Legal delays over discharge of patients criticised

THE GOVERNMENT has been criticised for failing to legislate for the discharge of patients sent by the courts to the Central Mental Hospital.

The chairman of the Mental Health Review Board, Mr Justice Brian McCracken, makes the complaint in the foreword of the board’s 2009 report, published by the Department of Justice and Law Reform yesterday.

The board, now in its third year, is responsible for reviewing the cases of patients detained at the Central Mental Hospital whom the courts have deemed unfit to stand trial, who have been found not guilty by reason of insanity or who are suffering from a mental disorder.

According to the report, the board carried out 167 individual reviews of detentions at the Central Mental Hospital during 2009, an increase of 11 per cent on 2008 and the highest number since the board’s inception.

Following its review of a patient’s case, the board must make an order for the further detention of a patient in hospital or in prison, or for the conditional or unconditional discharge of the patient in order to receive out-patient treatment.

The report states the majority of reviews of detention in 2009 were patients committed to the Central Mental Hospital, having been found not guilty by reason of insanity.

In his report, Mr Justice McCracken said while the majority of patients detained under the 2006 Act were not suitable for discharge at present, “there are some whom the board would discharge if it could do so under enforceable conditions”.

Justice McCracken said the board had “serious concerns that the legislation to provide for the enforceability of conditions of discharge has not yet been enacted”.

In a criticism of the Government, the report said that due to lack of legislation, there was “no power” to enforce conditions should it discharge a person “conditionally”.

Justice McCracken has said that as a result of the failure to enact legislation, the work of the board in relation to “the discharge of some patients to the community with safeguards in place for the patient and the public has been severely curtailed”.

The report states that while the board understands from the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform that “legislation to remedy the situation will be enacted shortly”, it remains of the view that “the continuing detention of these patients is contrary to the original intention of the (2006 Criminal Law Insanity) Act”.