The Mental Health Alliance has said the new Mental Health Act
2007 must be reformed "sooner rather than later" to ensure
legislation is based around "human rights, equality and
respect".
The 77-strong coalition of mental health charities and
professional bodies said
the
act, which formally became law last month, should not last as
long as its two predecessors - 24 years - without reform.
In a final report on the act, the Mental health Alliance
restated its fundamental criticisms of the legislation as
authoritarian and stigmatising. It said that while other countries
had fundamentally modernised their mental health laws, England and
Wales had only slightly improved its own.
However, the alliance said that without its campaigning on
the legislation - and that of the government's opponents inside and
outside parliament - the Mental Health Act 2007 could have been
much worse.
Concessions won from the government included a right to advocacy
for patients, a guarantee of age-appropriate treatment for
under-18s and provision to ensure treatment should be intended to
benefit users - and not just be "appropriate".
But opponents failed to persuade parliament to restrict new
community treatment orders to so-called revolving door patients -
those who would otherwise be in and out of hospital - and ensure
people who possessed capacity could not be detained.
More information
What next for campaigners after the Mental Health Bill?
Mental Health Bill: special report
Mad World blog
Essential information
on mental health services