Ms Angela Denning:

It is a tricky balance. Our courts, at District Court level, every day are filled with people who have addiction problems and mental health issues and who have made poor decisions as a consequence of that. However, they do not fall into a degree of severity so that the High Court would invoke its jurisdiction to detain somebody and make them a ward of court. There is a significant distance between that. That is part of the challenge we have. This is a stepped regime for people with mental incapacity for medical reasons in the main.