New case alert: Staffordshire County Council v SRK & Anor [2016] EWCOP 27

Mr Justice Charles had to decide whether the positive obligations imposed by Article 5 or its spirit and so its purpose to protect individuals from arbitrary detention would be violated if, on a proper application of the domestic regime of law, supervision and regulation a welfare order is not made by the COP to authorise the P's private deprivation of liberty  (i.e. one where the P was not in a care home or hospital) within Article 5. He ruled that it would, expressing that he had "reached this conclusion with real reluctance because ... in this and many other such cases a further independent check by the COP will add nothing other than unnecessary expense and diversion of private and public resources which would be better focused elsewhere."

Read the full text of the judgment on Bailii