§ Mr. Tony Lloydasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what guidance he issues to regional and district health authorities about the provision of acute psychiatric beds; and whether the planning norms have been amended recently.
§ Mr. WhitneySince March 1983 we have made available to health authorities a policy paper which brought together existing DHSS advice on a range of topics including planning guidelines. As regards the latter, it indicates that local circumstances will determine needs, which should be discussed locally with the professional people involved, but suggests that district analysis on these lines is likely to show a need for acute psychiatric beds in the range of 0.3/0.5 per thousand population in most districts.
Our officials first wrote to regional health authorities in 1982 to advise them that experience suggested that the tentative guideline of 0.5 per thousand, mentioned in the 1975 White Paper, was often too high for present psychiatric practice; they cited one regional health authority which had worked with a guideline of 0.35.
The hon. Member will find the current version of the policy paper is produced as annex 1 to the Government response to the Social Services Committee report on community care published on 20 November—Cmnd. 9674.