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Australia's mental health legislation

Part of: BJPsych International Mental Health Law Profile Collection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Kenneth C. Kirkby  and
Scott Henderson
Kenneth C. Kirkby
Affiliation:
University of Tasmania, Australia, email ken.kirkby@utas.edu.au
Scott Henderson
Affiliation:
The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
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Australia has a generally progressive approach to mental health law, reflective of international trends in human rights. Responsibility for most legislation is vested in the six States and two Territories, a total of eight jurisdictions, such that at any given time several new mental health acts are in preparation. In addition there is a model mental health act that promotes common standards. Transfer of orders between jurisdictions relies on Memoranda of Understanding between them, and is patchy. State and Territory legislation is generally cognisant of international treaty obligations, which are themselves the preserve of the Federal Parliament and legislature. UK legislation has had a key influence in Australia, the 1959 Mental Health Act in particular, with its strong emphasis on voluntary hospitalisation, prefacing deinstitutionalisation.

Type
Mental Health Law Profiles
Information
International Psychiatry , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , May 2013 , pp. 38 - 40
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits noncommercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists 2013

References

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