APPG AHW Webinar: How culture and creativity can support changes to the Mental Health Act

All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing (APPG AHW) Webinar hosted on 17 May 2021 by Arts and Health South West (former secretariat for the APPG AHW).
How can the arts, culture and creativity contribute to better experiences for people who come into contact with mental health services, and support the recommended changes to the Mental Health Act 1983?
The government consultation on Reforming the Mental Health Act (MHA) closed on the 21st April 2021. This roundtable discussion explored how culture and creativity can support the four principles on which the reforms are based. They aim to place people at the centre of decisions about their own care and ensure everyone is treated equally.
The principles are:
Choice and autonomy - ensuring service users’ views and choices are respected.
Least restriction - ensuring the MHA’s powers are used in the least restrictive way.
Therapeutic benefit - ensuring patients are supported to get better, so they can be discharged from the MHA.
The person as an individual - ensuring patients are viewed and treated as individuals.
Chair: Ben Spencer MP, Co-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing
Speakers included:
Dr Lorna Collins, Research Fellow, Expert by Experience
David Cutler, Director of The Baring Foundation
Sue Flowers, LENs North West Champion and Artist
Sandra Griffiths, Founder and Director of The Red Earth Collective
Dr Roisin Mooney and Professor Kam Bhui, University of Oxford
Stephen Sandford, Professional Lead for Allied Health Professionals, East London NHS Foundation Trust
Clancy Williams, Director, Angels Without Wings
Responses from:
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
Baroness Meacher