New DIRECTION
1994 – 2004
Transferring my Youth Work skills to Mental Health work.
This decade gives an overview of – my consultancy and development work in Tower Hamlets, focusing on supporting African and Caribbean individuals who were diagnosed with a mental health disorder.
– Becoming a Mental Health Act Manager in 1997/8
– My Very Important Moment of the Decade and
– What’s coming in the decade 2004 –14.
New DIRECTION
Between 1980 and 2000, significant strides were made within the realm of mental health, particularly the development of Survivors movements and User Led mental health Organisations.
In 1995, the Tower Hamlets User Development Project recruited me to consult with African and Caribbean communities on their mental health needs. This consultation led to the creation of the Tower Hamlets African and Caribbean Mental Health Organisation (THACMHO).
The West African symbols of TABONO ( representing strength, confidence, and perseverance), and the SANKOFA bird (representing going forward while looking back) were adopted as THACMHO’s motto. Together they symbolised THACMHO commitment to serving their members and community.
ANOTHER NEW BEGINNING...
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I was made redundant after a restructuring of the Newham Youth and Community Education Services in 1992/93. This provided me with an opportunity to change careers and I took up counselling. My previous work with the Drugs Advisory and MIND Newham in the 80’s had opened my eyes to the challenges of poor mental health in the Black community. |
After successfully completing a diploma course at CSCT in Counselling, I joined the MIND Tower Hamlets and the Hackney MIND counselling services.
I also began volunteering with the MIND Tower Hamlets African Caribbean Mental Health Project at the MIND Open House Centre Bow E3.
MENTAL HEALTH
The UK Mental Health Act of 2007 defines mental illness as:
“any disorder or disability of the mind”
The World Health Organisation defines Mental Health as:
“A state of mental well-being that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, realise their abilities, learn well and contribute to their community”
Here are some examples of the discriminatory nature of psychiatric diagnosis and their relationship with the African diasporic communities both in the USA and the UK.
In the USA as early as 1851 a famous Louisiana physician Samuel A Cartwright published his essay:
“Report on the disease and physical peculiarities of the Negro race”
claiming to have discovered the mental disease peculiar to the Negro race, which he believed justified their enslavement. ‘Drapetomania’ caused Africans to have an uncontrollable urge to run away from their “Masters” the treatment was whipping the devil out of them. As well as ‘Dysaesthesia Aethiopis’ which supposedly affected both the mind and body, the diagnosable signs included: Disobedience, answering disrespectfully and refusing to work. The cure was some kind of hard labor which apparently sent “vitalized” blood to the brain to give liberty to the mind!
In the UK the Commission for Racial Equality published an information pamphlet on mental health in September 1995 stating:
“Black people are more likely than white people to be compulsorily detained under the Mental Health Act, diagnosed as ‘schizophrenic’, detained in locked wards of psychiatric hospitals, or arrested by the police under section 136 of the Act. There are claims that this is the result of either: a genetically determined high illness rates, the reactions of Black people to white racism, or the failure of white practitioners to understand Black culture. Others have questioned current methods of diagnosis and assessment, suggesting racism may play a part in the relationship between the psychiatric system and Black people”.
There have been many reports with recommendations on issues surrounding Black mental health in the UK which is worthy of a special report. Sadly, most of the institutions who led campaigns on Black mental health like the Commission for Racial Equality, local Authority race departments, Community Health Councils, progressive Trade Unions, health charities, voluntary mental health organisations and User groups have disappeared mainly due to the lack of funding.
The 1990 Community Care Act
The 1990 Community Care Act significantly changed mental health services in England and Wales, emphasising user participation to empower those receiving community care.
The 1990 Community Care Act
The Act had 6 key tasks:
Involving service users
Care management
Strategic commissioning
Provider development
Shifting the balance of care
Involving housing agencies
Community care services determine the quality of people’s lives: whether they can live where they choose, participate in personal relationships, engage in activities which give meaning to life. Such services are necessary to give people access to basic human rights.
Unless service Users are fully involved in every stage – from planning through to service delivery – their human rights will not be protected, nor will their civil rights be promoted.
User involvement is not an optional extra, it is essential to the proper implementation of community care.
NEW DIRECTION
The community care Act gives some background to my consultancy work in Tower Hamlets with African and Caribbean mental health service Users.
Mental health services in the UK have historically failed African and Caribbean people because they were not designed to accommodate other cultures.
For several years, Tower Hamlets Council encountered substantial difficulties in engaging with the African/Caribbean community on various issues. Based on my experience as a member of the Tower Hamlets African Caribbean Association (THACA), the Council ceased funding the organisation responsible for facilitating these consultations in 1986.
Following unsuccessful efforts to engage with the community regarding the 1990 Community Care Act, Mike Loosley, a worker at the Tower Hamlets User Development Project, recruited me to assess the mental health needs of the African and Caribbean communities living or working in Tower Hamlets.
My contractual meeting agreed the following:
The purpose of the consultation is to provide an opportunity for African/Caribbean users of mental health services in Tower Hamlets to meet, explore and identify common issues and then make those findings available to purchasers and providers of mental health services in the borough.
To achieve this purpose, the following goals were agreed as the work of the consultant:
- To facilitate a group of users in the planning of a Consultation Conference in the Autumn of 1996.
- Prepare a final report with members of the planning group to present the Conference findings to the purchasers and providers of services.
- To explore the process of the consultation for opportunities i.e. training on Cultural and racial awareness from an African/Caribbean user perspective.
- Tower Hamlets Community Health Council’s Mental Health Users Development Project agreed to arrange funding and provide resources so that the purpose and goals of the consultation could be met
My Very Important Events – VIE’s
The British High Commission in Barbados commendation of the Eastlea Barbados IYY project.
Appreciation of the Archbishop of Canterbury visit to the centre and his thank you letter.
Working with young people’s ideas and supporting them to achieve successful outcomes.
Returning to Barbados on a family holiday in the Autum of 1985.