The difference between restriction and deprivation of liberty really isn’t so clear as we might like. Actually even the government isn’t at all sure which is why the guidance is a bit vague.

What we do know is that……….

“The difference between restriction and deprivation of liberty is one of

intensity or degree and not one of nature or substance”

The Bournewood Judgement

(ECHR HL vs UK 2004)

To put it an other way….

“It aint what you do, It’s the way that you do it”

Many people are confused about what this might mean. Some have said that the Bournewood judgement makes it unlawful to use things like electronic coded door locks for example. Nothing could be further from the truth.

There is no problem using such devices so long as they are used appropriately. If the manager of a care home uses coded locks to secure the doors but opens them when it is necessary then that’s fine. If on the other hand the coded locks are used as a way of determining who can go out and who cannot (if you can remember the code you can leave) then that’s a different matter.

Remember it’s not what you do (coded locks), it’s the way that you do it. Using the lock in place of a capacity assessment or legal process such as the Mental Health Care & Treatment Scotland Act 2003 (MHC&T) in Scotland or the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards in England & Wales is probably unlawful. However if you make reasonable provision to allow those inside to exit when appropriate that is unlikely to be a problem. The big question comes when deciding when it might be appropriate.

The real problem is in determining the degree of restriction that is lawful before it crosses over into deprivation of liberty. We know, for example, that restriction is lawful if the person lacks capacity to decide the issue for themselves and the restriction is proportionate and it is in the best interests of the person who lacks capacity.

Nevertheless we also know that once it crosses the line and becomes deprivation then further authorisation is necessary.

The basic principle is that deprivation of liberty is only lawful if it adheres to a process prescribed by law. This means that it’s not enough for care workers to decide to deprive a person of liberty – they need authorisation under the relevant legislation. If you don’t get the approval you’re breaking the law.

In brief:

You can restrict a person’s liberty if the restriction is:

• Proportionate (least restrictive);
• In the individual’s best interests.

Deprivation of liberty requires authorisation under:

There was a citizen of Gaunt who had never been outside the city walls. For some reason or other the magistrate passed an order that he should not go outside. Strange to tell, up to the moment that the command had passed, the man had been perfectly easy, and never thought of passing the line, but as soon as ever he was forbidden to do it, he pined, and sickened, and even died moaning over the restriction.

If a man sees a thing to be law, he wants to break that law. Our nature is so evil, that forbid us to do a thing, and at once we want to do the thing that is forbidden, and in many minds the principle of law instead of leading to purity has even offered opportunities for greater impurity. Although you may point out the way of uprightness to a man, and tell him what is right and what is wrong, with all the wisdom and force of counsel and caution, unless you can give him a heart to choose the right, and a heart to love the true, you have not done much for him.

—Charles Spurgeon

DRC- IS A CERTIFICATE ISSUED BY THE MUNICIPAL BODY TO THE LAND OWNERS TO DEVELOP THEIR PROPERTIES.  IT IS ISSUED TO THOSE, WHO SURRENDER THEIR PROPERTIES TO THE CONCERNED MUNICIPALITY.

TDR- ON THE OTHER HAND IS ALSO A CERTIFICATE OF  DEVELOPMENT RIGHT, THAT IS TRANSFERABLE( TRANSFERABLE DEVELOPMENT RIGHT), COULD BE SOLD AND BOUGHT LIKE ANY OTHER COMMODITY FOR A PRICE OR CONSIDERATION WITHIN A ZONE AND CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL FLOORS.  BUT THERE IS NO PRICE OR NO BUYERS.

THIS IS A MOCKERY OF DEMOCRACY.  BBMP OFFICIALS TURN A BLIND EYE TO ALL THE ILLEGAL STRUCTURES AND BUILDINGS, WHICH HAVE BLATANTLY VIOLATED THE CDP AND MASTER PLANS AND CONSTRUCTED THE BUILDINGS BY 500% DEVIATIONS.  THE SANCTIONED PLAN HAS NO SANCTITY.

THE HONOURABLE CITIZENS, WHO ABIDE BY LAW AND COMPLY WITH ALL THE STATUTORY REQUIREMENTS, ARE THE WORST AFFECTED.  THE VIOLATORS, ARE A LUCKY LOT.  THEIR BUILDINGS/STRUCTURES WILL BE REGULARISED BY THE AKRAMA AND SAKRAMA SCHEME.  THE HONEST AND MOST LAW ABIDING CITIZEN GOES TO DOCKS.

THE CITIZENS CAN ACCEPT OR REJECT THE TDR.  IT IS VOLUNTARY.  THE REFUSAL/REJECTION MUST BE INTIMATED TO THE CONCERNED AUTHORITIES THROUGH REGISTERED POST OR PERSONAL SUBMISSION.  AN WRITTEN ACKNOWLEDGMENT MUST BE OBTAINED FROM THE CONCERNED OFFICER FOR HAVING SUBMITTED THE REFUSAL LETTER ON HIS LETTERHEAD OR WITH HIS OFFICIAL SEAL.

CARE SHOULD BE TAKEN WHILE ACCEPTING THE NOTICE OR LETTER OR TDR FORMS.  PLEASE DO NOT SIGN BLINDLY.  READ THE ENTIRE CONTENT ON THE BOOK OR REGISTER OR COPY AND CONFIRM THAT NOTHING ELSE IS WRITTEN AND DO NOT LEAVE ANY ROOM FOR THE CORRUPT OFFICIALS TO WRITE OR MAKE ANY OTHER ENTRY, ONCE YOU HAVE SIGNED AND OBTAINED THE NOTICE.  THE ACKNOWLEDGMENT MUST CLEARLY STATE THAT THE LETTER/NOTICE/ORDER/TDR FORMS ACKNOWLEDGED.

OR ELSE, CALL YOUR ASSOCIATION MEMBERS FOR ASSISTANCE.  STRONG REJECTION/REFUSAL LETTER MUST BE SENT AND ACKNOWLEDGMENT MUST BE OBTAINED FROM THE CONCERNED OFFICE, WHICH HAD ISSUED THE LETTER/NOTICE/TDR.
SECTION 14 B OF THE KTCP ACT STATES AS FOLLOWS:

14B. Benefit of development rights.- Where any area within a local planning area is required by a Planning Authority or local authority for a Town and Country Planning [1963: KAR. ACT 11 80 .
public purpose and the owner of any site or land which comprises such area surrenders it free of cost and hands over possession of the same to the Planning Authority or the local authority free of encumbrances, the planning authority or the local authority, as the case may be, may notwithstanding anything contained in this Act or the regulations but subject to such restrictions or conditions as may be specified by notification by the State Government, permit development rights in the form of additional floor area which shall be equal to one and half times of the area of land surrendered. The development right so permitted may be utilised either at the remaining portion of the area after the surrender or anywhere in the local planning area, either by himself or by transfer to any other person, as may be prescribed. The area remaining after surrender shall have the same floor area which was available before surrender for the original site or land as per regulations.

Tenants in a commercial property will have to vacate the premises if asked by the land owner, the Supreme Court has ruled. The court has struck down a provision of the rent law applicable for the Capital that restricted the right of the landlord to evict a tenant from the premises lent/rented/leased for residential purposes only.

A bench comprising Justice B N Agrawal and Justice G S Singhvi said: We hold that Section 14(1)(e) of the 1958 Act is in violation of the doctrine of equality embodied in Article 14 of the Constitution of India insofar as it discriminates between the premises let for residential and non-residential purposes when the same are required bona fide by the landlord for occupation for himself or for any member of his family, dependent on him and restricts the latter`s right to seek eviction of the tenant from the premises let for residential purposes only. The court further said: We feel that ends of justice will be met by striking down the discriminatory portion of Section 14(1)(e) so that the remaining part thereof may read as under: That the premises are required bona fide by the landlord for himself or for any member of his family dependent on him, if he is the owner thereof, or for any person for whose benefit the premises are held and that the landlord or such person has no other reasonably suitable accommodation.

Justice Singhvi writing the verdict for the bench said, an analysis of the various rent laws for the Capital shows that till 1947 no tangible distinction was made between the premises let for residential and nonresidential purposes. The implicit restriction on the landlord’s right to recover possession of the non-residential premises was introduced in the Delhi and Ajmer-Marwara Rent Control Act, 1947 and was continued under the 1958 Act. However, the 1995 Act does not make any distinction between the premises let for residential and non-residential purposes in the matter of eviction of tenant on the ground that the same are required by the landlord for his/her bona fide use or occupation. Even though, the 1995 Act is yet to be enforced and in Common Cause vs Union of India this court (Supreme Court) declined to issue a writ of mandamus to the Central Government, for that purpose, we can take judicial notice of the fact that the legislature has, after taking note of the developments which have taken place in the last 37 years i.e. substantial increase in the availability of the commercial and non-residential premises or the premises which can be let for commercial or non-residential purposes and meteoric rise in the prices of land and rentals of residential as well as non-residential premises, removed the implicit embargo on the landlord’s right to recover possession of the premises if the same are bona fide required by him/her. The court allowed the appeals of the landlord’s seeking eviction of the tenants, who had opposed it saying that the premises were let out for residential purposes. One, Smt Satyawati Sharma had purchased the property from legal heirs of the lessee. After purchasing the property, she had sought eviction of the tenants who said that the previous owner let out the premises for non-residential purposes CANNOT BE EVICTED, BUT THE SUPREME COURT RULED IT OTHERWISE.

THE TENANTS MUST VACATE THE PREMISES EITHER FOR THE BONAFIDE USE OR FOR THE USE OF OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS.

We have been told twice now that under a new government we would not have to pay extra for electricity, water and all other necessities of life. Yet each time, like clockwork, within months up go the rates of everything. Now normally this would be a sufficient enough point to maintain a sustained warranted whinge, but this time I am going to let it slide. Only because I want to ask the question, Where the HELL is all that extra money going?

It would appear, of late, that it is going on laws that are designed to generate a smoke screen and mirror the appearance of actually attempting to accomplish something.

Can someone please explain to me why it is that every time some idiot in this state (W.A.) does something stupid, or upsets someone else, the Government feels the urge to write a new law restricting the activities of everyone else?

What good is a law, new or old, if the state is not prepared to pay for the extra police officers to enforce it? This state can have all the restrictive laws under the sun; we can convert to an authoritarian dictatorship but that won’t change anything. They won’t stop people from being inhumane and irresponsible

How do “Stop-and-Search” laws prevent a grandmother in Attadale being bashed and raped in her own house? How do metal detectors at Perth Station prevent a drunk driver from slamming his car into another killing the kids in the back seat? These Stop and search laws only work if there are officers available to perform the stop and searches.

Metal detectors only work on weapons with a significant density, like for some reason my watch (according to the guys at the airport). Does this mean that every time I go to or from a meeting in the city I am going to have to unpack my laptop, take off my belt, remove my watch and empty my pockets. Then stand in line whilst my bag and laptop get x-rayed, then walk through a metal detector. Then repack and redress on the other side?

There is no such thing on the market as a metal detector that scans multiple persons at a time. Even if there was, every time it went off, every person going through it at that precise moment would have to be individually searched. Now how many extra officers would that take? Or is the police force going to hire that out to private contractors as well? How much inconvenience and imposition are we as free people expected to endure in order to uphold the appearance of societal protection?

I mean really, think about it really. The people that cause most of the trouble in places like Northbridge and Perth are the idiots that have too much to drink, cannot control their own insecurities about their girlfriends, their sexuality or their small peckers. They get a few too many under the belt and feel the need to openly display their inability to control their newly developed testosterone fuelled egos.

Most people involved in alcohol fuelled violence, if not using their own body parts as weapons, will use whatever is available at the time they attack. Does this mean that all restaurants will now only provide plastic knives and forks and pubs, clubs and eateries will only be allowed to use plastic cups?

All this because of a minute percentage of socially inept morons that have never fully developed a sense of civil propriety, and a government that is hell bent on total control of it citizenry.

When I hear the pundits’ claim that Obama Care and government health care does not conflict with freedom, I would like to bring the following to their attention.

What freedom is: Freedom (n.) liberty, autonomy, lack of restrictions, self-determination, independence, choice, free will, sovereignty, openness, inventiveness, frankness, candor, and free expression (the last free which defies political correctness).

Antonym for freedom and liberty is restriction and conformity which is everything the Socialist Democratic Party is and is trying to force upon us, claiming to champion freedom.

This is what the Socialist Democratic Party and Obama Care and government health care is: dependence (n.), dependence, addiction, reliance, need, habit, craving, and ENSLAVEMENT.

Antonym for government dependency is, INDEPENDENCE AND FREEDOM.

The next time you hear Obama and members of the Socialist Democratic Party claim they are champions of freedom, open your eyes, as by all laws of freedom, they are mere liars.

You cannot say you are for freedom while creating dependencies which is exactly what Government ran health care is all about as with all other government ran social programs. Each chips away at freedom like a thousand paper cuts that brings down the elephant, freedom dies giving life to government dependency. Where freedom ceases to exist, enslavement is manifested.

Socialism is just a fancy word for slavery.

That is the view from here,

Duane

The European Commission has published a report on potentially trade restrictive measures introduced between October 2008 and October 2009 by the European Union’s (EU) major trade partners. 223 new trade restrictive measures were reported as planned or introduced since October 2008.

The report says that a protectionist worst-case scenario has been avoided as the measures taken so far are rather limited in scope, relative to fears and previous experience with economic downturns.

Muhammad Masood Azhar | Language: English | Format: PDF | Pages: 156 | Size: 2 MB
A simple yet comprehensive study regarding the history and rewards of performing Jihad. The hearts of the Kafirs are burning with hate and animosity for Islam but they frightened and scared stiff of the same people whom they have labeled as “the fundamentalists” and “the extremists” These Kafirs are not scared of the Muslims leaders, because they know well that these so-called leaders could bought over a goblet of alcohol. They are not afraid of the Armed Forces of any Muslim country, because they know that these forces are constrained by their Heads of States. The Kafirs only fear the blasts of those bombs which detonated in the Israeli army’s installations and barracks; they are scared of those mines which blast the Indian army’s vehicles. They are frightened of the restriction enforced upon Amarnahh Yatra, (a Hindu religious procession) which shook the whole of India. They fear a blind holy man like Umar Abdul-Rahmad (a distinguished ‘Aalim, presently in a US jail on trumped charges) who dared to speak about the greatness of Islam. They are afraid of those Muslim youth of Europe who openly stroll the streets of London and Paris wearing military clothing and are eager and anxious to participate in the defense of Bosnia. They are scared of shamil Basayev (leader of the Mujahedeen, who successfully carried out the Jihad inside Russia) who with handful of Mujahedeen had forced the whole Russia to their knees. Their hearts are filled with awe of general Dudayev (leader of the Mujahedeen in Chechnya, recently assassinated by the Kafir Russians) who reminds them of Imam Shaamil (the great leader of Muslims of Russia who raised the flag of the Jihad against the then Tsarist Russian Empire). Their minds are disturbed with the thought of those unknown Mujahedeen who forced the Americans to pack their bags from Somalia. They are frightened of those Muslim daughters who somehow transport weapons to the Mujahedeen in Kashmir, Palestine, Bosnia. All Kafirs fear the word of Jihad. It is our duty and responsibility to revive the forgotten obligation of Jihad.

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It is very clear that Michael Jackson did not want to leave any of his money to his father, or any other family member, because they were not mentioned in his last will and testament.

It is a sad reality,one that I would be embarrassed about if my son did that to me, but Michael was clear in his demands.

Joe Jackson can only ask himself why he created such a bad relationship with his son.His proclemation to a judge this week…. ”entitled to his own independent family allowance.” … speaks volumes to his delusions.

How is he ”entitiled to” another grown man’s property, no matter what the relationship? There is no legal precedent to back up such a claim.If you have one, please refer it to me.

It is unseemly to witness a man so incredible slimy and guiltless, to publicly demean himself and his family, and lower his dignity by stooping to such an incredible low, as to grovel and beg for money from the bones of his own dead son.

Think about the grandchildren, this man is dangerous.He seeks to further exploit his son, and if he does not get his way,he may resort to drastic measures.I thought he was kidding about putting Michael’s kid’s on the road,and it was wierd the way he was talking the children’s talent right after his son had died.

The man is simply inappropriate, and Jermaine,Jackie, Tito, Randy…one of you gentleman need to sit your pop’s down and slow his roll.I know he used to be bad, but he is an elderly man at this point, and all of you guys are way bigger than him.

I know you respect you dad, but your family name is at stake here.Joe Jackson, the patriarch of your family, is viewed upon as the head of your family.

I think he is suffering from an undiagnosed case of dementia, and these types of antics and statements are a classic sign of that affliction.He can be forced into a short observational period.

He does not realize what he is doing, because he is not in control of his faculties. A close family would quietly seek help for their stricken relative, out of the public eye.

The family should immediately come together discuss and vote on this matter, and make sure we do not have to follow your dad begging money from your dead brothers estate, would be my advice.

As it stands, if this train wreck of a father of yours is allowed to continue with this failed course of action, it will be fodder for the blog and news world.

Let Michael rest in peace, and concentrate on the health and welfare of his children.

My question to Joe Jackson is , why is his relationship with his wife so messed up that he and Katherine can not sit down and resolve this between the two of them.

Is he that terrible of a person???

Seems like it…Here is what she receives from his estate…A  judge has approved $26,800 in monthly support for Katherine and $60,000 a month for the care of Michael’s three kids.

The Will was not an obtuse document, it plainly stated what he wanted to do with his own money and property after his untimely death.

Joe’s attorneys are contending that via heresy, that Michael Jackson used to provide Katherine Jackson with a monthly allowance of  60 thousand dollars a month to live on, and instructed her to give half of that to Joe Jackson.

They are saying that simply because the King of Pop did not provide for Joe in his will, does not mean that the estate is legally prohibited from providing for Joe, they insist.This sounds like a complicated legal matterI will be interested in how they go about  proving that.

A judge has already rejected Joe’s petition for an expedited hearing and to file the motion under seal.

http://www.tmz.com/2009/11/06/joe-jackson-wants-money-from-michael-jacksons-estate/

http://perezhilton.com/2009-11-07-joe-jackson-seeking-allowance-from-michaels-estate

http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b152612_joe_jackson_demands_piece_of_michael.html

Definition. A morphism of presheaves is given by maps

such that

for all open sets and .

Remarks

1. I don’t know how to put commutative diagrams into wordpress.
2. If we are considering presheaves over some category, we require the maps to be morphisms in the appropriate category.

Definition. Let be a topological space. A presheaf on is a correspondence between open sets of with sets along with restriction maps

whenever is open so that the following hold:

1. ;
2. If , then ;
3. If are open subsets of and , then

The elements of are called sections of over .

We may further require that each have some algebraic structure, e.g. one of abelian groups, rings etc. Then if we also require the retriction maps be morphisms in the appropriate category, we may also talk of presheafs of abelian groups, rings, etc.

WHILE Aussie Jessica Watson is already sailing, New Zealand-born teenager Laura Dekker is still not allowed to set sail and attempt the world record as youngest solo sailor around the world ever.

SPIEGEL: A court in Utrecht, Netherlands, has ruled that the 14-year old teenager keeps being blocked from setting sail until 1 July 2010, when a new decision will be made.

Dekker announced earlier this week that she wanted to finish the current school year before starting her trip.

However, the Family Court in Utrecht said it needed proof that the sailing trip did not endanger the child’s health or mental development.

It is not decided whether Dekker can set sail after 1 July 2010.

Her parents’ rights concerning her upbringing and education keep restricted by the court.

Dekker is going to stay with her father Dick Dekker, who supports her plans, on his boat in Wijk bij Duurstede near Utrecht.

Her German mother, Babs Müller, told media in September  that she’d rather have a daughter that is alive but will never talk to her again, than a dead daughter.

Dekker’s parents live seperated since their divorce in 2002.

Several sponsors have already put their names forward and offered to support Laura Dekker’s trip once she is able to sail around the world and even plans for Reality TV-shows are being made.

PICTURE: WANNA-BE-RECORD-HOLDER: Teen Laura Dekker still not able to head off. (pic: NZ Herald)

- visit the SPIEGEL-website here (German) or here (English)

- view earlier blogposts about Laura Dekker & other solo-sailors here, here, here & here

 This article applies to residential (and hospital) care settings in England & Wales.

So far in this series we have established that people in receipt of health and social care have the same basic rights as everyone else so long as there is no legal mechanism to remove those rights from them. We further established that those basic rights include the right to make their own choices and to take risks. After all, quality of life depends upon taking risks to some degree – even if that risk is no more than crossing the road.

Further we have identified that there are two types of risk – organisational risk that care providers must manage and individual risk that may well be none of our business. Individual risk only becomes organisational risk if it affects others for whom the organisation has a duty of care or if the individual lacks the capacity to understand the risk they are taking.

If the person lacks capacity to decide then care providers can restrict their liberty under the Mental Capacity Act so long as the restriction is both proportionate and in that person’s best interests. However they cannot deprive a person of their liberty without external authorisation. This third article in the series considers the difference between restriction and deprivation of liberty and how to go about getting authorisation to deprive should it be necessary.

Liberty means freedom – it means rights. All rights represent the freedom to do something or the freedom from something. All our choices are freedoms and they are not to be trifled with unless there’s very good reason.

Let’s examine the difference between restriction and deprivation of liberty. According to the European court of Human rights:

“The difference between restriction and deprivation of liberty is one of intensity or degree and not one of nature or substance.”

(European Court of Human Rights HL vs UK (the Bournewood case) 2004)

To put it another way:

“It aint what you do – it’s the way that you do it.”

An emergency response to a wandering resident with dementia may be to pull him physically from the path of a speeding car.

A resident with a urinary tract infection causing toxic confusion may need to be restrained to prevent her from injuring herself or someone else.

An autistic resident who bangs his head repeatedly against the wall may require immediate physical restraint to prevent head injury.

All of the above examples are likely to constitute restrictions of liberty because they are emergency responses and not long term policy. The common law doctrine of necessity recognises that sometimes workers are caught between a rock and a hard place – they have only two options and they don’t really like either.

The law accepts that in such situations the best we can manage is the lesser of two evils – restraint is usually better than injury so the common law doctrine of necessity allows us to act. Berar in mind though that common law works best in emergency. It is not nearly so reliable when the restraint is carried out as part of a longer term policy. That is because policy is more likely to represent deprivation of liberty and not unplanned emergency restrictions under common law.

For example:

George is 87 years old and lives in residential care. He has physical difficulties but appeared mentally ‘sound’ until now.

It is 3am in November. The temperature outside is well below freezing when George appears wearing only his underwear and slippers. He is making his way to the front door and clearly intends to leave.

The night staff ask him where he is going and he replies the post office to buy stamps. The night staff try to persuade him to wait until the day time when the post office will be open. They also suggest that he is not suitably dressed but George does not appear to understand. He attempts to force his way out of the building and the night staff physically prevent him from leaving.

This is an unexpected emergency response. It is a restriction of liberty – not a deprivation. The reason for this is that there is no intention (at least not yet) to deprive George of his liberty in the long term. It is simply a proportionate response in George’s best interests to restrict his liberty because it is reasonable to assume that he would come to harm should he be left to wander in those conditions.

If in the morning George has regained his understanding (his capacity) and wants to go to the Post Office fully dressed and in a rational state of mind then he will do so. There is no need for further restriction and so no need for further authorisation.

If however it became necessary to keep George from going outside for longer than that it would be necessary to seek further authorisation under the new Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) which came into effect on April 1^st 2009.

Some people believe that the new DoLS procedures represent a new crime but nothing could be further from the truth. In fact they are a way to make deprivation of liberty lawful for people in hospitals and care homes without the need to seek a court order or detention under the Mental Health Act. DoLS makes your job easier. Let’s look at the situation DoLS seeks to change.

It has been unlawful to deprive people of their liberty throughout Europe without legal authorisation for years. This is why Josef Fritzl was prosecuted for locking his daughter Elisabeth in a cellar for 24 years:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/joseffritzl/1929150/Austria-Elisabeth-Fritzl-was-imprisoned-behind-eight-doors.html

It is also why the Bournewood ‘admission’ that prompted the government to create the Mental Capacity Act 2005 was unlawful:

http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2009/09/02/112480/the-bournewood-case.html

Both of these cases were against articles 5 (the right to liberty) and article 8 (the right to respect for private and family life) of the European Convention on Human Rights ECHR. The convention demands that all member states create laws preventing such human rights breaches and the UK is no exception.

Article 5 (the right to liberty) effectively says that there should be no deprivation of liberty without legal process including the right to a fair hearing and to speedy appeals processes. This means that it is unlawful to deprive a person of liberty without recourse to a court.

For decades the culture in care homes has been that people are routinely denied their right to liberty by workers with no legal training, no real understanding of Human Rights legislation and no authority to replace the courts. This has been illegal and has left care workers open to criminal prosecution.

The Bournewood judgement made it clear that this practice had to stop. Residents’ rights had to be respected or their would be legal consequences for care workers who wrongfully deprived them of their freedom.

So the government created the deprivation of Liberty safeguards (DoLS) in order to help residential care providers obtain legal authorisation without the need for lengthy court processes. In effect DoLS does you a favour. It gives you a way to do what you need to do to fulfil your duty of care without having to appear before a judge and without fear of prosecution.

The process is very straightforward and is designed to help you to stay within the law.

The authorisation comes from the local supervisory body (either the local authority or the local PCT) and depends upon 6 assessments. These are:

1. Age requirement
2. Capacity requirement
3. No refusals requirement
4. Mental health requirement
5. Eligibility requirement
6. Best interests requirement

In the next article in this series we’ll look at the DoLS process itself, how it works, why the 6 requirements are there, who completes the assessments and what happens once the authorisation is granted.

We’ll also talk about what will happen if the authorisation is not granted.

 This article applies to residential care settings in England & Wales.

Not so very long ago I was delivering training on the Mental Capacity Act and Deprivation of Liberty to a group of workers in a residential home in the West Midlands. The registered manager of the unit was there and when I got to the part about locking doors she said something quite surprising:

“It’s alright Stuart, you can skip this part. It’s not relevant for us.”

I asked her how the issues of locked doors could possibly not be relevant for residential care. She said:

“Because our people don’t go out.”

I asked her why they didn’t go out and she replied:

“Because the doors are locked.”

“Why are the doors locked?” I asked

“Because they’re old.” Came the predictable response.

I’m not really trying to criticise this manager here. I don’t blame her at all for holding this view – it’s rife in UK. Her view is part of a cultural misunderstanding about the duty of Care that has encouraged residential care workers to lock people away for years. So it’s not the people that should be taken to task – it’s the culture. Unfortunately the only way to change the culture is to prosecute the people – hence the new legislation around rights and capacity.

So here’s another principle to consider….

Getting older is not a crime and it is no reason to sentence someone to life imprisonment.

The same is true for learning disability, mental disorder, physical disability etc etc. Social care is not the same as prison and social care workers are not employed to take the place of judges. It is not up to us to decide who can and who cannot exercise the right to liberty.

Care workers can restrict liberty if it’s proportionate and in the person’s best interests to do so but they cannot deprive them of it without authoirsation. This is a major source of confusion and we’ll address the difference between restriction and deprivation in a later article in this series but for now it’s enough to define these principles:

• It is unlawful to deprive someone of their liberty without legal authorisation.
• Care workers can only restrict a person’s liberty as part of their care if the person lacks the capacity to decide and the situation is both proportionate and in their best interests.
• Routine restriction is likely to be a deprivation of liberty(not just restriction) and needs external authorisation

So what do we mean by liberty?

The answer to this question is surprising to many people. Liberty is much more than simply locking doors.  Basically all our rights are liberties. They are freedoms which means the same thing. All UK citizens have the right (the liberty) to do certain things and also to be free from certain types of abuse such as assault or discrimination.

Rights are given to us by law and so they can only be removed from us by legal process. This is why so many previously routine practices in social care have had to change – even preventing a person from using the toilet when they want to or from choosing what they would like to wear is a restriction or deprivation of liberty and so we must follow legal process in order to stay within the law.

Don’t panic though – this doesn’t mean that you need to go to court every time you set a menu in residential care. It simply means that you must make sure you follow the new legal procedures ‘in house’ for most decisions. This in because most decisions would amount simply to restriction of liberty – something you can authorise for yourself so long as you understand and can justify why you are doing what you do.

To make sense of this we need to talk briefly about the Mental Capacity Act 2005.

The Mental Capacity Act came into effect in 2007. The ‘Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards’ took effect in April 2009. Both are based upon the Bournewood judgement in the European Court of Human Rights (HL vs UK).

http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2009/09/02/112480/the-bournewood-case.html

They radically alter how we must deal with people in our care. Many previously routine care practices could now be unlawful.

Principles of the Mental Capacity Act

At the heart of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 are five underpinning principles:

• An assumption of capacity – until it can be shown that the adult cannot make their own decisions;
• The right for individuals to be supported to make their own decisions – people must be given all appropriate help before anyone concludes that they cannot make their own decisions;
• That individuals have the right to make eccentric or unwise decisions;
• Best interests – anything done for or on behalf of people without capacity must be in their best interests and;
• Least restrictive intervention – anything done for or on behalf of people without capacity should be the least restrictive of their basic rights and freedoms.

Essentially this means that before we take away a person’s right to make their own decisions we must be able to show that they cannot decide for themselves because they lack the capacity to do so. It is not enough to say that we thought they were making a mistake – that is their right. The only starting point is the assessment of capacity – not diagnosis or unwise decision-making. After all we all have the right to make unwise decisions – that’s how it should be.

So how do we assess a person’s capacity?

First we need to realise that capacity assessments only apply to a person’s ability to make this particular decision at this particular time.

Having capacity means being able to perform the four stages of decision-making. In other words can the person:

• understand the information relevant to the decision;
• retain that information long enough to decide;
• Use and Weigh that information;
• Communicate their decision.

Only if we can reasonably show that a person lacks the capacity to decide for themselves may we presume to decide for them. Even then it’s more than simply doing what we think is right – there’s a specific checklist that we need to follow when working out what is right. This is called the Best Interests checklist and is defined in the Mental Capacity Act code of practice.

http://www.dca.gov.uk/menincap/legis.htm#codeofpractice

 The checklist includes:

• Equal consideration and non-discrimination;
• Considering all relevant circumstances and information (including written information);
• The likelihood of the person regaining capacity;
• Permitting and encouraging participation;
• Special consideration for life-sustaining treatment;
• Advance decisions;
• The person’s wishes and feelings, beliefs and values;
• Lasting Powers of Attorney;
• The views of other people.

Bear in mind that the obligation to consult relatives etc does not mean that you must do what they tell you to. There are certain formal circumstances where people can tell you what NOT to do (refuse consent under a Lasting Power of Attorney for example) but nobody can tell you to do anything that you think is professionally inappropriate.

Remember also that this is a delicate issue because of confidentiality. However, if we can speak to others we must in order to get a proper feel for what would be in that person’s best interests as an individual.

Do not do this without consent if the service-user has capacity to decide for themselves.

So to summarize the points raised in this second part of the series:

• It is unlawful to deprive someone of their liberty without legal authorisation.
• Care workers can only restrict a person’s liberty as part of their care if the person lacks the capacity to decide and the situation is both proportionate and in their best interests.
• Routine restriction is likely to be a deprivation of liberty(not just restriction) and needs external authorisation
• Liberty means the right to self-determination
• Capacity means the ability to make this particular decision at this particular time
• People with capacity to choose can do so unless a formal, legal reason exists to prevent them such as a court order or the Mental Health Act
• The Mental Capacity Act protects people’s rights to choose
• If the person lacks capacity then in most cases the decision-maker will be the person delivering the care or treatment
• Follow the best interests checklist when making decisions for other people who lack the capacity to decide for themselves.

I am annoyed with Patch 1.5.0.11. Specifically:

All chat channels now have a level 10 restriction, both to join and participate.

Whispering now has a level 10 restriction.

Players can receive whispers but cannot respond below level 10.

Players cannot send in game mail until level 10.

Players cannot search for ‘who’ in game until level 10.

Players are now limited at the amount of in game mail you can send per hour.

I was frustrated with the restrictions placed at level 5, but I had thought that was a temporary fix until they had a better solution for clearing out the spammers. This new patch goes too far into the realm of punishing the innocent instead of the offenders and I’m starting to wonder if these restrictions are actually thought of as a solution and how temporary they’ll be.

I logged into an alt in Poeta last night to get a feel for new patch. That feeling is isolation. True, there was no spam, but there was also no requests or replies for help with Tutty or the Cube or legion invitations or discussion of any kind at all. Add to that my inability to who and PM my friends for an invite to the legion and this MMO felt more like a solo-play game. Being someone who enjoys helping people and the social interaction that MMOs provide, I couldn’t help but think that we, as a community, are losing more than we’re gaining with this new patch.

To add insult to injury, when I shifted back to my main and entered the Eltnen Fortress, the goldseller shopgirl was sitting in the same spot I saw her the day before with the website and price for kinah typed above her head. It only made me feel more like the problem was being hidden from new players instead of fixed.

This post can also be found at www.multiplaying.net.

Condo associations can collect the full assessments that are due them from absentee owners and units facing foreclosure. It is true. This is happening.

Some Florida courts understand the Condo Crisis and are giving Receivers the authority to collect rents directly from tenants, before the money has a chance to reach the owners, and then using it to pay the condo assessments FIRST, before the unit owner has a chance to get his hands on it.

This is an extraordinary solution prompted by extraordinary times. Florida’s condo statutes were not written to give Associations the power to enforce payment of assessments even in the face of an overwhelming number of foreclosures and the pressures felt by investor-owners struggling to stay out of foreclosure.

Receivers, court-appointed for no other purpose than to collect rents from tenants, can step in. Once the money is in their hands, Associations get paid first; well, almost first. The Receiver takes his fees off of the top, then pays the Association second. If money is left over after these dues are paid, the unit-owner gets it.

The plan is working, bringing financial health back to condo associations and stabilizing property values.

This here is my notes in a debate I recently participated in. The topic at hand was “The Restriction of migration by states in expensive, dangerous, and deeply immoral”. I was on the ‘negative’ side, saying that it is none of these things.

I myself personally agree with the topic(in that its expensive, dangerous and immoral), but at the same time I’m a bit of a nutter for the rights of the state as a legal, recognized entity with its own freedoms to do as it pleases. That’s why I chose to argue along the legal lines of the topic, avoiding points of race and religion as much as possible due to my belief that arguing against religion along those lines has zero credibility.

Note that there was more to what I said, these were just notes. The text in red is additional points added now.

First off, Australia is a recognised state by the United Nations. As a recodnised state we are accepted as a sovereign entity, with the rights to do as we wish within the parameters of international law. [Of course, many states question the rhetoric of international law, much like Australia has done in the past under the Howard government.]

As a recognised state with obligations to the UN, Australia accepts thousands of refugees legally every year. We accept the number that has been made in an agreement between the UN and our highest diplomats. These refugees are welcome here. [In reality, Australia never really reaches its agreed quota, always falling short, but never going over.]

The boat people who pass through Indonesia and cross the Timor Sea are not refugees to us. They are illegal immigrants.

Here’s why; They want to live here and not leave, and they already have outstayed their welcome before even getting here by seeking to completely circumvent the legal process of applying to become residents.

These boat people are not poor. [In most cases.]

It costs what to us would be thousands of dollars to acquire the services of a people smuggler. [This is always true. If a poor family is able to aquire the services of a people smuggler, they always put themselves into severe debt, leaving any family they left behind in danger of resorting to crime.]

With these thousands, they could have waited in line. They’re on the boats because they were impatient. Australia has a duty as a representative of the UN to help them yes, but by no means should we reward bad behavior and breaking the law. -Namely our laws.

Refugees are always welcome in Australia, illegal immigrants are not. We are only upholding our laws by stopping them. We are breaking no international laws by turning them away. [We are breaking no laws as long as we refuse to recognise these people are refugees, who have legal status worldwide. Even if other states recognize people as refugees, Australia has no obligation to give them the same title.]

In a broad sense, the restriction of immigration on the other hand- being the movement of people by choice- is not so much a policy of governments as they come and go, but a requirement on behalf of their citizens.

• One of the obligations that governments have is to do with protection of the states borders, so that its citizens may live in peace and prosperity.
• Protecting the border does not only include stopping armies. It involves stopping armies of people.
• There is a contractual agreement between the state and its people, in that the state provides services and opportunities in return for taxes and the occasional duties performed by citizens. The state must first focus on its own people, by whom it has been elected, rather than those who wish so become its people. Whilst migrants are important, and a major part of Australian society, the fact is that in order to protect the Australian way of life, while they are waiting to come into Australia- if at all- they come second.[In the case of refugees however, they have their own rights, not equal to, but not below the rights of the Australian people. As such Australia has an obligation-not a duty- to put them first due to their circumstances.]
  
• It can takes months for a prospective migrant to find out if they will be accepted into Australia. If the government spends weeks processing a single person and feeling bad about it, who later becomes a productive member of Australian society, we are far better off than spending a minute, feeling good, and essentially getting a lemon. Australia wants productive immigrants who can add to Australia, not live off it. Not to sound nasty, but a prime example here is the high numbers of New Zealand migrants who come here because they get more benefits. -Increased concessions in allowing more immigrants also pose the threat that we may let terrorists into our country. We haven’t had a terrorist attack yet, but they have been directed against us. To prevent one from ever happening on Australian soil, we must continue to be harsh about who we let into Australia, and who we turn away. [It can literally take years to process a prospective migrant. For a nation of migrants, we've come a long way since the White Australia Policy, but we've got a long way to go in accepting new migrants.]
• Conflicts are to do with people. They are borne of and perpetuated by the people involved. Australia is widely seen as a refuge and land of opportunity for prospective migrants and displaced persons alike, and as such, restricting immigration is our way of stopping these people who would otherwise bring conflict with them. [This point I completely agree with. Even on a cultural level, new migrants must be aware of and willing to accept that conflicts with rival groups are not welcome. For example between Serbians and Croatians,  Greeks and Turks, etc etc.]

Borders are drawn so that people may know where one state ends, and another begins- and as such, where their journeys- free of regulations- end.

• When an individual crosses a border between states, they are passing between one governmental body’s area of jurisdiction to another that may or may not have any similarities.
• Regardless, this person is still bound by the laws of the state they are presently in. [Yet at the same time the state they are in is bound by the laws of the international community.]
• These laws are made by the government of that state, which is the representative of the citizens of that state, and as such, is also bound by these laws, and its obligation to its people.
• As such, in order to protect the rights of the citizens from whatever threats there may be posed by excessive, unrestricted immigration- whether it be economic(the ‘taking jobs’ argument, or more credibly the overall lack of jobs as seen by the recession), political(going against the grain far too much, for example fascists), for safety reasons to do with terrorism, religious, even – if they are a threat through fundamentalism, the state must control its borders and stop some people who may be deemed dangerous, or even an inconvenience.
• The state has a duty to protect its citizens way of life, and as such, it has the electorate-given right, AND the right given the United Nations as a sovereign state to turn migrants away.

People are either born into states- receiving instant citizenship- or move there later in life, because a particular state may offer better opportunities than the alternatives.

• Despite the fact that this sounds almost feudal in nature, where the lucky ones among us are born into wealth and opportunity, the fact of the matter is that the opportunities offered to citizens of a state were meant for them. [What I mean here is; When it comes to wealth, whats mine is not yours. Rich nations and the people within them do not gather wealth to give it to others.] By this, I mean that previous generations of a family and all families in a state help develop the economy of their home nation for the future of their people.[This point here is far too similar to the Nazi rhetoric before WWII, and has zero credibility.]
  
• Of course these opportunities and the wealth associated may be shared with others who wish to become citizens of a nation, but this can only happen with smaller controlled numbers of people.
• Citizens of the European Union fear for their standards of living regarding the admittance of Turkey into the Union. Religion is of course an issue, but their standards of living are a far more credible issue. Turkey by comparison is poor and backwards, whilst Europe is rich and progressive. Europe’s wealth may be sapped by the admittance of poorer states into the Union, wealth that was built upon the idea that Europe could unite and be prosperous together, rather than wage war on each other.
• My point of that example relates to Australia also. The point being that over the years we have built up wealth and prosperity for ourselves. Australia did not gather this wealth to become a magnet for migrants. [As a people- no, as a nation- actually it did.]
• Our own standards of living may come down if we allow a free flow of migration into Australia.[This point here is highly contentious. Its widely accepted that the standards of living of your average citizen will fall in coming decades due to restraints economically and environmentally. As such, any level of migration may become a target for anti-migration activists as a scape-goat for poorer living conditions in the future.]
  
• There are already too many people living in Australia with these standards of living. Australia’s ability to provide for its citizens as a geographical entity is at breaking point. Our sovereignty is already being sapped by the government’s inability to provide. We already rely on other nations for food. Unrestricted immigration will only worsen our situation.[This point here is actually true. The Australian continant can only support 10 million people living in the conditions we all do now. The resources for the remaining 12 million are all imported goods. Australia is by no means self-reliant.]
  

In conclusion, as a sovereign state Australia has the right to turn away any and all immigrants that it deems undesirable.

• It’s not too expensive because it can cost more to accommodate so many more immigrants than it would to ask them to wait in line.[This point really doesn't have much to go with. The long term benefits of allowing freer migration would vastly out-weigh the costs of allowing them entry and setting them up through their contribution to the economy.]
  
• It is only dangerous in the way we are protecting our borders FROM dangers. [It is also dangerous in that we are forcing desperate people to take a number. Desperate people can do desperate things. Endangering lives.]

And by no means is it immoral. Australia is within its rights to turn migrants around. Australia is WELL within its rights to stop illegal immigrants not only by our laws but the laws of other states too. [Despite being legal, by restricting immigration and refusing access to illegal immigrants we do not label as refugees, Australia looses face in the international community. As a middle power with comparatively meagre economic and political weight, this can affect us more than we'd hope. Being a moral disgrace saps credibility and respect.] And refugees (people who have been displaced) in reality rarely come to our shores in large numbers. As an island, the poorest, most desperate of the refugees come with the aid of the UN.[The main sources of refugees who enter Australia are from West Papua, and other parts of South East Asia close to us and the Pacific Islands.]

Blah, blah, blah. Ok, I know I have been sucking at blogging since I started this bad boy. Graduate school is ruining/consuming my life, but that is no excuse. More to the point, I’ve been continuing my lifelong struggle with food issues over the past nine or so months, and I’ve reached the conclusion that I’m going to (try) to start using this blog to a better purpose than just documenting food & recipes.

I know, “Great, another chick food blogger who used to have an eating disorder and is gonna write about how eating two carrot sticks a day is TOTALLY better than eating one.” Yes, and no.

When I say “food issues” I mean like “for my entire life I have not been able to control my eating, and have gone through this horrible cycle of restricting and binge eating.” I also mean that in the past 1.5 years I have made significant alterations to the way I view food, nutrition and diet, but I still struggle with restriction, arbitrary food rules and poor control of my cravings almost daily.

So, here it is, my food philosophy:

1) Eat real food. Like Kath over at KathEats, I think eating food in its whole, unprocessed and natural state is the paramount rule to follow when cooking and eating. I’d rather eat sugar than Splenda, and real cheese than Cheetos any day. I also prefer to do things like bake my own bread and make my own soup, when I can (which is pretty often).

2.) Meat is murder (for the environment) [kinda] If you go back to my very first post, I talk about being a “flexitarian.” What this means is, I don’t really eat meat. Sometimes I eat fish or seafood, and if someone cooked a meat-based meal for me, or I was at a restaurant famous for a meat specialty, I wouldn’t turn up my nose at it. And sometimes I eat bacon. Whatever.

3.) Cheap and healthy Look, I am broke. I work a part-time job, and go to graduate school. On top of that, I’m not in a field where I’ll ever be making the big bucks. So for me, the primary directives when shopping, cooking and eating are to stretch my dollar and eat as healthy as possible. What this means is I will not live on ramen & mac n’ cheese just because its cheap, but I have to make due with natural peanut butter instead of almond butter, because I’m po’.

Anyway, I know this has been a long post, but I’m hoping to put the pep back in my blogging step by starting to expand on these ideas, and talk about how I apply them to my daily life. Also, blogging=accountability. Let’s do this.

So last time we proved that the dimensions of an irreducible representation divide the index of the center. Now to generalize this to an arbitrary abelian normal subgroup.

There are first a few basic background results that I need to talk about. 

Induction  

Given a group and a subgroup (in fact, this can be generalized to a non-monomorphic map ), a representation of yields by restriction a representation of . One obtains a functor . This functor has an adjoint, denoted by .

It can be described explicitly using tensor products in a simple manner. Given an inclusion , there is a map from which one gets the restriction functor . As is well-known for rings , the adjoint to this functor is given by the tensor product:

It follows that if , then is a -submodule of . Also, if is a coset decomposition, then

as vector spaces. In particular, . Conversely, if the above decomposition holds then .

The adjointness relation is usually called Frobenius reciprocity, and is written as

Restriction  

First, we discuss the restriction to abelian normal subgroups via a lemma, which will enable us to induct on : 

Lemma 1 Let be a group, an abelian normal subgroup. Let be a simple -representation. Then there are two possibilities: 

1. acts by scalar matrices on .
2. There is a subgroup with and

   

   for some . 

 

A more general version of this is in Serre or Curtis-Reiner, in the latter attributed to Clifford.  The more general result drops the abelian hypothesis and replaces 1 above by “the restriction to A is isotypic, i.e. a direct sum of isomorphic simple objects.”

So, by restriction is an -module. By the previous post, we can write as -modules

where

Perhaps ought to be thought of as a weight space, as in the theory of semisimple Lie algebras, when is replaced by a Cartan subalgebra. It turns out that in this case, the elements of permute the spaces : if , then where because of the “fundamental calculation” (Fulton and Harris’ phrase)

Now pick with . If then we are in the first case. Otherwise, take to be the stabilizer of and the result follows.  

Finally, the theorem   

Theorem 2 Let be a finite group and an abelian normal subgroup. Then each simple representation of has dimension at most .  

Induction on . Assume the theorem proved for smaller groups.

First of all, let’s make some reductions. Assume that is a simple representation of which is faithful, because otherwise we could replace by the image in to get a representation of a quotient of . The image of in that quotient satisfies , so we reduce to the faithful case.

Next, I claim that we may assume that does not act by scalars on . If it did, then would be contained in the center of (by faithfulness), in which case the theorem is already proved.

By the lemma, this means there is a subgroup containing with for some (necessarily simple) . Then by the inductive hypothesis

proving the theorem.