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The risk of financial abuse is a major concern for the PGO and the Court of Protection. Master Lush has suggested that some 10‐15% of cases brought to the Court involve some element of abuse or impropriety. The study reported here analysed case files identified by PGO staff as those in which abuse was a strong possibility.

The Criminal Record Bureau (CRB) offers a ‘one‐stop‐shop’ for checking the suitability of potential employees to work with adults in health and social care settings. This paper argues that an exploration of the rationale for recruitment decision making following the creation of the CRB is timely and necessary.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the way that practitioners apply the 2005 Mental Capacity Act (MCA) in complex cases involving people with learning disabilities who cannot make some key decisions by themselves. Like many qualitative studies it began with a felt sense that practitioners were struggling to apply the clear framework set out in the Act to real life situations, and that some of the decisions they were faced with did not fit neatly into the linear, cognitive model of decision making set out in the MCA and its accompanying guidance.

The study was conducted under the aegis of the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) during 2010‐2011. A number of “complex” cases were obtained from Social Services, Primary Care Trusts and other organisations and subjected to thematic analysis. The current paper focuses on the 16 cases that involved people with learning disabilities.

A number of issues were identified that underlay the complexity of the cases examined. The cases drew attention, in particular, to the way in which practitioners were confronted with mounting concerns as opposed to single, discrete decisions, with the risk that decisions could be delayed until positive choices were much less available.

The aim of the study was to support the use of the Act in these situations and to give practitioners confidence in applying its principles across a wide range of diverse circumstances. Although the original study specifically related to the English legislation, the factors that led people to consider a case “complex” would apply equally in other jurisdictions. The study also shed light on difficulties that arise when intervening in less formal ways.

This paper reports some preliminary lessons from a qualitative study of services that have cared for a person with learning disabilities during a terminal illness. It reflects current concern about access to health care as well as the national priority being placed on improvements in cancer services for all patients. The study documents how the service learned of the person's illness, how they mobilised services and made decisions, how agencies worked together (or not!) and what support staff needed in the person's last months and weeks. It also considers the way staff, as individuals and as teams, made sense of their experiences and evaluated the input of other professionals.

In this paper the meaning and use of the term ‘financial abuse’ is explored and new ways of looking at the phenomenon suggested. In particular the paper looks at the interaction between financial abuse and neglect in the context of adults who lack capacity.

This review of the decision‐making literature aims to challenge the rational model of decision‐making upon which the Mental Capacity Act (MCA) 2005 is premised.

The paper forms part of a larger study commissioned by the Office of the Public Guardian looking into complex cases.

The literature supported the study findings that decisions are not made in a linear way and identified the importance of history and memory, motivation and drive, mood and stability, and openness to influence when assessing the mental capacity of vulnerable people, especially in the context of self‐neglect.

This paper will inform workers in health and social care about the emotional factors that influence decision‐making and increase their ability to make nuanced assessments.

Taken together, with other publications from this project, this paper alerts practitioners to situations where vulnerable people are out of their depth; when the role of depression and anxiety may be at least as salient as their understanding of possible consequences and when the past may exert more control over their actions than their understanding of future options.

The paper's added value is that it uses ideas that are current within academic psychology to make explicit some of the factors that lead to complexity when assessing mental capacity under the MCA, especially in the context of self‐neglect.