Mr. Tom Ward:

I might just come in on that point. If we were to think about any of us around the table here and the stage we are at in our lives, we could be in the middle of buying property, we could be owed money by someone or whatever. The discharge process is an effort to finalise all the outstanding matters to do with somebody's affairs to allow them to successfully move to the new arrangement. There are a couple of issues around this. The Deputy mentioned the legal fees. An application to the High Court is certainly involved, which is intimidating in its own right. It is necessary to go to the time and effort of finding a solicitor to move the application and then people are caught with the legal fees. After that, once the new arrangement is in place, people may find themselves in a position where they might have to get a professional decision-making representative, such as an accountant or a solicitor, to be part of their future as well. There are costs associated with that as well.

I am saying there is a good cohort of people who are very happy to be under the wardship regime at the moment. They see themselves as paying minimal fees to us. This cohort of people went to the trouble of having become wards of court whenever they came in, so the incentive for them to move on is not pressing, unlike for others who really want to get out of wardship. We are trying to encourage people to move sooner rather than later. We have done a great deal of outreach work with individuals and their families to encourage them in this regard and to point out to them that this day is coming and it would be better for them to come in early. As Ms Denning said, if we think about the period after discharge from wardship, they are going to need all the supports around them as well. It is better that this is done in a planned rather than a forced way, whereby, for instance, the President of the High Court could make an order discharging someone from wardship and no supports would be in place. This really would be a less-than-optimal solution for those people.