Blair: grave concerns on mental health bill

The Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has privately told ministers and senior Labour MPs that he has grave concerns about proposed mental health laws described as "draconian" by campaigners.

Mr Blair acknowledged that the Government needed to "disentangle" measures to detain indefinitely people with dangerous personality disorders from other proposals to improve mental health care.

Government sources said Mr Blair told MPs at a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party earlier this month that mistakes had been made in drafting the Mental Health Bill and that more time was needed to rethink the reforms.

He is understood to have responded to a question on the Bill's progress from Dr Doug Naysmith, a member of the health select committee.

This follows huge opposition to the Government's proposed reforms from the Mental Health Alliance, whose members include the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Law Society. The Independent on Sunday is campaigning against the Bill and in favour of better treatment for the mentally ill.

The alliance is concerned about plans to compel people with dangerous personality disorders to be detained indefinitely, when they have committed no crime.

Last Wednesday, while a protest was staged at the Commons, Mr Blair admitted publicly the Bill raised "difficult issues". At Prime Minister's Questions, he said: "The public worry that some people, who tragically have a severe mental disorder, can pose a threat to the public, so we need to strike a balance."

Alan Milburn, the Secretary of State for Health, is now understood to be reconsidering the reforms. However, government sources said that the Home Secretary was pressuring Mr Milburn to ensure that measures to detain people with dangerous personality disorders were left intact.

The pair are at loggerheads over the Bill which David Blunkett regards as the means to curb anti-social behaviour. Next week, Mr Blunkett is the keynote speaker at a conference organised by the Zito Trust which wants compulsory treatment in the community.

The Department of Health has received more than 2,000 responses to the draft Bill, including those from the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Disability Rights Commission. Last night, mental health charities said they welcomed the Government's attention to their concerns.

However, the mental health charity Rethink said new laws were still needed to improve services and remove the stigma of mental illness. "It's more important to get the Bill right than to get it early. We are very concerned that the proposals are worse than the existing law," said its spokesman, Paul Corrie.