Mental Health - September 2009
Why aren’t we locking up more old ladies?
Many hospitals and care homes now have the
power to deprive people of their liberty. That is the result
of the DoLS – the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards – which came
into force in April. The government sees the DoLS as
protection, principally for the old or the incapable. So
maybe we should be worried that the new safeguards aren’t being
used.
The government predicted that by next spring,
approximately 21,000 people would have had their cases assessed,
and that a quarter of them would have been brought within the
DoLS. According to the first statistics, that isn’t going to
happen:
- Well over two-thirds of the local authorities
and PCTs charged with implementing the safeguards say they have had
fewer than five DoLS cases, and almost a quarter that they have had
no cases at all.
- It seems that only just over a third of the
forecast number of people will be assessed in the first year of the
DoLS and brought within the substantive safeguards.
- These national figures conceal an even more
striking regional picture. One council, for example, reported 105
DoLS cases in April and May, while only two of its neighbours even
reached double-figures.
Could there be a simple explanation for this:
that in quite a few parts of the country, DoLS-applications are
being actively discouraged? That would be worrying, for it would
mean that hospitals and care homes had placed themselves in
jeopardy. Where permission is required to deprive an incapable
person of liberty, the failure to obtain it will be unlawful, and
that one was discouraged from seeking it will be no
defence.