Lord Ouseley – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what monitoring takes place of the use of tasers on patients detained under the Mental Health 1983, and how that monitoring information is made accessible to the public.

Lord Bates

Data is not recorded centrally on the number of individuals tasered who are detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 or on the monitoring of patients. A Taser record is completed by police officers on every occasion where a Taser is used. However, this record does not show whether individuals are detained or monitored after the incidents nor information on the ratio of staff to patients.

Police guidance specifies that all individuals who have been subjected to the discharge of a Taser should be examined by a forensic medical examiner.

To improve transparency around how force such as Taser is used by the police, the Home Secretary has asked Chief Constable David Shaw to carry out an in depth review of Taser data and other use of force. This will present options for collecting, collating and publishing data on how force including Taser is being used, who it is being used on and what the outcomes are.