Effort to reduce legal applications backlog

STOCKPORT council is at risk financially and reputationally if a backlog of deprivation of liberty applications are not processed, a report has revealed.

The legal procedure, also referred to as DoLS, is enforced to deprive someone of their liberty if they lack capacity to consent to their care and treatment.

The authority is the ‘supervisory body’ responsible for signing off DoLS applications - and each assessment should be processed within 21 days.

A DoLS request is usually made by a home or hospital when a patient is under its care.

“However, current figures show that there are an increasing number of DoLS applications, and limited capacity,” read the report.

“We currently triage our applications high, medium or low. It is unlikely that low would be addressed with our current capacity.

“Currently there are 194 highs, 46 mediums and 926 lows awaiting assessment.”

The council has launched a recruitment exercise to start to address the backlog and improve the process.