The rights of mental health patients in New Zealand are covered in law by both the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 and The Code of Health and Disability Service Consumers' Rights. Section 11 of the Bill of Rights Act states that "everyone has the right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment". However the Mental Health (Compulsory Treatment and Assessment) Act 1992 allows for the compulsory treatment of patients with major mental illness who do not consent. This legislation also allows for the detention and treatment of individuals who have committed crimes but who have either been deemed unfit to plead or have been found not guilty by reason of insanity. Medical treatment and the Bill of Rights Act Section 11 of the Bill of Rights Act states “everyone has the right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment.” However, many mental health patients are treated compulsorily under the Mental Health (Compulsory Treatment and Assessment) Act. Sections 4, 5 and 6 of the NZBORA allows for reasonable limitations on the rights laid out by the act. Section 6 states: “Wherever an enactment can be given a meaning that is consistent with the rights and freedoms contained in this Bill of Rights, that meaning shall be preferred to any other meaning.” The word “everyone” in s11 has been interpreted to mean “every person who is competent to consent”. Competence plays an important role in the decision making of clinical staff when seeking to treat patients compulsorily. Re M case Previous mental health legislation, the Mental Health Act 1969, was challenged in relation to the NZBORA in 1991 in the case of Re M. In June 1984, M was detained by mental health services after disclosing that he intended to kill a woman whom he had become obsessed with and then commit suicide. Clinical staff concluded that his obsession was of delusional intensity and that his risk to himself and others was significant enough to detain him under s24 of the Mental Health Act 1969. The High Court of New Zealand considered whether the man's detention was, under the Bill of Rights Act 1990, “arbitrary”. It was held that refusing to release M was not arbitrary, based on evidence that he was mentally disordered, and that he posed a risk to both the public and himself. This interpretation follows in relation to the current Act. The Code of Health and