Protecting the vulnerable

Concern is starting to be expressed at senior levels of the Court of Protection about the unilateral way in which some local authorities carry out their protection of vulnerable adults work. A recent decision of Baker J, sitting as a nominated judge of the Court of Protection, was highly critical of a local authority for removing a young man with severe learning disabilities from the home of his long-term carer and then failing to make any arrangements for contact between them for a number of months (G v E & Others [2010] EWHC 621 (Fam), [2010] All ER (D) 120 (Apr)). Neither of those actions was authorised by order of the Court of Protection, as they should have been, and the judge found “serious breaches” of the adult’s and carer’s rights to respect for their private and family lives under Art 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention). The theme was developed by Munby LJ, speaking extra-judicially