Roy Heather: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Roy Heather: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:607;Page:4544] 
11.  
HEATHER ROY (ACT NZ) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: Does she stand by comments made on her behalf in the House on 26 March 2003 that “keeping patients in police cells when they should be in health services is an unacceptable situation in isolated parts of Auckland” and “it does not represent a crisis in mental health services”; if so how long is she prepared to allow this practice to continue? 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Health) 
: 
 I stand by my comments that keeping patients in police cells when they should be in health services is an unacceptable situation. The police are a legitimate pathway into mental health services but patients should not be held for more than 6 hours before transfer. District health boards are being monitored to ensure they are using the additional money the Government has provided to put in place appropriate services as fast as possible. 
Heather Roy 
: In the light of the Minister’s answer is not the real reason that 32 out of the 360 prison inmates under psychiatric care and treatment within the last 6 months are awaiting beds in psychiatric forensic units that the politically correct drive to deinstitutionalise has been a complete failure or is it her opinion that it is acceptable to have the mentally unwell handcuffed in their cells because their conditions cannot be controlled in prison? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: There are people in prison who have mental illnesses but they have also committed a crime. Some mental health services are provided in prisons. Those who are seriously mentally unwell ought to be held in appropriate facilities. However one of the key issues for mental health and it has remained a key issue for a number of years is the lack of a trained mental health workforce to be able to provide all the services that are required. I am pleased to say that there has been some improvement in that area but there is still some way to go. 
Dr Lynda Scott 
: What words of advice does she have for a mother with a depressed and suicidal son in Auckland who when the crisis team could not get there soon enough was advised to call the police—who held her son in a prison cell and treated him like a prisoner rather than a patient—and who now has absolutely no confidence in New Zealand’s mental health system? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: It is unfortunate when that happens. It is certainly not a new thing in New Zealand. If one reads back over the years one finds it has happened for decades. What we are doing as fast as we can is providing the appropriate health services for people. However I am glad that the police do work with the mental health services because I can only assume the member would prefer that the person had no help at all. 
Ron Mark 
: Who is responsible for mental patients who have committed crimes and ended up in our prisons: the Ministers who place them in the community without the proper mental health services to support them due to the unrealistic expectations of the deinstitutionalisation process or the patients themselves? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: That member consistently makes comments about mental health patients. There are thousands of mental health patients who live in the community and who do not commit crimes—they do not murder rob or beat people up—but there are thousands of New Zealanders who are said to be sane and who do so. What we do need is for those who are seriously mentally unwell to receive the appropriate services to help them. We have a deficit in New Zealand in terms of those services whether they are in institutions or in the community and I am pleased to see that considerable resources have been put in by this Government over a short period of time. 
Ron Mark 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I asked who is responsible. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The Minister addressed the question. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. If she did she took three-quarters of the question to get to an answer that was not to do with the question. She began by attacking my colleague for making speeches. She then moved on to what she called innocent mental health patients who had not committed any crime. None of that was asked of her. The question she was asked was who is responsible: the Minister or the victims themselves? She still has not answered that question. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The Minister has addressed the question. 
Heather Roy 
: Does she find it acceptable that due to a lack of psychiatric beds patients are discharged into the community only to commit murder and then to be imprisoned as has happened on three occasions in the Wellington region in the last 9 months with one of those patients going on to kill himself in his prison cell; if not why does she refuse to address the problem of the lack of psychiatric beds? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: This Government is addressing that lack—and not just of psychiatric beds. There have to be people to treat psychiatric patients when they are in the beds. This Government has put in an extra $257 million in the last 3 years. The National Government when it was in power neglected mental health. This Government has not. 
Heather Roy 
: I seek leave of the House to table a document printed in the  
Dominion Post  
on 12 March outlining how patients with psychiatric illnesses in prisons are handcuffed in their cells. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that newspaper article. Is there any objection? There is. 
Ron Mark 
: Noting that the Minister has said on numerous occasions that sane people who are not mental patients commit crimes and that there is exaggerated comment about the numbers of people who are mental patients who commit crimes can the Minister table in the House the exact crime statistics that show how many crimes committed in this country were committed by people with a psychiatric illness or problem that had been identified; can the Minister give us those numbers to verify what she is saying? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: I believe I can give the member the number of people who have committed murders and who are seriously mentally unwell. I am unsure—and perhaps the Minister of Police could be asked this question—whether that can be done for other crimes but we do keep statistics on mentally unwell people who have committed murder. That member might wish to ask a question of the Minister of Police.