openjusticecourtofprotection

Approving a conveyancing plan to move P to residential care

The need for an urgent hearing was because the house that P had been living in had been sold at auction and completion of the sale was due the following week (on 18th November). The house needed to be cleared of furniture and effects before then. Additionally, P needed to vacate the property and live elsewhere.

Naming a putative ‘expert’ in a COVID vaccination case: A letter to the judge

Videos posted by Dr Rogers online include assertions that masks are ineffective and that it is not “a good thing to do” to have a vaccine unless you are very elderly or vulnerable.

How long can you keep trying to rebut the presumption of capacity?

By Celia Kitzinger, 3rd December 2021 It’s a fundamental principle of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 that “A person must be assumed to have capacity unless it is established that he lacks capacity” (1(2)) Likewise, “A person is not to be treated as unable to make a decision merely because he makes an unwise decision” (1(4)). TheContinue reading “How long can you keep trying to rebut the presumption of capacity?”

The most complex Covid patient in the world: Planning for a re-hearing after a successful appeal

All this detailed planning – what needs to be provided by what deadline and by whom – is part of preparing for a full hearing, especially where (as here) matters are contested. Hearings like these feel relatively pedestrian: they lack the intrinsic interest we all feel about the ethically weighty decisions made in final hearings. But they are the essential scaffolding upon which those final hearings depend.

Capacity to engage in sex: Nine responses to the Supreme Court Judgment in Re. JB

The Supreme Court considered the issue of whether to have capacity to decide to have sexual relations with another person, a person needs to understand that the other person must have the capacity to consent to the sexual activity, and must in fact consent before and throughout the sexual activity.

Fact-finding, ‘magnetic importance’, and the consternation of colleagues: A final hearing adjourned

At the heart of this hearing is the question of whether P can live with her mother, who loves her and wants to care for her. Attempts to elicit P’s wishes and feelings have been unsuccessful, but the social worker has said that “having observed the loving and affectionate relationship that [P] has with her family and that she has been cared for by them throughout her life, it is understood that [P] would wish to continue to stay with her family and be cared for by them”.

A life-sustaining treatment decision from Hayden J in the Court of Appeal

Having witnessed a loving and dedicated family rally to their mother/sister’s cause at the previous hearings, I was not surprised to learn that they had brought an appeal against Hayden J’s order that it will not be in AH’s best interests, and not lawful, for ventilatory treatment to continue after 31st October 2021.

“Burdensome and futile” treatment and dignity compromised: Poor practice at a leading UK hospital

The RHN clearly failed to provide high-quality, patient centred care – and part of this Court of Protection judgment is dedicated to exploring why this happened and what lessons might be learned.

C-section and anaesthesia: An unexpected unified decision

There had been two major changes in the situation since the first hearing a week ago. Firstly, SM’s baby was now in the breech position. Secondly, as expressed by Mr Justice Holman, the Trust was now “not necessarily resistant to doing some form of spinal anaesthesia on the day if that is her express preference and she is cooperative”.

Eight Litigants in Person

My sense, for this family, was that they had not had the opportunity to have a conversation with one another about their various grievances – and they seemed to have an appetite to do so, or at least to air them and have them heard. The court setting is not able to facilitate this in the way they might have needed emotionally, yet I thought DJ McIlwaine offered a textbook illustration of how to, sensitively yet determinedly, conduct a hearing with LIPs – quite a feat with so many LIPs to boot!