Vast and Gruesome.

Hi - Please check out my little film about my book:

Mental Health Human Rights Survey.

Hi - I have now published a survey which will form part of a research paper, looking at how patients feel about the law, and how they may feel in the future, should the law change.

The Uplift of Human Rights in Mental Health.

About the Research.

As part of a response to the UN Convention on the Rights for People with Disabilities (CRPD), which made it illegal for people to be detained and forcibly treated for having a mental illness, I am conducting some research into how patients might feel about having more rights and maybe the use of magistrates to help patients and their doctors make decisions about their care. Although the CRPD doesn’t prevent the state from detaining mentally unwell people and compelling them to take medication, this new international law, makes it harder for governments to continue the practice of detaining people and compelling them to take medication. The UK government for example, has not changed the law in the light of the changes to international laws. This research is being carried out to find out more about what patients think about such laws.

Who is Carrying Out This Research?

My name is Ben Bamber, and I am a patient who has been involved in helping the local Trust, as Chairman of the User Forum, in 2001-2003 and I work as a writer having been published in the psychiatric literature several times.

Why Am I Doing This Research?

Last year I decided, inspired by the changes to international laws, to look more closely at why patients are denied some of their basic rights and how patients might feel should they get the same or similar rights to people accused of a crime. This research will seek to establish patient’s views on increasing the rights for mentally unwell people.

Funding.

The research is being funded by Ben Bamber.

Who Has Approved this Research?

This research has been produced with the assistance of 2gether NHS Foundation Trust R&D Department.

What Will Happen to the Information Collected by the Project?

The information will be collated and will form part of a report, supporting or otherwise the introduction of more and better rights for mentally unwell people. The report will be made available to patients, carers, professionals and MP’s, plus the news media in the form of a press release. No personal data will be included in the report. All data relating to your identity will be destroyed.

Also an article will be written and submitted to a psychiatric journal, which has not yet been chosen, for publication and to be made available to clinical staff. This will help professionals understand what it is like to have your rights restricted when detained in hospital.

Other Information.

You are not in any way obliged to take part. If you do not wish to participate then that’s okay. None of your personal details be recorded as all questionnaires will be completely anonymous.

Go to survey...

Nicola Edgington.

This case is horrific in the extreme. Nicola Edgington who killed her mother, got released after a few years and then attempted to kill someone, then after making several calls to the Police to warn them that she was going to kill someone, murdered a stranger, almost decapitating her. She got 37 years in jail, but as the judge signed off on her sentence, he effectively blamed her and told her that she must take responsibility for her actions. The laws are there to bring dangerous people like her into hospital, and the law is there to ensure that people with a diminished capacity to prevent themselves doing terrible things, should not then be blamed when things go wrong. While a sane Edgington could feel regret, remorse and see her actions as we see them, she clearly could not.

If the law was adequate in this case, if mentally unwell people were given a habeas corpus protection, then this woman would have been arrested for threats to kill, (even though her threats were non-specific), she would have been arraigned, her case would have been argued and examined in court and she would have come into custody for further treatment. But because the law is vague and depends largely on doctors to make assessments, whilst knowing there are pressures on beds and resources, the automatic system that would have kicked in at the point at which she was seen by Police, she was left to kill and maim people instead.

Also, the Police did not take her seriously. They had her in their care and for some reason did not listen to her claim that she felt that she wanted to kill someone. This is just a mystery to me.

Lastly, this is the second case in recent months where the media have been allowed to openly discuss decapitation of victims of mentally unwell people. If one mentally ill person, decapitates someone - a stranger, and that story is openly discussed in the national media, it is the equivalent of a hundred killings by mad people, in terms of the impact on the lives of mentally unwell people who would never kill anyone, no matter how ill they are. Now there have been two horrific murders, the media have reinforced very powerful stereotypes and has made life even harder for mentally ill people, trying desperately to reintegrate into the community. Shame on the government for allowing these details into the media and shame on the media for repeating them.