Jen Craft
MP for Thurrock · Labour · United Kingdom
“My constituents and I have some probably fairly justifiable concerns about a private enterprise levying tolls, particularly via the use of automatic number plate recognition at tollbooths. Many have had experiences with the current Dartford crossing toll operator in which, when things go wrong, it is hard to get redress.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I imagine that it would cover the lower Thames crossing as well given its proximity to many crucial parts of our industry. It is only right that my constituents, who will be most impacted by the lower Thames crossing, must be those who benefit most from it.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is complete and utter misery. I am concerned about whether the lower Thames crossing will mitigate that congestion. My other concern relates to the tolls levied. If there is a disparity between the charge for using the lower Thames crossing and that for using the Dartford crossing, it is fairly obvious which one most people will use.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“People are desperate to see it return. The main issue with the return of the ferry is the cost of the subsidy for running it. There is public will to get it back, and there is will from businesses in the area—the Port of Tilbury, Forth Ports, DP World and a whole host of others really want to see it, because they know it provides that lin…”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful to have the opportunity to speak to this Bill and to talk in particular about its primary focus on the financing of the lower Thames crossing. My constituency will be one of the two areas most impacted by both the operation and the construction of the lower Thames crossing.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would therefore be grateful for the Minister’s assurances around the transparency and accountability of any toll operator for a future Thames crossing, particularly as to how we get redress if things go wrong. My hon.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“On clause 5(4), the amendment in the other place inserted the phrase “by a constable or other authorised person” which relates specifically to the phrase “unless the patient is immediately restrained from leaving the hospital”. What the hon. Gentleman describes as a level of ambiguity in the subsection allows that to be done by people who are not necessarily listed as an authorised person, such as a medical practitioner. I think we would all agree that we would not expect to see a nurse, doctor or other clinician immediately and physically restraining a patient, and that when a police constable is not available, other people, such as hospital security staff, can carry out the task. The clause says, “immediately restrained”.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On a point of clarification, I note that the amendments tabled by the shadow Minister specifically say “recovery from any childhood trauma”. Why has he opted for the word “childhood”, rather than general trauma-informed care? A number of female in-patients in mental health units are recovering from past sexual trauma or domestic violence—I know such abuse is not committed exclusively against women, but it tends to be more prevalent in that group—and the mental health unit can potentially exacerbate that traumatic experience. I seek clarification on why childhood trauma has been made so prominent, as opposed to general trauma.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to speak in support of clause 8, and I will briefly speak to the Liberal Democrats’ amendment 12. I have already flagged my concerns with the Opposition’s amendments 44 and 45. Clause 8 introduces and puts front and centre the notion of therapeutic care for those detained under the Mental Health Act 1983. I strongly welcome clause 8, as drafted. For far too long, for people who have been deprived of their liberty and detained in a secure mental health setting, the main focus has been risk management and harm minimisation rather than therapeutic care.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we have to take the accommodation into consideration, that might mean that it would never be an appropriate setting for someone to receive therapeutic care, even though we know that quite often it is the only setting where someone can be for a short period.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Not to read this against the earlier clauses that take autism and learning disability away from the definition of a mental health condition, which I strongly welcome, I would welcome the Minister’s thoughts on capturing how, for this specific group of people, detention in a secure mental unit is probably more harmful to them than it is for the majority of the population. I cannot, however, support amendment 12, because of the catch-all nature of looking at the setting in which a treatment takes place. I speak as someone who has had lived experience of this issue and I have to say that quite often a secure unit is probably not conducive to anyone’s mental health; indeed, it is often a place of last resort, and I think that it poses a risk.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Although I support looking at whether a specific setting is appropriate for certain groups of people, there needs to be heightened awareness of the impact that a locked setting can have on people with a learning disability or autism. I spoke about this on Second Reading. If someone is sensitive to over-stimulation and has an increased sensory need, need for routine and need for familiarity, taking them away from a place that feels safe and putting them in a ward with strip lighting—autistic people talk about strip lighting as being particularly harmful—that is noisy, unfamiliar and completely out of their routine can feel extremely harmful. Therapeutic care in that setting may never be effective enough for that group of people to be released.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will speak briefly to amendment 12, tabled by the Liberal Democrats. I may have slightly misunderstood the intent of the amendment. It was my understanding that naming the setting where medical treatment takes place—putting it on an equal footing with the treatment—was aimed at looking at the impact on people with learning disabilities and autism. For that specific group, detention in a secure unit is often counter-productive to their recovery. A review undertaken by Baroness Hollins found that there was no therapeutic benefit for long-term segregation of patients with a learning disability, and that attempting to deliver a therapeutic benefit for some of those patients in a locked setting is all but impossible.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The cost was looked at in areas in the south-west—in Devon—and in London, and it was found that a third of spending from hospital trusts was going towards this very tiny group of people. That is not to say that we should always look at the cost of care, because that can seem reductive to someone as an individual, but clearly, these people are not getting effective treatment that is good value and makes sense for them. I would welcome the Minister’s thoughts on developing system-wide and community-based change for some of the most complex cases in an in-patient setting. How does he see the clause interacting with that? Does he believe that providing therapeutic benefit for all patients in a secure setting will have a positive impact on that complex 1.5% group of patients?”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For some individuals who have spent a significant amount of time in a locked unit, the prospect of them receiving therapeutic care is very low, and the prospect of them receiving therapeutic care that leads to them recovering sufficiently to leave those units is about nil. The talking therapies taskforce highlights that some of the most severely complex patients with personality disorder—the most severe 1.5%—make up nearly one third of the annual spend on in-patient treatment costs. That group of people have very little prospect of receiving appropriate therapeutic care in an in-patient setting. A system-wide change looking at community-based care, sometimes intensive community-based care, would be much more effective than what they currently receive.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Although I understand that the Minister will probably state that the clause advances the principle of “therapeutic benefit”, I believe it also touches on two of the other key principles developed by the independent review: the principles of seeing “the person as an individual”, and of “least restriction”. We can all appreciate that if someone is in a setting for their own therapeutic benefit, rather than just being contained because of the risk that they might pose to themselves or others, then they are being less restricted, in a way that is real and important to them, and will have the benefit of being seen as an individual.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As I was saying, for too long the focus in a locked setting has been on management of risk and harm reduction, rather than actually treating the condition that the patient may have. Clause 8 looks almost to reverse that. It advances the idea that therapeutic care is the aim of detention under the Mental Health Act and that it is fundamentally important, when someone is deprived of their liberty, that there is a therapeutic benefit to the patient, and it places that aim in a prominent position at the start of the Act, so that it is not buried further down.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend for highlighting the Lampard inquiry, and highlighting the impact of the treatment that the inquiry is looking at on the lives of the patients who were subject to it. I do not wish to get ahead of the inquiry because it is still under way, but I have met with some of the families involved, and there is a feeling that there has been a complete breakdown of trust in the care of patients in our part of the world. That trust is difficult to rebuild, particularly for people in a locked mental health setting, who have no choice but to trust that the providers of their care are acting in their best interests. The lack of trust is almost harmful to their continued recovery. I thank my hon. Friend for raising that particular point.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I know that there are times when people will act in a way that may be at odds with the risk that they pose to the public, but these matters are properly addressed elsewhere in the Bill. What the clause speaks to, and what we should try not to dilute, is the patient experience.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not want to get ahead of the Minister, but I want to address a few points that the shadow Minister raised. I want to say this as someone with lived experience of severe mental illness; it is important to have someone on the Committee that can speak to that, so I probably should when I can. This clause speaks to the patient experience. There are other parts in the Bill that deal with potential risk to the public and risk of harm. In the first example the shadow Minister gave, he mentioned that the woman in question said that her wish was to be admitted to a secure unit. I would say that, under this clause, had they had regard for her wishes and how she wanted to be treated, that would have mitigated some of the risk.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Looking at how they may have acted in the past, or may have opted for treatment when not at a crisis point—including, I note, through the introduction of advance choice documents, allowing people to choose how they would like to be treated if they have lost the ability to make those decisions for themselves about the best way forward and, indeed, if they have to be detained—and taking their wishes into account, as well as their beliefs and values, is important in developing an individual treatment plan that allows them to be seen as an individual deserving of care, in order to achieve the best possible outcome for them. Across the House, we have noted the important fact that, when patients are involved in developing their treatment plans, they are much more likely to engage and have significantly improved outcomes.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to speak in support of this important clause, which puts patient experience and individual choice at the heart of treatment. It is a brilliant focus on seeing the individual as a person, and ensuring that they have a strong role to play in deciding their treatment pathway going forward. I very much welcome the development of a clinical checklist that includes looking at a patient’s past and present wishes and feelings. That is important because, when someone is in a mental health crisis, they might not be in the best possible place at that moment to articulate what their wishes are.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If I was in a mental health crisis, I might not be in a place to articulate the best treatment for me, but right now I can say what works. I will not go into that, because it is private, but I know that the best course of care for me would involve someone taking advantage of my knowledge of my condition and working with me to allow me to get the care I need to get better. The point is that the clause’s stand-alone focus on the patient experience deals with some of that stigma. It puts the patient’s experience at the heart of treatment, it speaks to some of the issues mentioned about what happened in Essex, which is now the focus of the Lampard inquiry, and helps to deal with some of that. It sees us as individuals.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It has been particularly hard to be open about the fact that I might be subject to in-patient mental health treatment; I probably see that as a likelihood in my future at some point, although I hope it is not and I work very hard every single day to avoid that. However, it is important that there is a part of the Bill that speaks to me as an individual. I speak to the Committee today as an articulate individual—I do not want to say intelligent; I will not blow my own trumpet—who can say what treatment option I would like. It is incredibly important to recognise that people who are subject to detention under the Bill are individuals who have opinions on their treatment. I have lived with these conditions for the best part of two decades, and the biggest expert on them is me.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I welcome the hon. Member’s intervention. On Tuesday we discussed clauses on who can be detained and when, and earlier today we discussed the necessity of detention, and there was some debate about the amendment in the other place. Other bits of the Bill focus on when it is necessary to detain an individual for public safety and not just for their own treatment; I will not re-litigate who should be performing that function, but earlier clauses deal with that. The importance of this clause is the patient perspective. There is a significant stigma associated with severe mental illness. I have been reticent about my own conditions in the past because of that, and because of how I would be perceived.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend for her kind words. That concludes what I was trying to get at: the importance of a clause in the Bill that is focused on patient experience. Understanding and acknowledging the sheer importance of that person’s experiences, and the value that brings to their care plan, cannot be overestimated. I hope that members of the Committee will support the clause, because it represents quite a sea change in how people subject to treatment under the Mental Health Act are treated.”
House of Commons12 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have a question about the list of risk factors that has been provided. Is there not a concern that it might be too prescriptive or restrictive, and that putting it in primary legislation prevents local authorities or ICBs from widening it, from having registers and risk factors that might be appropriate to their areas, and from focusing on what the appropriate level of care is that they are best placed to meet?”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Bill makes allowances for the Secretary of State to introduce appropriate risk factors via regulation, and that it is more appropriate to list the risk factors that ICBs should take into account in secondary legislation issued by the Secretary of State than in primary legislation, as amendment 47 seeks to do?”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“While we look back on the history of the past 14 years, focusing specifically on the people who are detained under the Mental Health Act, let us remember that Lord Darzi pointed out in his report that some of the facilities are more redolent of the Victorian era than of a modern mental health care service. Perhaps those who were in government in those 14 years should reflect on why that is the case.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for reflecting on the fact that mistakes were made by the previous Government—acknowledgment of that is often sorely lacking. I respect the fact that he says that the debate has moved on, but does he accept that while the debate may have moved on, policy to enact actual change for people who are detained under the Mental Health Act, particularly those with learning disabilities and autism, has not kept pace? The number of people in locked units, under detention, has remained solid, without much wavering, for the past 14 years. Despite the acknowledgement that this is a scandal, and we should all hang our head in shame that it continues to this day, not much has been done to get them out of those units.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“However, it would definitely be welcome to have an understanding of where we are heading, what “good” looks like and how we are going to get there, and what the Minister might see as a road map for community services to reach the point where clause 3 can be switched on, so that autistic people and people with a learning disability do not need to be detained under the Mental Health Act purely because there is insufficient support for them in the community to enable alternative provision. I would welcome any thoughts from the Minister about how those concerns about the operability of the Bill can be addressed. If they will not be addressed via these amendments, how will they be taken forward?”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Therefore, I would welcome the Minister’s thoughts on how we will know that we have reached the point where we can address the issues that clause 3 looks to tackle. As the Conservative Members mentioned, there are concerns about funding and access to fairly scarce resources, and a concern that rolling out this provision could put undue burdens on people who are unable to deliver certain parts of it.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will be reasonably brief, as Members have covered a lot of what I was going to talk about. The intent behind amendments 10 and 24 and new clause 11 is to address the issue raised by a number of organisations, such as Mencap, the National Autistic Society and the NHS Confederation, around the delay in particular clauses being switched on for people with autism or with a learning disability due to insufficient community services. The concern is that there is not, as yet, an articulation of what sufficient community services look like or how we will know when we have reached that point, so that we can turn on parts of the Act. There is a sufficient community backing in place for that to happen.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In a locked setting, someone with a learning disability or autism may be unable to demonstrate behaviours that show they are improving or getting better, which can undermine the care they receive. I would just question whether primary legislation is the best vehicle by which to provide for this. We have spoken at length about how the NHS workforce plan and the 10-year plan are coming forward. I wonder whether this would be better placed within that wider framework. Training could be taken forward either as part of continual professional development, or for medical professionals at the start of their career.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to share a few brief reflections. I appreciate that the intent behind amendment 25 is to make sure that the relevant training is in place. I assume that the hon. Member for Guildford has in mind something similar to the Oliver McGowan training provided across hospital trusts, which mandates that all healthcare providers spend a certain amount of time training with someone who has lived experience of autism and of learning disabilities, in order to make sure that the very different ways in which people with autism or learning disabilities might present do not overshadow what they are attending hospital to demonstrate. Particularly for mental health, we all know that diagnostic overshadowing can be fairly significant.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think there is a concern about having a prescriptive mandate in primary legislation, rather than using a vehicle that could implement real change. Again, I would welcome the Minister’s thoughts on how to ensure that those working in a mental health environment have sufficient training on learning disabilities and autism. We need to make sure that those with a specialism in learning disabilities and/or autism are present and people have access to them, so that things like diagnostic overshadowing do not continue to occur.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I do not want to speak outside the scope of the clause, but I would very much welcome a commitment from the Minister on ensuring that people with learning disabilities and/or autism are part of the process of the consultation to produce guidance on what good community services look like, and that they are engaged with from the start in a very real and meaningful way.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On a small point of clarification, the six-month criteria are based on the current NHS guidance around CETRs. It is loose guidance; it is not statutory. The reason that it is six months as opposed to 12 months is that that would bring us closer in line with the guidance.”
House of Commons10 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This week, I will be meeting eight new community police officers who begin their roles on the beat thanks to the Government’s investment through the national policing guarantee. Does the Home Secretary agree that investing in community policing is the best way to tackle so much of the crime that blights our communities? Will she join me in wishing these vital officers all the best as they begin their new roles?”
House of Commons2 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the Secretary of State agree that a proper community treatment plan for those with learning disabilities and autism is not just reliant on the actions of his Department, but a cross-Government effort and an integrated care system at a local level?”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who has brought his wealth of experience to this place. Would he concede that the focus on learning disability and autism is perhaps because those disorders have very specific features? Being in an unfamiliar, over-sensory stimulating or noisy environment, with a break from routine, has an adverse effect on some people precisely because of the nature of their disability, and perhaps more so than for some of the other conditions he has mentioned. Indeed, it seemed something of a weird anomaly that learning disability and autism were classed as mental illness for the sake of the Mental Health Act. I am sure the hon. Gentleman will agree they very much are not.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I very much support what my hon. Friend is saying about making sure that there is an active plan. One of my concerns is that implementation of this Bill will be delayed until community support is ready. Does he agree that it would be welcome if the Minister offered a reflection on what good looks like in this space, and what ready looks like, so that we know what we are aiming for?”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Black British people are detained at 3.5 times the rate of white people, and those with learning disabilities and/or autism are at a unique and increased risk from detention and the impact that it can have on their lives. I will initially focus on that latter group. I declare an interest as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on learning disability. Under the 1983 Act, as we have heard, learning disability or autism in themselves can be a reason for detention. The hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer) said that we will disagree on this, and I am afraid that we will, because I do not think that learning disability or autism are necessarily conditions of the mind. A number of these conditions are genetic and also affect the physical health of a person.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Mental Health Bill is a long overdue update to the Mental Health Act 1983, and I hope it will be the start of a much wider overhaul of a mental health system that is often not fit for purpose and has historically been treated as secondary to the physical health system. It is a system where too often patient voices are ignored, injustices are common and the use of detention is relied upon in the place of person-centred community care. Too frequently, those in acute mental health crisis cannot access the right support. They are refused help in the community, forced to rely on accident and emergency, and detained against their will as their mental health deteriorates. Incidence of detention is three times higher in the most deprived areas.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For someone with sensory issues, a reliance on routine, a need for a specialist diet or equipment or myriad other needs, being in a busy, over-stimulating environment—often with strip lighting and minimal privacy—often means they are set up to fail from the very beginning.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. I would welcome the opportunity to discuss this issue in more detail with him, although we will probably continue to disagree. People with learning disabilities and autism can suffer from mental health conditions as much as the rest of the population, but they have a unique set of challenges. I point out as a note to policymakers in general that they should not conflate learning disability and autism as one and the same thing. That is vital. At the end of January 2025, 2,065 in-patients in locked mental health facilities were autistic or living with a learning disability. As one of my hon. Friends said earlier, the average length of stay for these patients is nearly five years. For those with a learning disability or autism, a locked mental health ward can be a living hell.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Let me say this: “There is someone standing here among you, a Member of Parliament, who has a serious mental illness. It does not prevent me from doing my job or from living my life; in some ways, it makes me better at it.” While the Bill continues its passage through Parliament, can we please bear in mind that we are talking about individuals, and individuals who will be affected by it, and that what we seek to do—and what I hope we will accomplish—is give people who live with serious mental illnesses the ability and the right to live the best lives that they possibly can, with all the support that we can make available?”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Like thousands of others, I have had to create my own care package and my own route to treatment, because I made the decision that I deserved to live, and I deserved to live well—and also that my children deserved their mum. However, I am very aware that my ability to do this is based on a number of privileges, in no small part a very supportive family, which so many do not have. While I welcome the Bill for its advances in reducing the amount of detention and increasing the agency of those who are detained, I must call for a significant overhaul of community mental health services to prevent crises from occurring in the first place. We know that we can and must do better. I ask all Members to note that when we discuss people’s serious mental illnesses, we often talk as though they were “others”, which they are not.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I was diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder as a teenager, and with bipolar disorder in my 20s. In two and half decades with these conditions I have received good care, but sadly that is the exception and not the rule. I have never been asked what it is that I want from treatment, what it is that I want for my life, and how I can be helped to get there. I have received care that is patronising, reductive, inconsistent and non-existent. During mental health crises I have had to tread a fine line between proving that I am ill, and sometimes extremely ill, and proving that I am not so ill that I need to lose my liberty, because I know that more often than not, treatment is based not on therapeutic care but on risk management.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“While I recognise the importance of this step and this legislation alongside the Government’s investment in mental health crisis centres, a pledge to recruit 8,500 mental health staff and the Secretary of State’s commitment to the mental health investment standard, there is a desperate need to transform community mental health services to put patient voice and experience at its heart and avoid the need for detention orders in the first place. As a member of the Health and Social Care Committee, I have had the privilege of hearing from some extraordinarily courageous individuals who shared their experience of living with a serious mental illness. It is in that same spirit that I will share my own experience now. I hope that it offers an insight into the limitations of our current system.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“People who have a lived experience of these conditions are unable to contribute in a meaningful way. More broadly, I welcome the legislation’s attempt to make progress in putting patient voice at the heart of care, particularly through advance choice documents, but there is scope to go further. The Royal College of Psychiatrists is advocating for a statutory right to an advance choice document, which the pre-legislative scrutiny Committee also recommended. That would ensure that all patients who would benefit from one would get one, with the aim of reducing detentions and involuntary treatment.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We also need those with a specialism in learning disability and autism to be present in assessing whether an individual also has a co-occurring mental health condition. Finally, I put a plea in to the Minister that there is a real need for those who live with a learning disability or autism to be properly consulted. A number of disabled people’s charities that are run by people with a learning disability, such as the “Bring People Home from Hospital” campaign, which is operating under the auspices of Inclusion London, do not feel that they have had sufficient opportunity to input. A very minor point is that some relevant documents related to this legislation have not been printed in easy read. If they have, it has taken a while for them to arrive.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would welcome the Minister’s assurances on how that will be delivered in the timescales set out and how we get from where we are now to where good is. The continual detention of people in this way should shame us all, and an end to that cannot come fast enough. I sound a note of caution—I think this is fairly similar to that of the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge—that the legislation continues to allow for the co-occurrence of mental health conditions to be a reason to detain someone with a learning disability and autism. That in and of itself could lead to this continual cycle where people are detained for longer than is necessary for their treatment while in an environment that is entirely counterproductive to them becoming well.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Kevin McKenna), I note that the Government have said that these changes to detention criteria will only be switched on when systems can demonstrate a sufficient level of community support. That is a source of real concern. As the NHS Confederation has warned, the “success of the reforms will be dependent on the wider infrastructure to support” the Bill. As others have said, there is no clarity on what a sufficient level of support means in practice. We do not know where we are heading or when we will have got there. The most successful support for learning disabled and autistic people to live independently in their communities is integrated care that encompasses health, housing, occupation and much more besides.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“However, she ended up being locked up for days, weeks and then months on end in a room with only a mattress on the floor. She was unable to see her family or her support network, and her parents were absolutely devastated at being unable to get her out of that environment and seeing her continually deteriorate. It is hard to imagine the anguish of people seeing someone that they love go through this. When this happens to someone or their family, how on earth can they ever again trust the system that put them there? Learning disabled people and autistic people who have been through that have their confidence in accessing support taken away. In turn, that can create a vicious cycle. I strongly welcome the moves that this Bill makes towards removing learning disability and autism as a reason alone for detention. However, similar to my hon.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will come to that point a little later, but that confinement is detrimental to their mental health. It can sometimes be hard to pick apart a co-existing or co-occurring mental health condition from the behaviour exhibited within that environment. This is part of the reason that it is all but impossible for some detained individuals, in the circumstances they are in, to demonstrate the behaviour change they need to prove they have become sufficiently well to be released. My attention was drawn last year to the case of a young woman called Bethany, who was detained for the best part of half a decade under the Mental Health Act. She is an autistic young woman whose parents believed that her entering a secure unit was the best choice.”
House of Commons19 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗