Politicians to visit mental hospital site

TDs and Senators will today visit the proposed site of the controversial new Central Mental Hospital.

Members of the Oireachtas Health Committee will tour the area at Thornton Hall in Co Dublin where a new super prison is also being built.

In the afternoon, the committee will hear presentations on the issue in Leinster House from the Irish Mental Health Coalition and the Mental Health Commission.

The Irish Mental Health Coalition, which is opposed to the Thornton Hall development, recently helped compile the Patients Not Prisoners report with the CMH Carer's Group and Schizophrenia Ireland.

Members of the Oireachtas Committee visited the existing Central Mental Hospital site at Dundrum last week.