§ Mr. BeithTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prisoners in England, Wales and Scotland received some form of mental health care in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [1527]
§ Miss WiddecombeResponsibility for this matter as far as England and Wales are concerned has been delegated to the temporary Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given. The provision of information about the position in Scotland is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland.
Letter from Richard Tilt to Mr. A. J. Beith, dated 24 November 1995:
The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question about the number of prisoners in England and Wales who have received some form of mental health care in each of the last five years.This information is not available in the form requested. The Mental Health Act 1983 provides for prisoners who are so mentally disordered as to warrant their detention in a psychiatric hospital for medical treatment to be transferred to such hospitals. The number of such transfers for the years in question is as follows:376W
Year Number transferred 1990 337 1991 457 1992 605 1993 767 1994 784
Since December 1991, Prison Service establishments in England and Wales have been carrying out regular medical monitoring exercises. To monitor the assessed needs of mentally disordered prisoners, information is collected centrally on a periodic basis. On a given day prisoners considered by prison doctors to need some form of mental health care are categorised as follows:
- (a) prisoners requiring removal or transfer to a psychiatric hospital under Mental Health Act provisions and who are awaiting transfer. This figure included remand prisoners awaiting disposal by the court.
- (b) prisoners who were sufficiently ill to be occupying in-patient beds in prison health care centres.
- (c) prisoners requiring some form of mental health care but not removal/transfer to psychiatric hospital or in-patient treatment in a prison health care centre.
These single-day surveys can be used to calculate the average number of prisoners requiring transfer to a psychiatric hospital or some other form of mental health care on any one day in the year in question and produce the following figures.
Year Number of prisoners 1992 2,483 1993 2,694 1994 2,742