The Constitutional Court
recognized unconstitutional legislative regulations allowing treatment of
children and incapable persons in psychiatric hospitals without considering
their opinions based on the application of the Human Rights Defender.
The Constitutional Court set the
1st of June of 2020 as a time period for repealing provisions recognized as
unconstitutional, enabling the National Assembly to bring several legal
regulations into conformity with the requirements of the Constitutional Court
decision.
To remind, the issues recorded
during the Human Rights Defender’s monitoring visits to psychiatric hospitals,
the results of discussions of individual complaints addressed to the Defender,
as well as the international best practice and legislative problems are at the
core of the application addressed to the Constitutional Court.
The issue is that under the
current RA legislation the consent of the legal representative is already
considered as a sufficient condition for providing psychiatric assistance to
children and incapable persons, including for their placement in a psychiatric
hospital.
As a result, their right to be
heard and to give informed consent are violated.
Moreover, due to the insufficient
legal regulations, there are often cases in practice when people, who are kept
there on the basis of their legal representative’s consent, are considered to
be treated voluntarily.
In such cases, however, they are
in fact kept and being treated against their will (that is, involuntary) and
thus are automatically deprived of the opportunity to raise the issue of the
involuntary treatment in the court.
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