Scott Lynda: Intellectual Disability (Compulsory Care and Rehabilitation) Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
Scott Lynda: Intellectual Disability (Compulsory Care and Rehabilitation) Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:612;Page:9575] 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 This part contains some substantial provisions including definitions interpretations and the commencement dates. I want to talk about clause 7 “Meaning of intellectual disability”. We spent a great deal of time discussing this in the Health Committee. We did not want the definition to be too narrow. A definition that is too narrow would mean there were people who were not captured under the provisions of this bill. 
I had amongst my select committee papers an article from  
Truth 
 dated 26 March 1999 that has the headlines “Handicapped flasher hounded” and “Townsfolk gang up on village idiot”. I think that shows us how far we have come in the way we treat people with an intellectual disability because I do not believe those headlines would be used today. The article was about the pretty sad case of a chap called Peter McCallion who had a quite significant intellectual disability. He ended up in prison where he should not have been was accused of all sorts of things he never did and was beaten up severely. The people who had cared for him said: “There just aren’t any places for the Peters of this world.” That is what this bill is all about—making sure there are places for the Peters of this world who have a significant intellectual disability and who come before the law because of behaviour they are not responsible for or who have no anger management and just act out. 
The select committee came up with a new definition for intellectual disability. Rather than defining a person as having an intellectual disability if he or she has an IQ of 70 or below the committee tried to expand the definition by stating under clause 7(1): “A person has an intellectual disability if the person has a permanent impairment that—(a) results in significantly sub-average general intelligence as measured by standard psychometric tests generally used by clinicians; and (b) results in significant deficits as measured by tests generally used by clinicians in at least 2 of the skills listed ...”. The reason that was added to the definition is that somebody may have an IQ that is higher than 70 but be very deficient in certain skills especially social skills. If that happens that person may not be captured in a rigid definition that uses just an intelligence quotient and if that is the case this bill will not be able to be used to have him or her placed in compulsory care or in a permanent facility. Certainly in the case of Peter that is where he needed to be. He needed to be in a place where he could be cared for appropriately. 
Clause 7(2) states: “For the purposes of diagnosing under subsection (1)(a) a person’s general intelligence as significantly sub-average—(a) an intelligence quotient of approximately 70 or less ...” but we said under paragraph (c): “a possible quotient of 75 is the effective maximum at which a person’s intelligence can be diagnosed to be of that kind.” The Minister has a Supplementary Order Paper that takes that quotient of 75 back to 70. Amongst the people I spoke to who work in the intellectual disability and mental health areas there were those who thought it was of concern if the definitions were too rigid. The skills subclause that the select committee put in refers to the ability to communicate self-care home living social skills use of community services self-direction health and safety reading writing and arithmetic and leisure and work. We are talking about people who can actually function in society. I am sure there are quite a few people who do not function in society who do not have an intellectual disability but we are trying to confine the definition under this bill to those who do. So there is concern about that under clause 7. 
Clause 6(2) refers to special-care recipients meaning a person who is liable to be detained in a secure facility under an order made under the Criminal Justice Act. We have just debated the amendments to the Criminal Justice Act from which a new bill was developed—one that we did not support.