Mental Recovery

Thanks, no doubt, to the coalition's efficientisation of the NHS, a sixteen-year-old girl with mental health problems has been held in a police cell after causing a breach of the peace at Torbay hospital. She was sectioned on Friday, but Devon and Cornwall police were told that no beds were available anywhere in the UK, so there was nowhere else to put her. The local assistant chief constable expressed his indignation on Twitter - whereupon, mirabile dictu, a bed was found; hopefully not in the same dubious orifice from which the Chancellor has plucked his latest promise of NHS rah-rah tomorrow. Although the shadow health minister cavilled that the situation was worryingly common, this episode in fact epitomises the sort of no-nonsense right-wing solution favoured by the Government: services are free at the point of use, and are available to anyone who can get the local assistant chief constable to speak out for them.