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During the year 20,155 visits were paid to persons under supervision or on licence
from hospitals and 1,244 to persons under voluntary supervision, while 1,508 enquiries
were made to ascertain the home circumstances of patients in connection with the
statutory review of orders and the consideration of applications for leave of absence or
discharge.
Ascertainment
and
supervision
The ascertainment of the majority of defectives and the oversight of defectives under
guardianship has in the past been carried out by medical officers and social workers on
the central staff and the supervision of defectives in their own homes by social workers
employed in four local offices. Following an investigation in 1955 into the organisation
and methods in use in the department it was decided that the social workers employed
centrally should be allocated to the four local offices. The retirement of the senior
inspector in 1956 provided an opportunity to make this decision effective and in
December the change was made. As a result in future, with the exception mentioned
below, all mental deficiency social work will be undertaken by the four local offices.
A senior organiser charged with the duty of co-ordinating and supervising the work of
the social workers in the local offices was appointed to the central staff and this officer
will, in addition, undertake personal guardianship in certain special cases, in particular
of the girls at Dover Lodge, visit residential (E.S.N.) schools having children about to be
dealt with under the Mental Deficiency Acts and act as a link with the medical staff
who will remain at the central office.
Definition of
' neglected '
In February, 1956, a case affecting the working of the Mental Deficiency Acts
(Regina v. The Board of Control ex parte Rutty) was heard by the Lord Chief Justice,
Mr. Justice Hilbery and Mr. Justice Devlin in the Divisional Court. The Court expressed
the opinion that the word 'neglected' in Section 2(1) (b) of the Mental Deficiency Act,
1913, which sets out the circumstances which render defectives subject to be dealt with,
must at least be construed as meaning 'physically suffering from a lack of essentials
through want of reasonable care' and that the words 'found neglected' can only
intend a condition in existence at the time and cannot refer to a future condition which
it is apprehended will or may come about. This interpretation of the meaning of
'neglected' is much narrower than has commonly been observed by local authorities
in the past. It has, for example, been the practice of the Council, where a person in a
home for normal persons or a home for persons with a handicap other than mental
deficiency, has been ascertained to be mentally deficient and the authorities of the home
have expressed the intention to discharge him, to regard him as 'neglected' if he has no
home of his own to go to and to deal with him under the Mental Deficiency Acts.
The only alternatives to this course of action are either to leave him in the home, which
is not provided for his type of case, or to discharge him into the street and wait until he is
' physically suffering from a lack of essentials
The effect of the decision is to bring into question the validity of many orders made
in the past under the Mental Deficiency Acts and to make it virtually impossible to deal
with defectives on the ground of 'neglect' either on petition or by removal to a
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