In a wider legal milieu, it is typical for laws, including mental health legislation, to be reviewed and amended periodically as society progresses and services evolve. Prior to the June 2017 election, in an interview, Prime Minister Theresa May pledged to ‘rip up the 1983 Act and introduce in its place a new law which finally confronts the discrimination and unnecessary detention that takes place too often’. She argued that the key reason for the increase in detentions is the ‘discriminatory use of a law passed more than three decades ago’. Review of mental health law was then included in the government’s legislative agenda in the Queen’s speech of 21 June 2017.