For too long, our mental health laws have been a relic of another era. The 1983 Mental Health Act is older than many of the clinicians now working under it.
For four decades, it has too readily stripped vulnerable people of their dignity, their voice, and their agency. Its application has been unequal, leading to demonstrable racial inequalities.
It has seen autistic people and those with learning disabilities detained inappropriately. And it has left families often shut out of the care of their loved ones.
But this changes as we embark on a watershed moment for mental health care in Britain – the Mental Health Act receiving royal assent to become law.
This is a personal milestone as the first piece of legislation passed by my department under this government. But much more importantly, it’s a promise kept to the thousands of vulnerable people who have been failed for decades by a system stuck in the past.
Take Steve Gilbert, who, along with members of his family, has experienced at first hand the trauma and loss of dignity that many patients feel as a result of being detained under the act.
Steve was diagnosed with bipolar disorder after being sectioned in 2010, and has spent the past decade working tirelessly to implement mental health reforms, including by co-chairing the Mental Health Act Review that has paved the way for this announcement.
I am inspired by the way he has taken the pain of what he and his family experienced and turned it into a force for good, ensuring each and every voice is heard, especially those in the Black community who have been disproportionately detained.
Today, we are one step closer to consigning that unfair and outdated system to history.
History will judge us on how we treat the most vulnerable people in our society at their most vulnerable moment, and I’m proud that this government has overseen this fundamental shift in how we care for people who are seriously unwell.
This is what real change looks like.
Back in 2018, Simon Wessely’s landmark review of the Mental Health Act revealed the injustices faced by too many people under the act. Over the past 18 months, this government has worked tirelessly to bring these reforms over the line and make the changes we desperately needed to deliver.
The new Mental Health Act puts patients in the driving seat of their own care through statutory care and treatment plans (CTPs) and advance choice documents (ACDs), which will help pave the road to recovery and give patients and their loved ones more autonomy over their care.
Wes Streeting with Keir Starmer on a hospital walkabout (PA)
It brings families and carers into the room where decisions are made. It ends the disgrace of seriously unwell people being locked in police cells when they need hospital treatment. It protects children and young people, ensuring that from now on their voices aren’t just heard but genuinely listened to, in terms of their specific care needs and vulnerabilities.
We’re bolstering legislative reform with action on the ground, recruiting 8,500 additional mental health workers, rolling out mental health support teams in schools, expanding talking therapies and investing £473m in mental health infrastructure, for instance, to establish 24/7 Neighbourhood Mental Health Centres and fund more hospital beds for people in crisis.
This is all part of a plan to shift care from hospitals into communities through our 10-year health plan, catching people before they reach crisis point.
Today belongs to everyone who refused to accept that the system couldn’t change. The campaigners. The clinicians. The patients and families who shared their painful experiences so others wouldn’t have to endure the same injustices.
Mental health is health. And today, we’ve taken a giant leap towards building an NHS that finally treats it that way.
Wes Streeting is secretary of state for health and social care