Part of Offender Management Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 11:00 am on 23 January 2007.
Edward Garnier
Shadow Minister (Home Affairs)
11:00,
23 January 2007
Of course the Minister is right, but the problem is that there is a difference between being in such a mental state that one needs to be sectioned and placed in a secure hospital and being mentally ill but still short of needing to be sectioned. Many courts frequently have to send to prison people who are not, if I may loosely use the expression, “McNaghten mad”, but who are none the less not well. While it would be better and preferable to send those people whom I loosely described as not being well into the national health system, there is not room or there are not the beds available.
For goodness’ sake, there are not even spaces for mentally ill people who do not commit crimes; we know that as Constituency Members of Parliament. When we send people to prison, we have to do so irrespective of our private wish that they could go somewhere else. As a judge, one has to do what the law requires one to do. Once they get to prison, the judge has no say over how the individual is cared for, and if there is an absence of proper care there is nothing that the judge can do about it.
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In a general election, each Constituency chooses an MP to represent them. MPs have a responsibility to represnt the views of the Constituency in the House of Commons. There are 650 Constituencies, and thus 650 MPs. A citizen of a Constituency is known as a Constituent
