Staffordshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner Matthew Ellis is today calling on all Chief Executives from NHS, Local Authorities and other partner agencies to get together and ‘make it happen.’ He’s referring to a system that stops criminalisation of mentally ill people, where it’s an ambulance not a police car offering support.
This call to action by Matthew Ellis comes on the first day of the newly appointed mental health programme manager Zofja Zolna, who is set to take the work forward and increase the pace of business in this crucial area.
Police officers responded to 15,000 incidents in Staffordshire last year involving people with mental health issues many of which could have been dealt with by more appropriate agencies.
In work commissioned by Mr Ellis earlier this year, a case by case report highlighted the scale of the problem, how much time officers spend dealing with mental health issues and the significant impact this has on operational policing.
The Commissioner said: “We need to do something serious about this now; I set out a challenge for all services involved to sort this out and come up with plans for Staffordshire. We need to get a system that stops people with mental health problems being locked up in cells and find an appropriate alternative.
“I’m pleased that the Staffordshire report we did a few months ago has stimulated such incredible public debate and I get the sense that for the first time that things are starting to move forward. I would hope that in the next few months in Staffordshire we come to agreement where the NHS, where I and where other services will invest money into new services which are 24/7, stop people being locked up and get police doing what they should be doing, being out there, being visible and catching criminals.”
