HC Deb 14 June 1978 vol 951 cc547-8W
Mr. Hooson

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) what steps his Department has taken to implement the urgent recommendation contained in the interim report of the Butler Committee of April 1974 to set up regional secure units for mentally disordered offenders;

(2) what directions have been sent out to regional health authorities about the establishment of permanent regional secure units for mentally disordered offenders.

Mr. Moyle

Regional health authorities were asked, by a circular issued in July 1974, to establish as a matter of urgency regional secure units for mentally disordered patients who cannot be satisfactorily managed in ordinary psychiatric hospitals or units but whose condition is not such as to require treatment in a special hospital. The circular was accompanied by copies of the report of a departmental working party on security in National Health Service psychiatric hospitals as well as the interim report of the Butler Committee on mentally abnormal offenders. The priority to be accorded to regional secure units was further emphasised in the 1976 consultative document on priorities and endorsed in "The Way Forward" published last year.

Special capital and revenue funds have been made available. Last summer, I set up a working group to help authorities overcome difficulties in setting up regional secure units. My Department is engaged in continuing discussions with individual health authorities on their proposals.

Mr. Hooson

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what proportion of the large sum of money made immediately and urgently available by his predecessor for the setting up of regional secure units for mentally disordered offenders has been spent by regional health authorities either as general revenue or to offset over-spending.

Mr. Moyle

I refer the hon. Member to my reply to my hon. Friends the Members for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Thomas) and Ormskirk (Mr. Kilroy-Silk) on 28th July 1977, in relation to the use of the allocation in 1976–77. Final information for 1977–78 is not yet available.—[Vol. 936, c.611–2.]