Tom Brabazon (Dublin Bay North, Fianna Fail)
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184. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the number of enduring powers of attorney that have been created since the commencement of the Assistant Decision Making (Capacity) Act 2015. [6467/25]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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The Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act 2015, along with the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) (Amendment) Act 2022, commenced on the 26th of April 2023.

Part 7 of the 2015 Act provides for a new "enduring powers of attorney" system which enables an individual to plan ahead by appointing someone they trust to act as their attorney and to make certain decisions on their behalf if they lose capacity in the future. The Decision Support Service (DSS) has statutory responsibility for the operation of many of the provisions of the 2015 Act, including processing and registering enduring powers of attorney- made under the Act.

Since April 2023,1,566 enduring powers of attorney have been fully processed and registered by the DSS. Of those completed EPAs, 41 have been activated, meaning that since making the Power the donor has subsequently unfortunately lost capacity since the EPA was made and registered with the DSS, and the EPA is therefore now in effect.

An additional approx. 16,000 EPA applications have been commenced and are being progressed by applicants.

Whilst the 2015 Act provides that EPAs can no longer be made under the 1996 Enduring Powers of Attorney Act, EPAs which were created under the 1996 Act and prior to the commencement of the 2015 Act can still be registered and activated in the advent of the loss the donor’s capacity. I am advised by the Courts Service that 2,336 enduring powers of attorney created under the 1996 Act have been registered by the Courts since the commencement of the 2015 Act.

Those EPAs may have been made at any time since the commencement of the 1996 Act. There will usually be a gap of potentially a number of years between the making of an EPA and the advent of capacity loss when it then comes into force. In that regard I am advised that the average time between creation of an EPA under the 1996 Act and subsequent application for registration following the advent of capacity loss is approximately 4 years.