Schedule to be inserted as Schedule AA1 to the Mental Capacity Act 2005

Part of Mental Capacity (Amendment) Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee at 2:00 pm on 17 January 2019.

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Photo of Caroline Dinenage Caroline Dinenage Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care) 2:00, 17 January 2019

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. A warm welcome to the Committee—albeit not quite as warm as it would have been had you been here on Tuesday.

These technical amendments build on important amendments tabled by the Government in the other place. They ensure that a person with a connection to a care home cannot conduct the assessments needed for an authorisation or the pre-authorisation review, and thereby eliminate any potential conflict of interest. It is vital that assessments and pre-authorisation reviews are completed independently. The amendments not only ensure there is no conflict of interest in the process but prevent the approval of over-restrictive arrangements that are in a care home’s interest but not in the best interests of the individual.

The amendments clarify that the definition of a person with a connection to a care home will be set out in regulations; the Bill therefore confers regulation-making powers. That may not have been sufficiently clear in previous drafting, so those connections will be laid out in regulations, which will allow us to provide the necessary detail and ensure that all care home staff and those connected to a care home are excluded from completing assessments and pre-authorisation reviews. Consideration was given to setting that out in the Bill, but we concluded that regulations would better serve our intention of ensuring that we exclude agency staff and others who do not work directly for the care home. I hope the Committee supports these clarifying amendments.