Page 3851 - Week 12 - Thursday, 30 October 2014
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The resulting bill delivers a major shift towards a more collaborative approach to mental health service delivery and fits well with the recovery approach adopted by mental health services, which supports people to determine their own pathway to recovery as much as possible.
I would like to reply to some of the further points made by Mrs Jones on behalf of the opposition on Tuesday, and I thank Mrs Jones for her indication that the opposition will be supporting the bill today. Regarding the provisions to enable ambulance paramedics to transport people to hospital for emergency assessment and care, I emphasise that this measure is eagerly anticipated in the mental health community as a way of normalising people’s transport to hospital, where possible, without the stigmatising public presence of police. It has been implemented in a number of other Australian jurisdictions.
Ambulance paramedics will be provided with the same apprehension powers and search powers currently available to a doctor or an appointed mental health officer but, like them, they will not be expected to apply those powers where the person resists. In this situation police remain available to assist. After this measure attracted some attention early in the review, consultations were conducted with ambulance paramedics. In the consultations, paramedics were unambiguously accepting of the new role, seeing it as a natural extension of their current work.
Mrs Jones raised the issue of staffing and safety in the coming secure mental health unit. I have previously notified the Assembly of a second bill to update the few remaining sections of the Mental Health Act not addressed in the review process and hence enable a completely new act. I wish to advise the Assembly that a further bill is currently in policy development prior to drafting, and this bill addresses security and other arrangements for the new unit. This development is proceeding, using a consultative process including officers of the Forensic Mental Health Service and the Justice and Community Safety Directorate and is planned for enactment in time for the commissioning of the new unit.
If I could just make some comments on the consultation process, the review of the Mental Health (Treatment and Care) Act has been guided by an advisory group of over 40 stakeholders, including mental health consumers and carers, advocacy groups and agencies responsible for implementing the act. The review has been exhaustive and has involved a great deal of consultation across the community. Indeed, the consultation process has shaped the legislation that we are debating today, and the debate, as I have said, about decision-making capacity added two years to the review to get that right, as it came up quite early in the consultation process.
The review began in 2006 with the release of the first discussion paper for public consultation. In November 2007 an options paper was released, which examined in more detail issues including the relationship in mental health legislation between voluntary and involuntary treatment and care, advance directives and forensic mental health. During 2008 and 2009 the review advisory group examined the very complex issues around decision-making capacity, supported and substituted decisions, and assessment of a person’s decision-making capacity in the context of mental illness and as a criterion for involuntary treatment orders. Currently, risk to self or others is the main criterion for making mental health orders.
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