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49
MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES
This service is one of the functions transferred from the former
Middlesex County Council under the London Government Act 1963.
The Mental Health Service forms part of the National Health Service
and local health authorities have certain functions to perform under
Section 28 of the National Health Service Act 1946, and Section 6 of the
Mental Health Act 1959.
The Mental Health Act is considered to be one of the most important
pieces of social legislation introduced in this century and it makes fresh
provision for the treatment and care of mentally disordered persons,
including attention to their property and affairs. The Act emphasises the
care of the mentally disordered in the community and local health authorities
are now required to provide full community care facilities as a complement
to hospital services.
Prior to this Act, mental illness was dealt with under The Lunacy
and Mental Treatment Acts, 1890—1930, and Subnormality under the
Mental Deficiency Acts, 1913—1938. The 1959 Act repealed all these acts
and dissolved the Board of Control. It also removed the terms 'mental
deficiency', 'mental defectiveness' and 'defective'. The terms now used to
describe mental disorder are 'mental illness', 'psychopathic disorder',
'subnormality' and 'severe subnormality'.
The functions of the local health authority include:—
(a) the provision, equipment and maintenance of residential accommodation,
and the care of persons for the time being resident in
accommodation so provided;
(b) the provision of centres or other facilities for training or occupation,
and the equipment and maintenance of such centres;
(c) the appointment of mental welfare officers authorised to act on
behalf of the local health authority and who have certain powers
and legal obligations under the 1959 Act;
(d) certain powers in respect of persons placed under Guardianship
(whether placed under the guardianship of the local health authority
or of other persons); and
(e) the provision of any ancillary or supplementary services for or
for the benefit of those persons suffering from or have been suffering
from mental disorder.
The two main hospitals which cater for the mentally disordered in
Harrow are Shenley Hospital, Nr. St. Albans, Hertfordshire, which accepts
the mentally ill, and Leavesden Hospital, Abbots Langley, Hertfordshire,
which accepts subnormal and severely subnormal patients, and the Hertfordshire
County Council has authorised this Authority's Mental Welfare
Officers to act within Hertfordshire for the purposes of the Mental Health
Act 1959.