Lynn Ruane (Independent)

I support this amendment. It is outside the space of this Bill but chemical restraint is widely used, even with regard to people's age and mental health, so it can affect people who end up in nursing homes or long-term wards in hospitals. I have my own experience of somebody being medicated because they were singing at night. When we look at this in terms of the medical constraint of a person's behaviour, it was being used in that situation because the nurses did not want the other people to be woken up by somebody singing. The singing was the person's regulation of their fear and anxiety. It kept them calm. Chemicals are used at an alarming rate to control people in hospitals. It makes me even more concerned to think about the degree to which they might be used in enclosed facilities where people are detained involuntarily or where there is even less access for families to pick up on it. The fact that I have seen it used in older age care makes me extremely concerned about it in this Bill. Having a broader definition of it is really necessary so that we protect vulnerable people in this situation. Someone's behaviour is not always a mental health issue and we do not need to control other people's behaviours just because they may be seen as a disruption to someone's shift. In my experience, that is how it has been used.