reflect on how having some level of oversight from a professional who is somewhat independent, and who can initiate communication with separate bodies (i.e. care home management, local authority, health commissioning) can be pivotal in ‘making things happen’ for P, that wouldn’t have necessarily happened without such intervention.
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Why members of the public don’t ask earlier to observe hearings (and what to do about it)
udges have suggested repeatedly over the last 18 months – to me, and to other observers – that we should ask to observe hearings in a timely fashion, giving judges (and advocates and court staff) more warning that we want to be there in court.
A ‘secret’ hearing on life-sustaining treatment
The Health Board was seeking a declaration from the court either [1] that PH does have capacity to refuse nutrition and that his wishes not to continue to be fed should continue to be respected, even if this means his death; OR [2] that PH lacks capacity to refuse nutrition and that it is not in his best interests to attempt to feed him nutrition against his wishes and so he should be allowed to die.
Cross-examining a GP in a COVID-vaccination hearing
By Celia Kitzinger, 4th February 2022 Editorial note: The judgment is published here: A CCG v. DC & MC & AC [2022] EWCOP 2. The parents subsequently appealed the decision, and the appeal was heard by Hayden J MC & Anor v A CCG & Anor [2022] EWCOP 20. (See postscript to this blog forContinue reading “Cross-examining a GP in a COVID-vaccination hearing”
Not quite there yet: My first three attempts to observe a Court of Protection hearing
The Judge then went on to say that as I had only requested access at 10.50pm the evening before, she had not had time to go through formalities. She then referred to Claire Martin, another public observer (and core member of the Open Justice Court of Protection Project) who was also observing the proceedings and requested that we ‘kindly leave’. So that was that. Abrupt as it was, I duly obliged, and felt slightly down beaten at this point.
Capacity and elective caesarean
By Samantha Halliday, 26 January 2022 I have written extensively about court-authorised obstetric intervention[i] but I’ve always relied upon reported decisions. I am acutely aware that as Rosie Harding has commented: “When only the judgment is available for academic scrutiny, we cannot be clear as to the ways that the various submissions were framed”. That being the case,Continue reading “Capacity and elective caesarean”
“Non-mainstream” treatments and CPR for a COVID-19 patient in intensive care
Counsel asked whether, if the court were of the view that CPR was in AB’s best interests, the treating team would then be willing to administer CPR. This question was presumably designed to address a lack of clarity (quite common, in my experience, in Court of Protection cases) as to whether a proposed treatment is actually an available option for the court to consider. The court cannot order doctors to give futile treatments – and CPR had been so described by Dr G.
On not allowing the strong views of family members to prevail: A COVID-19 hearing
“Strongly held views by well-meaning and concerned family members should be taken into account but never permitted to prevail nor allowed to create avoidable delay. To do so would be to expose the vulnerable to the levels of risk I have identified, in the face of what remains an insidious and highly dangerous pandemic virus“ (Hayden J §26, SD v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea [2021] EWCOP 14)
Untenable and unsafe: A trial of living in the community breaks down
So, Mr G will return to the safety of residential care, where he will no doubt continue to rage against his incarceration, but there will be a suitable infrastructure to help him manage his precarious health condition. The question one is left with, of course, is, as Munby J famously said: “What good is making someone safer if it merely makes them miserable?”
Abuse and coercive control? A fact-finding hearing and exoneration
allegations against Miss F. They included allegations of physical and financial abuse and coercive control, and an allegation that she’d deliberately administered an insulin overdose when she visited him in hospital. There were also reports of her being obstructive and hostile to healthcare professionals trying to support Mr G.
Promoting Open Justice in the Court of Protection 