Unfitness to Plead Consultation Responses - Law Commission ...

Graham Rogers and Associates Limited
Graham Rogers
156 Little Cattins
Harlow
CM19 5RW
01279-301-676
0795-217-0627
27th January 2011
Dear Sir/Madam,
A colleague of mine recently mentioned that ‘fitness to plea’ was
being reviewed, with the idea that ‘psychiatrists only’ were to be able
to do this, and that a standardised version of an assessment was to be
undertaken.
The first thing to say is a 260 consultation paper is prohibitive. If you
want responses, make the paper a sensible length!
Psychiatrists only
As a psychologist, the current rules say you need two psychiatrists and
as such, there would be little change. However, my concern is more
fundamental, they work primarily in hospital and clinic settings, and not
in the community. Hence, in my experience they tend to rate people
according to their own experience and the population they deal with,
and not the wider community. Hence, as psychiatrists tend to see only
the most complex, this proposal would mean a dramatic reduction in
those being able to claim that they were, for whatever reason, ‘unfit to
plea.’
Hence, in talking in the past with Professors David Cooke (2009) and
Jane Ireland, both have independently said that the background and
experience of the expert determines, for example, the nature of the
outcome from a risk assessment. Professor Ireland in November 2010,
said that due to her experiences (Ashworth Hospital, Liverpool), she
tends to see risk at ‘every opportunity.’ It is in the nature of the
population at the hospital, that this is the case.
One therefore needs to consider the typical training and day-to-day
experience of the psychiatrist in order to understand how they are likely
to behave when assessing for the courts. It is the same issue that affect
all experts, including myself.
Experience and its limitations:
Psychiatrists are trained as general doctors first, before specialising.
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