COMMONS AMENDMENT (Hansard, 7 November 1995)

§ Baroness Cumberlege

My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 11. I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 14 to 18.

These amendments, though minor in drafting terms, are important for the small number of patients they are likely to affect. Those are patients who, being subject to after-care under supervision, are readmitted to hospital under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act 1983 for assessment. This may follow an initial emergency admission under Section 4. Under the Bill as it stood when your Lordships last considered it, supervision would then lapse. The patient could then be discharged within days if he or she did not need treatment in hospital, and without the protection of supervision.

While it is true that readmission for treatment under Section 3 of the Act has the effect of ending supervision, this is different because a fresh supervision application can then he made when the patient is to be discharged. But an application cannot be made when the patient has been admitted under Section 2 for assessment and not subsequently detained for treatment. That leaves an unintended gap which the amendments fill.