What should the ratio of staff to residents be?

I work at a residential care home frthe mentally ill and there are 18 residents who live there. Staff shifts vary so I usually do the friday and saturday 12 hour night shift. During the day there must be at least 2-3 members of staff, but when the night staff begin their shift, there is always only one member of staff. By law, is this legal or illegal? People keep telling me that there must be two ,members of staff during the night also but im confused...can any of you help me out?

I would check with the Department of Labor and go from there...Good luck !!

Awww...that makes me really sad for the residents.

Well my sister used to work in a old folks home and legally the ratio is for every 20 residence there has to be at least 5 staff always working. Of course they had about 8 staff in the day and 6 staff at night but I think you should contact the departement of labour or do something because it's not fair to you or the resisdents

yeah, I agree; their mood can change any given time and they do have mental health, and a couple are quite badly violent (on occassions they have attacked a resident but not severely) when their mood changes...which is why I was concerned due to the fact there is only one staff member at night.