The High Court has refused an application to overturn a decision denying redress to an anonymised woman who said she was mistreated as a teenager at a residential treatment unit.
In a judgment delivered on 19 May 2015, Ms Justice Iseult O’Malley found that the Residential Institutions Redress Review Committee’s decision was not unreasonable or otherwise legally flawed. The court refused the relief sought. It did not rehear the redress claim or substitute its own decision on whether an award should be made.
The applicant was 15 when she spent several months at a children’s psychiatric unit run by a local health board. She told the Residential Institutions Redress Board that staff searched her after weekend leave, imposed “bed limits” requiring her to remain awake in her room, and physically restrained her during a dispute over a telephone call. She also described witnessing other residents’ suicide attempts. These were her allegations; the Board and Committee concluded that they did not amount to abuse under the Act.
The Board declined to make an award in September 2013. It considered that searches were reasonable given the applicant’s suicide risk, that the discipline was not abuse, and that witnessing another resident’s suicide attempt was distressing but was not abuse of the applicant. The Committee upheld that determination in March 2014. It said the search was a reasonable safety measure, the bed limits were appropriate discipline, the telephone incident did not constitute abuse, and the other residents’ incidents did not establish abuse of the applicant.
The applicant sought judicial review, arguing that the Committee had misapplied the statutory definition of abuse and disregarded evidence, including a psychiatrist’s opinion that the searches had damaging consequences. The Committee argued that the case was an attempt to have the court reconsider the merits of its decision.
Justice O’Malley said the searches were the issue that caused her most concern. She accepted that being viewed undressed could be unpleasant and perceived as demeaning, especially for an adolescent with body-image difficulties, and that the applicant had privacy rights. But she found that staff had a duty to protect her and other children from self-harm risks. The search, as described, had a legitimate purpose, was proportionate, involved no physical contact and had no aggravating feature such as a male staff member’s presence. The court could not interfere with the Committee’s conclusion that it was not abuse.
The judge also rejected the challenges to the bed limits and telephone incident. She said the bed limits did not meet the Act’s definition of abuse and were not “seclusion” under the Mental Treatment Regulations. On the telephone incident, she noted that there was no evidence the restraint caused injury within the meaning of the Act. She therefore refused judicial review relief.