A very busy week so far, and it’s only
Wednesday!
A meeting of our trustees gave unanimous
agreement to proceed with the purchase of a new building close to
the City, so hopefully I will be able to confirm the details
soon.
I was pleased to host a major speech on
mental health by Ed Miliband MP on Monday (see previous blog). He
didn’t find any disagreement here when he described mental ill
health as “the biggest unaddressed health challenge of our
age”.
I was also kept very busy by news from the
Department of Health that ‘technical irregularities’ had been
discovered in the approval of doctors qualified to detain patients
under the Mental Health Act in four English regions – so-called
‘Section 12 approval’. We have put out a
statement and will support any of our members who may be
affected. Despite the government pushing through emergency
retrospective legislation, we have been assured that no detentions
were illegal.
I would like to thank publicly our mental
health law lead, Julie Chalmers, for the huge amount of time she
spent on this issue with health department officials. For Julie,
myself, and colleagues in the communications and policy teams,
there was no chance of a quiet weekend. However, the safety and
well-being of those we serve - our patients – is always paramount,
as is the professional integrity of all our members.
Over the past week I have also been to two
important launches. Firstly,
Talking Self Harm was a new report from Young Minds, which
highlighted a lack of understanding of the issue among parents,
teachers and GPs. I hope this will help and link well with other
work supported by the College, such as U Can Cope, led by Alys Cole-King.
I also attended the launch of
Fatally Flawed, a report examining the experiences and
treatment of children and young people who died in prison custody
in England and Wales, published by INQUEST and the Prison Reform
Trust. It was a heart rending event as parents told of the untimely
death of their children. To me it stressed the need to diagnose
children with neuro developmental disorders early – something
highlighted recently by the
Children’s Commissioner in England.
After meeting Ed Miliband I had the
pleasure of visiting a recently opened young people’s unit - the
Mary St
Aubyn Centre in Colchester. When I last visited the North Essex
Partnership NHS Foundation Trust the unit was a building site, but
now it is a beautiful light and airy building with a real sense of
young people, families and staff working together to help young
people with mental illness and learning disability on the road to
recovery. They are helping young people to develop adaptive skills
so they will have the resilience to return back into life at home
and the community.
The unit is named after an exceptional
woman, Mary St Aubyn, who will soon step down as chair of the
trust. You can see how her deep commitment to all of the
services in this trust has a significant impact. She will be
moving to the board of Combat Stress, where am sure
her wisdom and enthusiasm will be of great benefit for
veterans.
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