PRISON: 50% of inmates suffer from a mental disorder


Mental health lawyers called for changes to sentencing policy this week after research revealed that the mentally ill are disproportionately represented in Britain's prison population.



A report from HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP) found that up to 50% of prisoners suffer from a mental disorder. Prison had become 'the default setting for those with a wide range of mental and emotional disorders', it said. The report also found significant weaknesses in the systems established to 'identify and divert those individuals who should properly be cared for in mental health settings' rather than in prison.



Mental Health Lawyers Association chairman Richard Charlton said: 'The government's sentencing policy is driving the mentally ill into prison. There are moves to soften the two-strikes system, but in the meantime indefinite sentences are being handed down to the mentally vulnerable. Society is the ultimate loser because nothing is being done to cure the illness and address their offending behaviour.'



Tim Spencer-Lane, a Law Society policy adviser, identified three main weaknesses in the present system. 'There is a lack of awareness among the judiciary as to how they can exercise their sentencing powers to divert an offender away from prison and into hospital. There are inadequate in-reach mental services within prisons. And there is a shortage of secure beds in hospitals, with a three-month or longer waiting list.'



The HMIP report found that the quality and extent of treatment available to mentally-ill prisoners had improved over the last decade. There were still too many gaps in provision, however, along with too much unmet and sometimes unrecognised need.



A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: 'We are investing £200 million every year in prison health services, and NHS primary care trusts are properly considering prisons as part of their wider communities.' He added that 360 extra staff were now being employed on mental health in-reach provision and that the ministry was working to improve the areas identified in the report.



Jonathan Rayner