An asylum seeker had come to be detained under the Mental Health Act. The Home Secretary, having refused the asylum application, ordered him to be repatriated.
Held: Though the Secretary of State could only exercise his powers of removal under section 86 of the MHA if it appeared to him to be in the patient’s interests and with the approval of the MHT, the use of his powers under the 1971 Act were not expressly circumscribed in relation to persons detained under the MHA. Though this might lead to greater harm for the applicant, it was not a breach of his Article 3 rights. The two schemes could run side by side, and the Home Secretary appeared properly to have considered the applicant’s mental condition.
Schiemann LJ said that the 1971 Act and the MHA deal with different categories of persons: the mentally ill and immigrants: ‘Parliament when enacting the Immigration Act 1971 had section 90 of the Mental Health Act 1959, the predecessor of section 86 of the 1983 Act, in mind: see section 30 of the 1971 Act which extended existing statutory powers for the removal of aliens receiving in-patient treatment for mental illness to all persons subject to immigration control.
Similarly Parliament when enacting the Mental Health Act 1983 had the Immigration Act 1971 in mind. Section 86(1) of the 1983 Act specifically refers to it and paragraph 30 of Schedule 4 and Schedule 6 to the 1983 Act expressly amended section 30 of the 1971 Act to which we have just referred.
The interaction of these two Acts is something to which Parliament has adverted its attention yet what Parliament clearly did not do expressly was to circumscribe the Home Secretary in the use of his Immigration Act powers in the case of Mental Health Act patients.
Parliament could have made special provision for those who fell into both categories, perhaps by providing a special regime for them, perhaps by providing that the Immigration Act regime was to prevail and be the only one, perhaps by providing that the Mental Health Act regime should be the only one. It did not do so. It left in existence two sets of powers either of which could be used subject to the conditions prescribed for the use of that power.
. . There appears to us no reason why the two regimes should not run in parallel in the case of a person who is both an immigrant and mentally ill. Clearly if the Home Secretary proposes to use his Immigration Act powers in relation to a mentally ill person that illness will be a factor which he must take into account. It is not suggested in the instant case that he has failed to do so.’
Judges:
Schiemann LJ
Citations:
Times 09-Jan-2001, [2001] 1 WLR 740
Statutes:
Immigration Act 1971, Mental Health Act 1983
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – MJ (Angola) v Secretary of State for The Home Department CA 20-May-2010
The applicant had been ordered to be deported and returned to Angola, but at the same time he was a detained mental patient. He argued that a return would breach his Article 8 rights.
Held: The respondent was entitled to decide to deport the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Immigration, Health, Human Rights
Updated: 11 May 2022; Ref: scu.87940