HOSPITAL security guards are defying State Government legal advice that they have no power to restrain violent patients.

Health Department documents show security guards at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital asked for a written guarantee that they would be protected from legal action when restraining patients after police cut back on officers transporting mental health patients.

The department advised guards: "There is no clear statutory powers of restraint for security guards."

Under a compromise arrangement, the guards can restrain a patient if they are part of a "code black response team" but LHMU state secretary David Di Troia said the uniformed guards were often the first to respond and their powers should be more clear.

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