Davidson, of No5 Chambers, specialises in mental health and capacity law. Here, she looks into a specific case (Re A (Covert medication: closed proceedings [2022] EWCOP 44). Having set down a detailed history of the case in the first part of her article, she now covers the hearing ‘following disclosure of the surreptitious medication duplicity’, reflects on the lawfulness of excluding the mother of the young woman at the centre of the case and discusses the practice of covert medication itself.
The court had previously held that contact between the mother and daughter was not in the daughter’s best interests due to the risk of adverse influence, but in the meantime hormone treatment was given. What safeguards exist in this situation? It can lead to a complicated situation for the court. Davidson writes: ‘Poole J’s strange decision to inform B and her lawyers of the non-disclosure only at the start of B’s application for A’s return home was an unnecessary ambush, unsurprisingly leading to an adjournment for B to properly consider the issues and documentation.’
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