Cases

Abbasi and another v Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust; Haastrup v King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust [2025] UKSC 15

Six members of 39 Essex Chambers appear in landmark appeal - Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Anr v Abbasi and Anr [2025] UKSC 15.How should a bereaved parent’s freedom of speech be balanced against doctor’s or nurse’s right to ... Read more  

Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council v LS & Anor

SummaryCobb J sketched the outlines of this complex case after an introduction reinforcing that “determination of an adult's capacity represents the crucial jurisdictional gateway to the exercise of the Court of Protection's powers to make orders, as... Read more  
 
Mental capacity - Assessing capacity

W v P

SummaryThe person at the centre of this matter, ‘P,’ was an unnamed person who had previously been in the public eye, and significant wealth. P was now elderly, had severe dementia and was unable to communicate; he appears to have lost capacity to ma... Read more  
 
Practice and procedure - Other

Re EM (Deprivation of Liberty, Care Planning & Costs)

SummaryIn this case, HHJ Burrows helpfully busted some disturbingly frequent myths about DoLS.  The case concerned a young woman, personalised by the court with the name “Emma,” and for present purposes, the central passages of wider relevance a... Read more  
 
Article 5 ECHR - Deprivation of liberty , Mental Health Act 1983 - Interface with MCA

MacPherson v Sunderland City Council

SummaryThis is the latest judgment in the long running Court of Protection proceedings about Ms MacPherson’s daughter. The matter came before the Court of Appeal on an appeal brought by Ms MacPherson against an order made by Poole J on 22 January 202... Read more  
 
Mental capacity - Litigation , Other

Re P (Property & Affairs Deputyship: Jurisdiction)

SummaryIn Re P (Property & Affairs Deputyship: Jurisdiction) [2024] EWCOP 77 (T2), HHJ Burrows confirmed that the Court of Protection has the power to revoke a property and affairs deputyship (and, we would add also, a health and welfare deputysh... Read more  
 
Other , Mental Health Act 1983 - Interface with MCA

US Environmental Protection Agency Ban on PCE and TCE

On December 9 2024, the US Environmental protection Agency announced a ban on the solvents trichloroethylene (TCE) and perchloroethylene (PCE) for consumer use. TCE and PCE have been widely used as solvents in industrial applications, cleaners, ... Read more  

Causation

In another claim involving the Watling Street development at Motherwell, dating back to 2013, 36 individuals brought actions against Lanarkshire Housing Association Ltd alleging personal injury due to contaminants in the soil of the development: ... Read more  

Duty of Care of Consultants to Future Occupiers of Land

There has been long running litigation in Scotland as regards “the Watling Street development” in Motherwell, where housing was built on land used as an iron and steel works from 1912-1939 and then during and after World War II by the Ministry of Sup... Read more  

Challenge for Non-Identification of Contaminated Land

On 21 November 2024, Laing J granted permission for a judicial review of Havering Council’s decision not to designate an illegal landfill site at Launders Lane in Rainham as contaminated land in proceedings brought by Ruth Kettle-Frisby, a Havering r... Read more  

Oldham MBC v KZ (Fluctuating Capacity: Anticipatory Declaration)

SummaryThis case is a salutary tale in which a failure to provide a Deaf young man with a suitably equipped translator and/or assessor very nearly had the effect of writing off the abilities he had and seriously underestimating his capacity to make d... Read more  
 
Mental capacity - Litigation , Other , Mental Health Act 1983 - Interface with MCA

ZX (Capacity to engage in sexual relations)

SummaryThis was a leapfrog appeal from a Tier 2 Judge to the Court of Appeal; a relatively recent innovation.  It concerns the thorny issue of capacity to engage in sexual relations. At first instance HHJ Burrows had been confronted, t... Read more  
 
Mental capacity - Sexual relations