As the result, a person is punished by what amounts to imprisonment, for what was a criminal offence, via an almost complete disregard for procedural legal rights. This is done by diverting the person into the medical world, where punishment becomes "treatment in the patient's best interests" and rights have no place. M's case illustrates the following legal defects in the $ 19-$ 20 procedure:-

(1)	The original reception required no legal procedure. The 1969 Act removed the necessity for a magisterial inquiry at this early stage.
(2)	The point of the magisterial inquiry is to determine whether "the patient" is "mentally disordered". The shock treatment, which M was given during the 3 week period, scrambles the mind ("makes me forget things") thus can give any healthy person the appearance of mental disorder by the time s/he's "examined" by the magistrate It can also drive the person to run away, as M was planning to and eventually did do. Yet running away will be further evidence of "mental disorder".
(3)	Since the person has been channelled outside the law world, into the medical world, s/he never comes to think in terms of lawyers as a source of help. It is difficult to get a lawyer when you are on bail, more difficult when you are remanded in custody, but when M was in Porirua it simply never occurred to her to get legal representation. Out there is a world of masses, doctors, and patients, not lawyers, judges and accused.
(4)	Even if the case does come to a lawyer's attention, as M's case did, legal aid is not available. There is no criminal charge thus no criminal legal aid; and the Legal Aid Act applies to "court proceedings". Neither the original reception nor the magistrate's inquiry involve "court proceedings". So either the person pays to be represented (M couldn't) - or gets a lawyer who will act for nothing and cannot afford to spend much time travelling to and from Porirua to see his client.
(5)	Even if the lawyer is instructed to act for the detained person, the medical description of "alleged to be mentally disordered" has a powerful mystique. The lawyer wonders "what if she really is crazy - maybe she'd be better off in Porirua - after all she did try to commit suicide once, and has heard voices". He m must force himself to remember his duty as advocate, which is to follow the client's instruction to get her out.
(6)	Similarly the magistrate is under no obligation to hear the detained person's story from her mouth - presumably that is why there is no provision for legal representation at the inquiry. He only "examines" her. You wouldn't listen to someone who is "alleged to be mentally disordered", would you? But the person is not yet proved to be "mentally disordered".