Bradford Sue: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Bradford Sue: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:608;Page:5166] 
2.  
SUE BRADFORD (Green) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: What steps if any has she taken since assuming office in 1999 to ensure that those who live with people with mental illness are adequately informed of their situation by mental health service providers? 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Health) 
: 
 Several important steps have been taken to ensure better information-sharing occurs between mental health providers and those who care or live with people with mental illness. They include risk assessment by clinicians as well as improving the involvement of family and caregivers in both service provision and aiding the recovery of people with mental illness and improving information sharing by mental health service providers. 
Sue Bradford 
: In the light of the Lachlan Jones case and a report this month that an elderly Wellsford couple were attacked and held hostage by their boarder whose illness and history of violence were kept hidden from them by health officials is the Minister planning any further changes to district health board guidelines and/or any further staffing both for community assessment and treatment teams and for ongoing health assistance in the Waitemata and Northland District Health Board areas? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: Following the Lachlan Jones case I asked the Mental Health Commission to review the existing legislation to see whether we need to tighten up around the privacy legislation area in particular or to ensure that the privacy legislation did not stop the sharing of information. The commission came back to me in early 2002 and said that the existing legislation was working well but that the district health boards needed to have more consistent information and to use the protocols and guidelines in a more consistent way. Those guidelines were then rewritten and republished and provided to district health boards in September last year. They then trained their staff. The guidelines are now being used and will be reassessed by the Mental Health Commission by the end of this year. 
Dave Hereora 
: Following the Mental Health Commission’s review of acute mental health services in Auckland when several recommendations were made what progress has been made in implementing the recommendations? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: Good progress has been made. Improved service coordination was recommended and this is being achieved through a regional service coalition led by a regional director of mental health. The appointment has been made for that position. Twenty packages of care were to be provided and all three district health boards have put in place or are putting in place that care. They will all be fully operational by the end of April. An additional $3 million was allocated to cover the recommendations. 
Dr Lynda Scott 
: Why do family members and carers all over New Zealand feel shut out from and not informed of the care treatment and rehabilitation of people who have a mental illness with the result too often being loss through suicide of the patient or abuse at the hands of the person who has become unwell and is she prepared to change the Mental Health (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Act? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: I asked the Mental Health Commission to look at whether the Act needed to be changed following a review and change that was made in 1999 and implemented in 2000 in relation to information sharing. After the review the commission said there was not a need to change the Act. There was certainly a need for district health boards and those providing mental health services not to hide behind the Privacy Act but to use it in the way it was intended. 
Ron Mark 
: Does the Minister not understand that members of the public believe that as a result of the mental health reforms initiated during her previous term in Government in the 1980s many victims of people who should not have been in the community due to their mental health problems could have been avoided had that Government listened; and if she does understand that will she seek to hold people accountable for the decisions they have made that have resulted in people becoming victims of those crimes and indeed in order to restore some faith in the families of those victims a belief that this Government actually does care about them and what has happened to their families? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: There are a number of issues in that question. First of all deinstitutionalisation in New Zealand for mental health patients did not start in the 1980s; it started in the early 1950s with the first anti-psychotic drugs that enabled people to live in the community. From the 1950s right through to the end of the 1990s we have seen people taken out of mental institutions who did not need to live there. In any one month of the year 40000 New Zealanders receive mental health services within the community in a perfectly safe way. However I would say that whenever decisions are made for a person to go back into the community those who make the decisions on a clinical basis should take responsibility for those decisions. 
Sue Bradford 
: Would the Minister give consideration to recalling the people involved with the most recent Mason report in the 1990s and asking them to formally review progress since the report was tabled? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: I do not think it is necessary to have yet another Mason inquiry into mental health. As I said to the member—perhaps she did not hear it because it was at the end of my answer—I have asked the Mental Health Commission to ensure that the protocols and guidelines that are in place for information sharing are reviewed by the end of this year.