Churchgoers Urge Priority for Black People in Psychiatric Care

Thousands of churchgoers across the UK urged the Government to make black people in psychiatric care a "national priority".

|TOP|The groups, who all represent black majority churches across the UK, are campaigning against the 1983 Mental Health Act which they claim discriminates against black people.

The central role Black churches have played in the civil rights movement both in the UK and in the United State has many believe been critical in combating many of the abuses of ethnic minorities rights.

Politicians will review the Act this autumn, as the churches want black people to be made a top priority as African-Caribbean people currently make up a third of patients in medium psychiatric care despite representing less than 3% of the national population.

The Black Mental Health campaign is led by the Black Londoner's Forum and supported by a range of organisations including the African Caribbean Evangelical Alliance, the Council of Black Led Churches and Christians Together.

The groups will launch the campaign before more than 200,000 delegates at the international conference of Europe's churches at the Kingsway International Christian Centre in London.

Chiefs behind the Black Mental Health campaign will argue African Caribbeans are subject to unacceptably high rates of sectioning, control and restraint, over-medication and misdiagnosis despite having similar rates of mental ill health as other ethnic groups.

The churches are now calling on the Government to take on board black peoples' legal duties under the Human Rights Act and Race Relations Amendment Act.

|AD|Campaign supporter and barrister, David Neita, said: "This campaign will stop the Government in its tracks and force them to take on board the views of church leaders who represent the majority of black people in this country.

"We are fighting for our civil and human rights. The death of David Bennett in a Norwich clinic after being restrained by staff proves that getting the law right is a matter of life and death for people in our community."

The chair of the African Caribbean Mental Health Commission, Lee Jasper, said: "The fact this Bill has not gone to Parliament is a great opportunity for us to impress upon Government the radical change that we need to see in the redrafting of the Bill.

"Launching this campaign during the national conference of Europe's largest church is a huge opportunity for black churches as a whole to demonstrate their collective strength and use it to galvanise the community, who have been disproportionately affected by this issue, into action."

Eroll Walter, the director of the Black Londoners' Forum, added: "It is unacceptable to think that we would stand by and allow legislation which will negatively effect another generation in our community to go by uncontested.

"This is a democracy and we will use the system to effect the change that we want to see as we did last time with the defeat of the 2004 Mental Health Bill."