Hello you brilliant people. I’m hoping you can share your thoughts, and offer some guidance on a situation that I’m facing. My elder brother is nearly 60 and is under the care of adult social services. He has mental health issues. He spent his entire life living with our parents in the family home, up until their subsequent deaths in recent years. He continues to live in the property, which through inheritance is now jointly owned by him and me. He has some paid for care and some support from me.
For the past few years, our local county council has acted as my brother’s financial appointee. However, unbeknown to me at the time, last year the local authority applied for Court of Protection financial deputyship, which was granted in September. I only found this out two days ago through finding a letter that wasn’t meant for me.
I am fuming about the local authority’s actions. From a legal point of view it would appear they failed to notify the court of my existence when making the application (as my brother’s closest living relative who plays a part in his care, I believe they had a duty to do so). And from a practical point of view they have effectively forced me into a wholly unwanted financial and decision making partnership with the council - although it’s a partnership that I’ve not been invited to or informed about!
At the end of the day I want what’s best for my brother but I also have to consider my own wellbeing. The local authority and I have butted heads too many times over the years over their failings with our late parents’ care, my brother’s welfare, and indeed my own welfare needs as a carer, and I can’t face going through it again. I want out.
What would you do? What advice can you offer please? Legally, practically, and pragmatically. I will challenge the local authority over their actions but I need to do so in the right way - and that’s why I really would appreciate your input. Is there a positive to all this that I’m missing? Although the court order has been granted, is it possible for me to challenge it given the circumstances (there is a statutory period of time that elapsed many months ago)? Your thoughts… please. Thank you.
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I would contact the Court of Protection asking initially for a copy of the procedure for Deputyship. May be online. Someone has badly mucked up!
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Try here: Deputies: make decisions for someone who lacks capacity: Apply to be a property and financial affairs deputy - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
I think it’s highly unusual for a council to take this approach without family members being notified other than where there are concerns that there is some financial impropriety going on. That said, you’d have found out much sooner had that been the case.
Your problem - as I see it, not being a lawyer of any kind - is that it may be very difficult to find out why they took this approach without discussing it with you first, and it’s likely to be costly as you will likely get nowhere without a solicitor.
And if you truly want out as a carer, while it must be galling to be pushed into it this way, now may be the time to pull out of it and just be a brother.
It depends on how strongly you feel, and whether you can afford the fight - financially and emotionally.
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I echo the other’s comments on this, someone has mucked up but also you are partly stuck in either wanting to be a brother or act as carer. The only thing I can think of is that either the council have mixed up records or trying to get your brother into a place to be looked after and thinking that they can get a court order to take the house off him to pay for it. I know sometime care homes will try this trick but if the house was left in someone else name then they would have to argue it with a solicitor. Write to the clerk of the court for further information but also speak to a solicitor. I don’t think it worth going to the police and raising a concern. Also go through the post and try and find some records about this.
Good luck
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Thank you all for your replies, I really appreciate you taking the time. I tried to keep my original post focussed on my current issue… but for context I provided care to our parents and brother for nearly a decade, alongside professional carers. I say that because there is a track record of the local authority acting in questionable ways. From repeatedly ignoring reasonable requests for help and information to outright lies. Until you’ve been there it is difficult to appreciate the mental health impact of realising the local authority can actually operate in quite dark ways and you can feel very alone. I’ve not had many dealings with them for the past couple of years - so discovering they’ve applied for and been granted deputyship has come as shock. My own health took a battering during the years of caring for our parents and my brother, and I now have to decide the best way forward, both for my brother and me. Time is a healer, and for any current carer reading this… once you come out the other side, you realise just how much your own mental and physical heath can be affected. So, thank you all for your support!
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A very different approach would be to write to the LA a very short letter, saying you understand that they now have deputyship. As you are joint owner of the house please can they give you the name of the officer who will be managing his finances? (After all, who pays the bills, maintenance etc needs to be formally agreed now.)
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