Foreword

We lead with the publication of the Paul Sieghart Memorial Lecture delivered by Brenda Hale for the British Institute of Human Rights on 7th July 2004. We are very grateful to Lady Hale and the Institute for permission to publish this acclaimed consideration of the question ‘What can the Human Rights Act do for my mental health?’. On 12th November 2004 the Law School of Northumbria University, together with Eversheds (solicitors), hosted the 2nd North East Mental Health Law Conference in Newcastle upon Tyne. We are very pleased to publish three papers arising from (and updated since) the Conference. In this issue we publish two responses to the Draft Mental Health Bill 2002 , one from Mat Kinton and the other from The Law Society, and Lucy Scott-Moncrieff provides a preliminary response to the findings of the Joint Parliamentary Scrutiny Committee.