As UK Health Minister John Bowis knew the challenges, the progress and the disasters of mental health provision and policy. He learned from service users, carers and practitioners that reality was usually different from theory. He came to believe a new structure was necessary to give patients a one-stop shop of care and treatment, that patients should be more involved in decisions that affect them and that stigma must be tackled by education and by wider understanding of services and crisis management. He now campaigns in the European Parliament and in many parts of the world for mental health to be higher on national agendas and to be based on effective and humane policies that ensure the appropriate treatment is provided and provided with dignity”

Declaration of Interest: none