Member

Like other amendments in this group, Amendment 115 would remove the inherent dangers of the presumption of capacity that others have spoken of. Unfortunately, there is clear evidence that the MCA is variably applied. Margaret Flynn, now chair of the National Mental Capacity Forum, who succeeded me in that role, has pointed out that there is, unfortunately, an enduring lack of awareness and a lack of understanding. Since the House of Lords Select Committee post-legislative scrutiny report of 2014, the National Institute for Health Research found evidence in 2022 highlighting several aspects of the way that assessments are conducted that are not compliant with the MCA, while in 2024, a decade after the House of Lords report, the Care Quality Commission continued to find a lack of understanding of the MCA among providers, as did the difficult cases review in 2023 that was published in the Medical Law Review.