The Minister for Health addressed the first meeting of the Mental Health Commission in Dublin today, highlighing its independent status.
"The Commission’s independent status will be crucial in driving the agenda for change and modernisation in the mental health services in the coming years," Mr Martin said.
The Commission, an independent statutory body, will aim to ensure good practices in the mental health services in Ireland.
The Commission is being established under the provisions of the Mental Health Act 2001. The Act replaces the Mental Treatment Act 1945, which was amended in 1961.
"Successive Governments acknowledged that this legislation was in need of substantial reform, to bring it in line with current thinking and international norms on the detention and treatment of people with mental disorder," said Mr Martin.
Dr John Owens, Chairman of the Mental Health Commission, believes the mental health sector is burdened with a poor public view of mental illness. "One of the main problems for the psychiatric services is persistantly that people seemed to be stygmatised by mental health," he said.
Key tasks for the Commission will include compiling a code of practice for those involved in the review of the detention process, liaising with mental health service providers to ensure that those working in the services know the details of the new Act, and the establishment of panels of consultant psychiatrists, lawyers and lay people who are willing to serve on Mental Health Tribunals.
"Ireland has a significantly higher rate of involuntary admission than other countries. The report entitled Activities of Irish Psychiatric Services, 2000, published by the Health research Board, noted that 11 per cent of all admissions to psychiatric hospitals and units in 2000 were involuntary admissions," he said.
"This represented a rate for involuntary admissions in Ireland of 75.3 per 100,000 of total population, compared with a rate of 49 per 100,000 in England and Wales and 26 per 100,000 in Italy."