Reducing Police Involvement In Mental Health Incidents Is ‘Game Changer’

A NEW agreement that means less police involvement in 999 responses to mental health incidents will be a “game-changer”, South Yorkshire Police Federation has said.

Under the National Partnership Agreement, people experiencing mental health issues will be attended to by medical professionals as the priority, rather than the police as default.

The new agreement is based on a model developed by Humberside Police, called Right Care, Right Person, which has saved the force 1,100 hours per month. However, officers will still attend such incidents where they are needed.

South Yorkshire Police Federation Chair Steve Kent said: “This hasn’t been instigated in our force just yet, but it’s coming in and it will be a game-changer.

“It’s absolutely right, because the police service has always been the service that can’t say no. When social services are run ragged or there’s nobody on duty, or the NHS have run out of resources, they’ll send police in.

“That creates a reliance on policing to plug the gaps, when we can’t even meet our own demand, let alone anybody else’s.

“The public should expect the right people to go to these incidents. For people in mental health crises, for example, it shouldn’t be the police, because we’re not medical professionals. It should be specialist NHS staff who would go in.”

He continued: “I really welcome this, because we have taken on these burdens way too often. The public and media see how much the NHS is struggling, but they don’t see how much the police are struggling. We cannot keep carrying the can for everybody else.

“I have sympathy with social workers and people in the NHS, I absolutely know the strain they’re under. They need to be resourced properly.

“But also sometimes we don’t help ourselves because we take on risks that we don’t need to take on. It’s about having the courage to say, ‘No, this is not a police matter. This is the right agency you need to speak to’. Humberside has already seen a dramatic decrease in demand on their officers, so it does work.

“We in the Federation absolutely support this, because it will take the lid off the pressure cooker.”