TUC general secretary PAUL NOWAK speaks to the Morning Star’s Berny Torre about the increasing frustration the trade union movement feels at a government that promised change, but has been too slow to bring it about
Inside the Mental Health Bill
PROFESSOR ANSELM ELDERGILL explains why this new piece of government legislation is giving cause for concern
DIANE ABBOTT exposes the misconceptions, rumours and downright lies perpetrated around immigration issues
With 12,000 fewer teachers since 2010 and dwindling resources, Scotland’s schools desperately need investment to support diverse learners rather than empty promises from politicians, writes ANDREA BRADLEY
Reversing outsourcing is the pre-election promise the government must honour, says Unison general secretary CHRISTINA McANEA
EMAN ABU ZAYED reminisces about the perilous time her family and neighbours endured in northern Gaza and how they were forced, in fear of their lives, to flee south
The EIS president who defended Marxist politics in the 1980s fought Thatcherite educational policies while organising Teachers for Peace rallies and ensuring Morning Star circulation in Scotland’s pit villages and factories, writes JOHN FOSTER
THE government’s Mental Health Bill is currently before Parliament. It amends the Mental Health Act 1983, which is the Act of Parliament under which people are “sectioned.”
The Bill is the culmination of a process which the then prime minister Theresa May begun in 2017 when she commissioned an independent review of the 1983 Act by a panel under Professor Simon Wessely. I chaired the Patient Safeguards and Mental Health Tribunals Working Group which formed part of that review.
The Bill is disappointingly limited in scope and ambition. The current system is 66 years old, as old as the Lunacy Act 1890 was when it was replaced by the present framework in the 1950s. We needed a new Act. Eight years on, we have an amending Bill that preserves the framework and much of the old legislation.
More from this author
ANSELM ELDERGILL examines the government’s proposals to further limit the right of citizens to trial by jury
Leaving the ECHR will not reduce illegal immigration as the far right claim, but it will reduce our rights, liberties and restrictions on the wealthy’s control of government, explains ANSELM ELDERGILL
ANSELM ELDERGILL draws attention to a legal case on Tuesday in which a human rights group is challenging the government’s decision to allow the sale of weapons used against Palestinians
In a legal system that is increasingly removing judicial discretion, the fundamental question remains whether justice requires a compassionate heart or a dispassionate application of Parliament’s will, writes ANSELM ELDERGILL
