Dr. Norella Broderick:

I was going to address the question on how we would best manage the issue of human rights. Senator Conway was hoping to hear specific examples. There are many provisions in the proposed legislation that we are happy with, as set out in the submission from the college. Specifically, to answer the Senator's question about human rights, we need to balance human rights. There is obviously the right to be involved in one's own healthcare and the right to liberty and so on that we are focused on. However, we also want to balance that against the right to treatment and to access treatment in a timely manner. We want to vindicate that right as well, and that is a big issue for us today. In terms of specific suggestions, we would not recommend changing the current standard for involuntary admission because the threshold has been raised and that is a concern for us in terms of people’s right to access healthcare. The second issue is who can initiate involuntary treatment. We think that restricting that to just authorised officers as Dr. Martin has set out would also restrict people’s access to timely mental health care when they are very unwell. I wanted to respond specifically to the question on human rights.