Mental Health Bill [Lords]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. Those who want to see mental health being dealt with on a level playing field alongside any other physical health matters think that the Bill could have gone further towards achieving that. Before you rule me out of order, Madam Deputy Speaker, that brings me to the first of the amendments and the issue of exclusions—I hope that I got away with that one. We have had a long-running debate on the exclusions that we think should be added to the Bill. The matters that particularly exercised us, and the Lords, related to religious, cultural and political beliefs. The amendment that was proposed in the upper House by Baroness Barker mentions"““respect for diversity generally including, in particular, diversity of religion, culture and sexual orientation (within the meaning of section 35 of the Equality Act 2006)””." It is useful that that reference has now been placed in the Bill, because we do not have principles set out in the Bill, which we believe to be a weakness. We challenge the Government over whether exclusions could be incorporated in the Bill, as they were in the 1983 Act. Indeed, exclusions stronger and more precise than those now being proposed have worked perfectly well in New South Wales, Victoria, New Zealand and, most recently, Scotland and have not, as the Minister’s predecessor warned, been the subject of legal challenges. Exclusions in the 1983 Act have been subject to only four legal challenges. We therefore believe that further tightening of exclusions would be a correct and appropriate counterbalance to the Bill’s widening of the definitions of mental illness and its absence of principles. Concern remains most markedly about the impact on the black and minority ethnic community. The most recent submissions of the Commission for Racial Equality challenge the Government’s race equality impact assessment, describing it as"““at best flawed and at worst highly misleading. The Race Equality Impact Assessment cannot be taken as an accurate indication that the provisions of the Bill will not adversely impact on particular ethnic groups when the legislation is implemented.””" Given the apparent absence of rigorous internal consideration of the impact of the proposals prior to the introduction of race equality impact assessments, it would be useful if the Minister said how the Government are monitoring the impact of the Bill’s watered-down exclusions on the BME community. There is no need to repeat the figures: we are all aware of the disproportionate number of members of the BME community, especially black African men, who are sectioned and subject to restraint and powerful drugs in hospital. I should be grateful if the Minister gave some undertakings on that.