Bath and North East Somerset Council v AJC [1999] MHLR 184

As a Tribunal order for discharge had not been challenged, it had to be given effect, despite the local authority’s view that it was invalid: the purported renewal was therefore of no effect. [MHLR.]

MHLR

The summary below has been supplied by Kris Gledhill, Editor of the Mental Health Law Reports. The full report can be purchased from Southside Online Publishing (if there is a "file not found" error, it means this particular report is not yet available online). More similar case summaries from the year 1999 are available here: MHLR 1999.

Whether a guardianship order could be renewed when the local authority believed that its discharge by a Tribunal was invalid because it was deferred - Bath and North East Somerset Council v AJC [1999] MHLR 184

Points Arising: As a Tribunal order for discharge had not been challenged, it had to be given effect, despite the local authority’s view that it was invalid: the purported renewal was therefore of no effect.

Facts and Outcome: In December 1997, a Mental Health Review Tribunal discharged AJC from guardianship, purportedly deferring it until March 1998 to allow other support services to be put in place. The local authority, taking the position that there was no power to defer the discharge of a guardianship order, treated it as continuing and purported to renew it. In a challenge to this by judicial review, it was declared that that there was an order from a Tribunal that had not been challenged and so could not be ignored; but the case was adjourned to allow consideration by the local authority as to whether a fresh guardianship order could be made and, if so, for AJC to determine whether to challenge that.

External links

Possible Bailii link (not there when checked last night, but might have appeared since)

Transcript (MHLR)