Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

Ms Grogan spoke on the financial abuse piece and welcomed the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act 2015. Everyone said we needed legislation around that. It was very rushed through the Houses here and we were told that there was a timeline that we definitely had to meet. Then it turned out that we did not have to meet that. All of the amendment stages of that Act were rushed and within that legislation now there still remains a provision that I believe is called the functional test of mental capacity. That has been found to discriminate against people with disabilities.

One of the key findings around that was that depending on who carries out the test, there is a different result and it, therefore, should not be used. However, it still will be used under domestic legislation.

In addition to that, Ms Grogan also spoke about the importance of presuming capacity, which was the entire purpose of that legislation. In the codes of practice that goes with this there were not, as far as we can gather as a committee, that much engagement with DPOs on these codes of practice or anything like that. Ultimately, this outlines that, for example, a bank manager could decide that a person does not have capacity. The codes of practice in this way fly in the face of the entire purpose of the legislation. Has she any concerns about that? I am aware that this is not something that HIQA necessarily look into but I am curious to know if there is anything that concerns the authority in this regard.

In a case which Ms Grogan spoke about where she might go somewhere and there is an urgent compliance plan put in place, could she give me an example, please, of a situation that would result in the requirement for such an urgent compliance plan?