By Gaby Parker, 29th June 2021 On 23rd June 2021 I observed a hearing (via MS Teams) before Mr Justice Hayden in the Court of Protection: COP 1354439T Re. PH. The case was about finding a suitable placement for P who remains in hospital although he is fit for discharge and has been for a long time. TheContinue reading “Delays in finding an Acquired Brain Injury Placement: “A very significant degree of muddle””
Tag Archives: Best Interests
“You can’t ask the High Court to turn a blind eye to illegal detention”
“You have to do better than that. You can’t ask the High Court to turn a blind eye to illegal detention. If this was an immigration case, I would be letting him out now. You can’t unlawfully detain people in the UK. You’ve got four days to sort this out. If the situation is that he should just go home – then just do it. I’m not going to order you to do it because I haven’t got the evidence.” (Mrs Justice Lieven)
Clinically-assisted nutrition and hydration: Decisions that cannot be ignored or delayed
By Jenny Kitzinger, 23rd June 2021 Hearings in the Court of Protection often bring crucial issues into sharp relief in a vivid, poignant and intellectually rigorous way. This was certainly so in the hearing I observed last week: Case No. 1375980T on 10 June 2021. It concerned GU, a 70-year-old man who sustained a severe anoxic brain injury in AprilContinue reading “Clinically-assisted nutrition and hydration: Decisions that cannot be ignored or delayed”
Hillingdon 10 Years on: Another Deprivation of Liberty
EW’s wish to end her days in Inverness may not weigh heavily in the best interests decision that will need to be made if the court decides that she lacks capacity to make her own decision about where to live. I worry that the groundwork for that is already being prepared. There was a weariness whenever Scotland was mentioned.
An urgent court-authorised Caesarean: Seeing behind a published judgment
I can see why planned care for someone in a highly distressed and deteriorating state is attractive on many fronts. However, like the Court, I really struggle with the sense that there seems to have been no attempt to engage openly and honestly with Miss K, at a time when she may have been better placed to consider her wishes and feelings in an inevitably harrowing situation.
Chaos in court and incompetent decision-making: Visual monitoring Part 2
By Claire Martin, 17th June 2021 This hearing, on 6th and 7th May 2021 before HHJ Howells at Wrexham County and Family Court (COP 13575520 Re: B) was the second hearing I’ve observed concerning “David” – a 39-year-old man with a severe learning disability, poorly controlled epilepsy and congenital cerebral palsy with right-sided hemiplegia. At the previous hearing, onContinue reading “Chaos in court and incompetent decision-making: Visual monitoring Part 2”
Best interests decisions when P’s views and wishes cannot be determined
The issue at this hearing was (still) whether NW should remain in Dover House, which is what the CCG (who fund her care) argued, supported by the local authority, or whether she should return home, which is what her mother wants.
“An onlooker at someone else’s social event”: A mother’s experience of the court
I don’t understand what was decided at the hearing. I did not get anything like a bit of paper saying “This is what was decided at your court hearing”. I don’t understand why there is another hearing planned for next year. Throughout these months between now and the next hearing my belief is that Lillian is not being given the care that she needs and is not being protected. I just want my daughter to come home.
My midwife heart weeps: Opinion on a court-ordered hospital birth
What the judge has done here is to create a precedent that any woman who has an anxiety disorder and requests birth outside of the regular menu of choice may be subjected to strong-arm maternity care – or may fear it, even if in fact the legal process is never instituted. For many women the impact of these experiences during their pregnancy care and birth will cause deep and long-standing trauma.
“Not nothing”? The Late Term Foetus in the Court of Protection
The right of a capacitous pregnant person to make their own medical decisions unfettered by any consideration for the life or health of the foetus they carry has been enshrined unequivocally in UK law. As Judge LJ emphasised in the Court of Appeal in St George’s NHS Trust v S, pregnancy does not reduce a competent patient’s right to make decisions about their medical treatment, and a capacitous pregnant patient therefore has the right to make a medical decision that might cause death or serious injury to the foetus, however repugnant such a decision might seem to onlookers.
Promoting Open Justice in the Court of Protection 