§ Mr. Doddsasked the Attorney-General if he will arrange to reimburse Mrs. Harriett Thornton for the £1 per week paid from her estate by the official solicitor from 17th May, 1956, towards her 164W maintenance whilst she was still certified as insane until discharged on 26th October, 1956, as a National Health Service patient.
§ Mr. Doddsasked the Attorney-General, in view of Mrs. Harriett Thornton having been detained in the Cane Hill Mental Hospital from 1st April, 1953, if he will state the reasons for her financial affairs not being handed over to the Official Solicitor until 10th June, 1955; and what authority looked after her affairs in the intervening period.
§ The Attorney-GeneralShortly after Mrs. Thornton was detained her next of kin was invited to consider whether a receiver was required to look after her property. No reply was received and it was not until the 16th June, 1954, that the Court of Protection received from another of her relatives information which disclosed the need for further inquiry about the management of her affairs.
After preliminary inquiries had been made the Court on the 19th August, 1954, directed the Official Solicitor to investigate and report on Mrs. Thornton's property and liabilities. As is usual in these cases, the information about the patient's affairs had to be obtained from a variety of sources and answers to the Official Solicitor's inquiries were in some cases given only after coniderable delays. In consequence, the Official Solicitor was not in a position to lodge his report until the 13th April, 1955. On the 27th April he was directed to apply for appointment as receiver; the application was made formally on the 4th May and heard by the Court on the 10th June, when the order appointing him was made.
The Lunacy Acts provide that only a receiver appointed by the Court can manage the property of a woman who is incapable of looking after her own affairs. Mrs. Thornton's property was not therefore under the management of any authority during the period referred to in the Question.
The investigation of Mrs. Thornton's affairs necessarily occupied a long time, but my noble Friend the Lord Chancellor considers that the procedure should have been expedited and he has asked me to express his regret that there was some avoidable delay in this case.