18th November 2015

Claire ANDRE from Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (NTW) is the only ‘police liaison mental health nurse’ in the country – a coordinating role in her trust to work on all issues that interface with the police from s136 and street triage, to liaison and diversion of vulnerable people in contact with the criminal justice system.  She is single-handedly flogging her way around Northumbria Police changing the world and last night was award-winning in the Positive Practice Collaboration awards hosted in Newcastle:  highly commended for the work she does – quite rightly, too!  So this short blog by (the award-winning!) Claire, gives notice of a free learning event she has coordinated in the North-East, supported by NHS England and by the Positive Practice Collaboration.

Since starting my role as Clinical Police Liaison Lead for NTW for over a year I have been privileged to work with Police on many areas. Work has been led by national agendas but some also local initiatives.  We have seen many new bits of guidance which affects this world like CQC report ‘Safer Place to Be‘, a new Code of Practice to the Mental Health Act practice, and a Government review of sections 136/S135 – and, of course, the Crisis Care Concordat.

There has been a lot talked about and some work completed with the first part of this partnership journey including Street Triage schemes and Criminal Justice Liaison and Diversion.  As those of us who work in the NHS & Police know there is much, much more to be done, with some areas much further ahead than others and both organisations feeling financial pressures already with more in coming years – so we need to work better together and understand each other more!

18th November 2015 in Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Register to attend on EventBrite.

So on that basis the mental health Positive Practice Collaboration has worked with NHS England to secure funding for a ‘mental health and policing learning event’.  The even better news in my humble opinion is that it will be held in the Newcastle-upon-Tyne and I will be facilitating this event with Michael Brown from the College of Policing.  We both want it to be productive and to add value for those who come and we are very aware that there are areas of policing and mental work that could be focussed on beyond street triage and section 136 – issues such as missing people, partnership roles, police deployment to mental health wards to mention just a few … Michael and I are both keen to push legal education for all professionals – but we really want those of you who work in this world to attend and shape the event, to tell us what they would like covered and how the day should be.

• Do you want presentations & workshops and what would these look like?
• Do you want to see and share good practice in policing and mental health?

We have confirmed keynote speakers including Kate DAVIES from NHS England who heads up strategic development on mental health and criminal justice; and Commander Christine JONES from the Metropolitan Police who is also the lead on mental health from the National Police Chiefs Council.  We now want your ideas about workshops!

We want the event to focus on issues beyond street triage: that subject was well covered in the EXPO hosted by Leicestershire Police in August and there are other issues which are often in the shadows of street triage that need discussing, as mentioned above.

Please let us know if you would like to be a part of this and if you would be willing to run a workshop.  You can either leave your idea / details on the BLOG comments, below or email either Michael or me.  Full details to attend this free event in the best city in England(!) will be on EventBrite very soon.

Claire’s email address – claire.andre@ntw.nhs.uk

Michael’s email address – michael.brown2@college.pnn.police.uk

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Winner of the President’s Medal,
the Royal College of Psychiatrists.

Winner of the Mind Digital Media Award

 

All opinions expressed are my own – they do not represent the views of any organisation.
(c) Michael Brown, 2015

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I try to keep this blog up to date, but inevitably over time, amendments to the law as well as court rulings and other findings from inquests and complaints processes mean it is difficult to ensure all the articles and pages remain current.  Please ensure you check all legal issues in particular and take appropriate professional advice where necessary.

Government legislation website – www.legislation.gov.uk

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