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Mental-health modernisation bill back on track

A bill aimed at modernising mental-health legislation has been restored to the Oireachtas legislative programme. 

The Mental Health Bill 2024 was published last year, but lapsed with the dissolution of the Dáil before the general election. 

The bill includes provision for the regulation of all community Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) for the first time. 

The Department of Health said on Friday (7 February) that the legislation would proceed to consideration at committee stage in the Dáil “in the coming weeks”, after completing its second stage last September. 

‘Complex and lengthy’ 

Mary Butler (Minister of State responsible for mental health), who brought the bill to second stage last year, welcomed the Government decision. 

“We need to enact this legislation in order to modernise mental-health legislation and to put in place the necessary safeguards to ensure the rights of people with mental-health difficulties are protected in the decades to come,” she said. 

Describing the bill as “a complex and lengthy piece of legislation”, the department said that its officials were finalising a series of amendments ahead of committee stage to ensure that the legislation was “as robust as possible”. 

Consent to treatment 

Its provisions include: 

• An updated involuntary admission and detention process for people with severe mental-health difficulties – including a revised set of criteria for admission,
• An overhauled approach to consent to treatment for involuntarily admitted people,
• An expansion of the Mental Health Commission’s regulatory function to include all community mental-health residences and services – including all community CAMHS,
• Closer alignment with the principles of the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Acts 2015 and 2022,
• Stronger safeguards for people accessing in-patient treatment, and
• Allowing 16- and 17-year-olds to consent to or refuse mental-health treatment.