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Otago Daily Times, Issue 19583, 12 September 1925, Page 10

MENTAL HOSPITALS. Dtoing the consideration yesterday oi the estimates of expenditure for the Mental Hospitals Department there was no real repetition of the complaints which were made by members of the Labour group in the Lower House when the annual departmental report was brought down. In these circumstances, and in view * of the policy of obstruction which the Labour members have been pursuing this week, there seems to be some ground for the suggestion that they simply seized the presentation of the report as a pretext for wasting time. In any event, however, it was a little surprising to find them carrying their argument at that time respecting the desirability of an “overhaul” of the mental hospital system of the Dominion to the point of urging the appointment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry. As they have offered vigorous opposition to the setting up of other commissions it might have been expected that they would be reluctant to put the country to the expense of an inquiry into the conditions obtaining in its mental hospitals when they have no definite cause of complaint regarding them. It was left to Mr Lysnar last week to assert that persons are “bundled” into the mental hospitals of the Dominion in “a loose and flippant way.” It might almost be conjectured from what he said that nobody is quite safe. Evidently he has no confidence in the manner in which either doctors or magistrates discharge their duties in relation to the committal of persons to mental hospitals. But there is fortunately no reason to take his charges very seriously. Beyond them the arguments in favour of the appointment of a Mental Hospitals Commission were distinctly vague and unconvincing. Mr Savage docs not think that “everything is as it should be.” But where are the grave grievances and the radical abuses the consideration of which, and the discovery of a remedy for which, would be the appropriate task for a Royal Commission ? There lias been no attempt to specify them or to show that there are any features in the administration of the mental hospitals that call for redress. That is not to suggest that there is any perfection about the mental hospital system of the Dominion, or that there is not room for departmental activity in effecting improvements where they seem to be desirable. It is acknowledged, indeed, by the department itself that there is a good deal of room for improvement, but it asks that it shall be allowed time to apply the remedies that are required. “If within the nextsix months our institutions arc not improved out of sight,” the Minister said yesterday, “you can have as many Royal Commissions as you like.” It is a fair bargain that is proposed, and so the House seems to have

thought. The admission of patients and the classification of inmates constitute particularly important assets of the system. And the need for the provision of some intermediate institution, that would meet the requirements of what are termed borderline cases, has been emphasised so strongly that clearly this is a matter to which the department must give attention. Sir Truby King, it will have been observed, has lent the weight of his authority in opposition to the view that the institution of half-way houses, for the care and treatment of persons suffering from potentially curable mental affections, is desirable. There is no name in the Dominion that commands greater respect in relation to the treatment of mental disease than that of Sir Truby King. It is with regret, therefore, that we are unable to follow his contention, as w© understand it, that persons in the incipient stages of insanity are less likely to recover if they are preserved from the environment of a mental hospital than if they are committed to such an institution, with its generally depressing associations. On the other baud, it is to be recognised fully that the treatment of cases of mental disease, from the earliest stages, should be controlled by capable and experienced practitioners.

Wales at Capetown he made aa important declaration on the question of secession, stating that personally he considered that separation weald be a flagrant mistake and a national disaster for Sooth Africa if it was caused by on© section of the community imposing its will on the other. •'He did not fear,” he added, “that secession would arise so long as each section refrained from asserting its superiority or dominance over the other' section.” In consequence of this speech Mr Hertsog was twitted by an organ of the Nationalist Party with breaking the pact with Labour not to raise the secession issue for a definite period, and was reminded that tne Nationalist straggle had always been for the realisation of the ideal of absolute independence. Evidently Mr Boos has deemed it quit© appropriate that he should speak publicly in favour of separation m view of the Prime Minister’s example m speakjrK' against it. Mr Boos is deriving for creating sensations by pronouncements from which it has been possible to draw the conclusion that the South African Ministry is not a particularly happy family.