'Axeing mental health calls is a cop-out - they can't STOP and abandon people'

03 June 2023 , 15:32

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Met Police duties are about to change (Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

I’m eternally grateful to the two young policemen who rushed to my aid when I discovered a friend in the midst of a mental health crisis 20 years ago.

She was locked in the bathroom of her London flat threatening suicide, having already made an attempt on her life some weeks earlier.

I rang 999 and the police were there within minutes.

They forced entry and stopped my friend from harming herself as we waited for an ambulance.

Then, as she refused to go to hospital voluntarily, she had to be sectioned under the Mental Health Act.

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But those two patient and caring cops stayed with us through a long, harrowing night as we travelled to a psychiatric unit and got her the care she needed.

Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley rightly wants his officers out on the streets catching criminals (PAUL GILLIS / Reach PLC)

I wonder what would happen if, God forbid, I had to make the same 999 call this September?

Because on August 31, the Metropolitan Police will stop answering mental health callouts to “focus on fighting crime”.

Officers will still be dispatched to an incident if there’s “an immediate threat to life”. But while I might be convinced of my friend’s suicidal intent, how would an over-stretched call handler decide if her threats were real or immediate?

Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley rightly wants his officers out on the streets catching criminals rather than stuck in A&E departments with patients.

And it’s truly shocking that they spend 10,000 hours a month picking up the pieces of our broken mental health system, while 69,000 crimes a year go unrecorded.

But they can’t just STOP and abandon people in their greatest hour of need.

It isn’t a choice between catching baddies or helping people in crisis.

It’s about protecting vulnerable, frightened people and getting them to a place of safety.

And it’s about protecting the caring society in which we all want to live.

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Years of underfunding the NHS and social services have put the police in a terrible position.

But, tragically, there is simply no one else to rush in and save people teetering on the edge of a mental health abyss.

We need a proper, nationwide mental health infrastructure with enough doctors, therapists, beds and community services.

And we need expert psychiatric crisis teams ready to respond to the 999 calls when they come.

That will all take time, money and real commitment from the Government, of course.

But it’s the only way to lift this huge burden from our patient, caring cops.

Rachael Bletchly