Report / Royal Commission on the Law Relating to Mental Illness and Mental Deficiency 1954-1957.
- Great Britain. Royal Commission on the Law Relating to Mental Illness and Mental Deficiency 1954-1957.
- Date:
- 1957
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Report / Royal Commission on the Law Relating to Mental Illness and Mental Deficiency 1954-1957. Source: Wellcome Collection.
315/346 page 303
![PROCEDURE AND SOURCES OF EVIDENCE AND INFORMATION (1) We held our first meeting in private on 25th February, 1954, to consider our procedure. We issued a notice in the press on March 14th, 1954, announcing that we were ready to receive evidence, and asked persons wishing to submit evidence to us to send a memorandum in writing. We also addressed invitations to a number of associations and societies who appeared likely to have special knowledge of subjects within our terms of reference. We later fixed March Ist, 1955, as the closing date for the submission of written memoranda of evidence. (ii) We received memoranda of evidence from 68 associations, societies, local authorities, hospital authorities and government departments, and memoranda or letters on subjects within our terms of reference from nearly 250 individual persons, including many engaged in or associated with mental health work, patients in mental and mental deficiency hospitals, former patients, patients’ relatives and others. Many of these offered to give oral evidence in support of their written memoranda. It was not practicable for us to invite all those who offered to give oral evidence; we selected those from whom it seemed to us desirable to obtain further amplification of the views set out in their written memoranda or letters. We took oral evidence from 42 associations, societies and public authorities and 11 individual persons. Lists of those who gave oral evidence, and of some of the others who sent written memoranda or letters, are given at the end of this Appendix. In the second list we have not included the names of any present or former patients or other persons who wrote about the personal experiences of individual patients; we found their letters of great interest and assistance, but as we know that many would prefer their names not to be mentioned, we have omitted the names of all. (iii) Our oral evidence was taken in public, except that we heard in private four witnesses who were either former mental hospital patients or wished to speak about the experiences of individual patients. The minutes of evidence taken in public were published in daily parts; the evidence taken in private is being published simultaneously with this report. An appendix to the minutes of evidence has also been published, containing memoranda supplied in response to requests made by us in the course of oral evidence, and some other memo- randa from persons or associations from whom we did not take ora] evidence. An index to the minutes of evidence, including the appendix, is also being published, (iv) We received letters from over 60 present patients or other persons asking us to arrange for individual patients to be discharged from hospital or trans- ferred to a different hospital. We had to inform these correspondents that we had no power to arrange such discharge or transfer. (v) We are grateful to the Board of Control for allowing us access to their files, and to other public authorities who supplied us with information on request. All the statistics quoted in this report were supplied by the Ministry of Health or the General Register Office, except where otherwise indicated ; we are much indebted to them for helping us in this way. (vi) We have studied the reports of the two Royal Commissions which enquired | into various aspects of our mental health legislation and administration earlier in this century (the Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble- minded, 1904-08, and the Royal Commission on Lunacy and Mental Disorder, 1924-26), and the reports of other Commissions and Committees which appeared relevant to our enquiry. (vii) We did not as a Commission make any formal visits to hospitals or local authority establishments, but we all made informal visits, singly or in small groups, to hospitals or local authority centres; at Rampton Hospital, Retford, and Belmont Hospital, Sutton, several of us met groups of psychopathic patients. We wish to express our gratitude to all the members and staff of the hospital 303](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b32177768_0315.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
