Police officers are spending more than five hours minding patients detained under the mental health act as they wait for them to be taken into professional care, according to a top police official.

Adrian Harper, chief executive of the OPCC (Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner), claims detaining vulnerable people takes the police away from fighting crime.

Through the mental health act, police officers have been granted the right to section people they think have a mental illness and move them to a safe place, a mental health facility, police cell or their own home.

The police use this right – known as a section 136 order – when a distressed person may be a risk to themselves or others in a public place.

However, detentions through these orders are on the increase in Kent.

The force is working with the NHS, councils and ambulance services to find solutions to improve the situation.

Mr Harper shared his concerns about the section 136 orders with representatives from councils, the fire service, public health and ambulance at a meeting of the Kent Community Safety Partnership.

He said: “The problem with the 136 orders, is once it’s used it cannot be unused.

“They have to be seen by a specialist of mental health of a quite significant grade so that raises the demand on our partners but there are often very little alternatives.

“This has shown that police officers are having to spend quite a bit of time in A&Es and at the mental health institutions, who haven’t got the capacity to receive them.

“Every case, without exception, has at least two police officers guarding those individuals and on average it takes an excess of five hours.

“So this often takes up two police officer’s entire tour of duty.”

The former police officer added sometimes the person showing mental distress could be in that state due to alcohol or drug misuse and during the wait to be seen by a mental health specialist the effects have subsided.

Also he explained while there are suggestions the increase in these order is due to police “overusing” the power, he claims officers often have “very little choice”.

Christina Shaw, spokesman for the Kent and Medway NHS social care partnership trust, said: “In April 2018, 164 people were subject to the use of section 136 powers by the police.

“Use of section 136 was, on occasion, an appropriate intervention however its

use was not always the best therapeutic option for people in mental distress.

“Often they are in crisis due to physical factors such as suffering from excessive alcohol consumption or drug abuse.

“Or they may be in crisis because of social issues they are experiencing, such as the breakdown of a relationship or homelessness.

“The service KMPT provides is for giving support to those who are diagnosed as being mentally ill.

“A number of joint initiatives are currently in place to reduce section 136, including mental health awareness training with Kent Police and an evaluation of the former Street Triage pilots across Kent and Medway with commissioners, the police and ambulance services in order to agree a future service model that would operate on a seven-day-a-week basis.”