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Since (due to some stupid Times article) people seem to be talking about the Human Rights Act, here's my story about it. It'll go on longer than it ought to, but that's the point.
Many years ago - specifically, on 13 September 2000 - I was sectioned under the Mental Health Act. I shouldn't have been, but I was. These things do happen.
Immediately on my arrival at the secure unit (well, immediately once they'd let me out of the rubber room) I was told I was entitled to an appeal hearing, within, if memory serves, five working days. Of course I exercised that option.
I was also entitled to free legal assistance and I talked to and met a lawyer - whose name I would like to recall, but can't - more than once over the next few days, to prepare for the appeal.
I was surprised not to be told of any formal arrangements for the hearing, even on the fifth day, at which point, I made it very clear, I expected to be let go, if no hearing was arranged. But it wasn't, and I wasn't.
In the morning I spoke to my lawyer, who was nearly as disgusted as I was. However she said that short of obtaining an injunction, there was nothing that could be done.
You'll appreciate what this meant: that despite being neither accused or convicted of any crime, I could effectively be imprisoned, deprived of a hearing within the time set out, and have no effective recourse, because the time limit didn't actually mean anything. This is scary.
The only effective form of protest I could think of was to refuse to take food until they gave me the hearing I was entitled to, and this I did, for another six days until the hearing did in fact take place.
My appeal was successful and a few days before the end of the month I was allowed to go. I said thank you to my lawyer, something different to the consultant psychiatrists and social worker and stayed with some generous friends until the end of the year.
After that, I gradually got back to everyday life, finished a Masters, got a library job, that kind of thing. And one day, at work, I read an article - where, I have no idea - about people who, in a situation similar to mine, had taken legal action, and successfully.
They'd not had their hearing within the statutory period, so they'd subsequently taken action against the relevant body (Trust? Health Authority?) and been awarded a sum of money.
So I thought I'd like to do the same - not in the hope of any eyewatering sum of money, but, I dunno, enough for a long weekend at the seaside or something. And more importantly, perhaps much more importantly, with a view to getting an apology out of the bastards.
You can often get a free consultation so I went to see a passably well-known practice somewhere in Holborn, and explained my case. What the lawyer then said made me laugh out loud.
They said that I might well have a case - had these events occurred just a few days later. Unfortunately, though, they took place in September 2000, and the difference was that the Human Rights Act took effect, or became law, on 1 October 2000.
I'd not read Moby Dick at the time, but Melville has this covered
Anyway, I guess the major impact the Human Rights Act has had on life is in not being there when I could have used it. It's there for other people, though, and I'd like that to continue.
Just as a coda, when I got married near the end of that decade, I wanted to send a small thank you to the lawyer, since without her, you know. But I never did, because I had long since lost her card, and I couldn't remember her name.
