The Mental Health Act 2025 has become law after receiving Royal Assent, introducing wide-ranging reforms to how people in mental health crisis are treated.
The new legislation, passed on 18 December 2025, replaces the Mental Health Act 1983, which details the legal framework for detaining and treating people who are considered at risk of harm to themselves or others.
Ministers say the reforms are intended to strengthen patient rights, reduce inequalities, and support NHS staff to deliver more personalised care.
Under the Act, patients will gain greater control over their treatment through new statutory care and treatment plans. Families and carers will also have increased involvement in treatment decisions.
Health secretary Wes Streeting said that the updated Act would ‘transform lives’ and ‘bring mental health care into the 21st century’.
‘For too long, thousands of vulnerable people in mental health crises have been failed by outdated laws that stripped away their dignity and voice,’ he said.
‘The new Mental Health Act will transform lives by putting patients back in control of their care, tackling the unacceptable disparities that have seen black people detained at disproportionately high rates, and giving NHS staff the tools to deliver care that truly helps people recover.’
According to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), black people are 3.5 times more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act than white people. DHSC also said autistic people and those with learning disabilities who do not have a mental health condition have often been inappropriately detained.
The government said the Act will address racial disparities through clearer statutory guidance for mental health professionals.
Children and young people’s rights will also be strengthened, with the legislation aiming to ensure their wishes and feelings are central to decision-making.
In addition, courts will no longer be permitted to detain people in prison as a place of safety while they wait for a hospital bed for assessment or treatment under the Mental Health Act.
The legislation implements reforms that were proposed in Sir Simon Wessely’s Independent Review of the Mental Health Act, published in 2018.
In his report, Sir Simon highlighted four core principles that needed to be reformed.
This included giving patients more choice over their care and ensuring the Act’s powers are used in the least restrictive way possible.
Sir Simon, chair of Psychological Medicine, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, at King’s College London, said the Act marked ‘a crucial step to achieving those aims’.
‘As public attitudes towards mental illness have shifted, so must the law. And [now] it has,’ he said.
The government is now starting to develop the detailed guidance on the new act before it comes into force.
