Mental Health Act 1959

63Effects of hospital orders and guardianship orders

(1)A hospital order shall be sufficient authority—

(a)for a constable, a mental welfare officer or any other person directed to do so by the court to convey the patient to the hospital specified in the order within a period of twenty-eight days ; and

(b)for the managers of the hospital to admit him at any time within that period and thereafter detain him in accordance with the provisions of this Act.

(2)A guardianship order shall confer on the authority or person therein named as guardian the like powers as a guardianship application made and accepted under Part IV of this Act.

(3)A patient who is admitted to a hospital in pursuance of a hospital order, or placed under guardianship by a guardianship order, shall be treated for the purposes of Part IV of this Act (other than sections thirty-one and thirty-two, or section thirty-four, as the case may be) as if he had been so admitted or placed on the date of the order in pursuance of an application for admission for treatment or a guardianship application, as the case may be, duly made under the said Part IV, except that—

(a)the power to order the discharge of the patient under section forty-seven shall not be exercisable by his nearest relative; and

(b)the special provisions relating to the expiration and renewal of authority for detention and guardianship in the case of psychopathic and subnormal patients shall not apply;

and accordingly the provisions of the said Part IV specified in the first column of the Third Schedule to this Act shall apply in relation to him subject to the exceptions and modifications set out in the second column of that Schedule and the remaining provisions of the said Part IV shall not apply.

(4)Without prejudice to any provision of Part IV of this Act as applied by this section, an application to a Mental Health Review Tribunal may be made in respect of a patient admitted to a hospital in pursuance of a hospital order, or placed under guardianship by a guardianship order, as follows, that is to say—

(a)by the patient, within the period of six months beginning with the date of the order or with the day on which he attains the age of sixteen years, whichever is the later;

(b)by the nearest relative of the patient, within the period of twelve months beginning with the date of the order, and in any subsequent period of twelve months.

(5)Where a patient is admitted to a hospital in pursuance of a hospital order, or placed under guardianship by a guardianship order, any previous application, hospital order or guardianship order by virtue of which he was liable to be detained in a hospital or subject to guardianship shall cease to have effect:

Provided that if the first-mentioned order, or the conviction on which it was made, is quashed on appeal, this subsection shall not apply and section forty-six of this Act shall have effect as if during any period for which the patient was liable to be detained or subject to guardianship under the order, he had been detained in custody as mentioned in that section.