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Mental Health Bill [HL]

As the Minister is coming to his summing-up, I thought that this might be the right place to put a question to him, which is in two parts. He began by saying that such principles should not be in the Act—it is an amending Act, but no legal point derives from that—but that they should be in a code of practice. However, he has since said that he does not accept the principles, although I noticed that he said nothing about the discrimination principle. He seems to oppose all the others, so that they will not be in a code of practice. His logic is that he does not like them. The second part of the question is perhaps more important—we shall come to it as the Minister said. Is not the stance of the Government on the matter of putting highly valuable principles on the face of the Bill really based on the new treatment principle, with the highly subjective test of appropriate treatment, instead of a straightforward, objective test which it would be much better for patients and those who want the Act’s protection to have?