has his own political agenda, which exerts command on his own largely political work. It just happens to be largely the same as the austerity politics pursued by May's government.

Technically there is no need for political influence if interests align, predate and are internal to the person doing the work. This is obviously why he was the right choice.
 
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