There have, to my knowledge, been 2 reported cases on this issue so far: E (Vaccine) [2021] EWCOP 7 and SD v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea [2021] EWCOP 14 Initially, I wasn’t planning on talking about this subject. Primarily because for those of us in local authority this is not really high onContinue reading “Mental Capacity Act and covid-19 vaccination: the court’s approach so far”
Category Archives: court of protection
DP v Hillingdon and the issue that may or may not be
If you practice in this area of law, or work with people who do, you’ll have heard of this case, because it has set a lot of hares running in a number of cases. If you don’t, then you might not have given this case much thought unless your local authority legal team sends bulletinsContinue reading “DP v Hillingdon and the issue that may or may not be”
Social care and health care joint working arrangements – what can go wrong
This post discusses a case example from my practice, suitably anonymised, where the local authority and NHS Clinical Commissioning Group should be working together to support a hospital discharge for an incapacitated adult, but that, to date, hasn’t quite worked out. Safety warning: I do work for the local authority here, so I’ll try toContinue reading “Social care and health care joint working arrangements – what can go wrong”
Spot the difference: The need for precision in capacity assessments
I wrote previously about the importance of evidence and not making assumptions here. It’s something I have been thinking about again, in the context of some work I was involved with over the last few weeks. Because I was involved with 2 cases with very different facts, but raising a central issue around assessing capacityContinue reading “Spot the difference: The need for precision in capacity assessments”
Let’s talk about court process – bonus: remote hearings
It occurred to me, helping one of my social workers prepare for a video hearing today, how little information about what actually happens in a remote hearing is available to anyone not ‘in the know’ with the court. So I thought I would add my thoughts, in the hope it might help some of you.Continue reading “Let’s talk about court process – bonus: remote hearings”
When everything hinges on a capacity assessment
I want to talk to you today about an issue that I am coming up against more and more at the moment in my day to day practice. Let’s refer to it as the ‘unco-operative patient’ issue. I am finding this to be a particular issue in personality disorder cases, where mental illness and personalityContinue reading “When everything hinges on a capacity assessment”
Sometimes the pieces don’t fit together
I started off with high hopes for today. I set myself a manageable list of tasks and intended to finish early and recalibrate myself after a fairly jarring return to the office. How foolish was I? And instead I am left feeling utterly deflated and quite demoralised, having spent most of my day trying toContinue reading “Sometimes the pieces don’t fit together”
Let’s talk about court processes: part 4 – concluding proceedings
The, rather delayed, final post in my series on Court of Protection processes looking at the conclusion of proceedings.
Let’s talk about court process: part 3 – hearings
In case you missed them, parts 1 and 2 of my posts about court process follow the same case study and you might want to go back to follow the story through. But now we get to the juicy bit that most people want to know about: court hearings. Don’t get too excited though, orContinue reading “Let’s talk about court process: part 3 – hearings”
Let’s talk about court processes: part 2 – ongoing proceedings
Let’s return to our example of P. At the end of my last post, we had got as far as the application being made, mum being notified of this, and a hearing date being set. So now what? Well the Official Solicitor will have to consider the papers and decide whether or not to acceptContinue reading “Let’s talk about court processes: part 2 – ongoing proceedings”