Held, (1) the starting point in evaluating any application for appointment of a PWD was by reference to the clear wording of the 2005 Act in which the twin obligations both to protect P and promote his or her personal autonomy remained central throughout (para 53(a)).

(2) The 18th birthday marked a transition to an altered legal status, which carried both rights and responsibilities, predicated on respect for autonomy to which P remained as entitled as his capacitous coeval. The extension of parental responsibility beyond the age of 18, under the aegis of a PWD, required vigilantly to be guarded against, while the stress and anxiety experienced in consequence of the transition from child to adult services could be remedied by promoting good professional practice and not by avoidably eroding the autonomy of the young incapacitous adult (para 53(b)).

(3) The structure of the 2005 Act and, in particular, the factors which fell to be considered pursuant to section 4 might well mean that the most likely conclusion in the majority of cases would be that it was not in the best interests of P for the court to appoint a PWD (para 53(c)).

(4) The above was not in any way to be interpreted as a statutory bias or presumption against appointment but was the likely consequence of the application of the relevant factors to the individual circumstances of the case. It required to be emphasised, unambiguously, that that was not a presumption, nor should it even be regarded as the starting point (para 53(d)).

(5) To construct an artificial impediment, in practice, to the appointment of a PWD would be to fail to have proper regard to the unvarnished words of the 2005 Act and would compromise a fair balancing of the rights under articles 6 and 8 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms which were undoubtedly engaged (para 53(e)).

(6) The Mental Capacity Act Code of Practice (2012) was not a statute, it was an interpretive aid to the statutory framework, no more and no less. It was guidance which, while it would require important consideration, would never be determinative. The power remained in the statutory provision (para 53(f)).

(7) The prevailing ethos of the 2005 Act was to weigh and balance the many competing factors that would illuminate decision-making and the same rationale applied to the decision to appoint a PWD (para 53(g)).

(8) There was only one presumption in the 2005 Act, namely that set out at section 1(2) that a person had to be assumed to have capacity unless it was established that he lacked capacity. That recognition of the importance of human autonomy was the defining principle of the Act, which cast light into every corner of the legislation and illuminated the approach to appointment of PWDs (para 53(h)).

(9) P’s wishes and feelings and those other factors contemplated by section 4(6) of the 2005 Act, where they could be reasonably ascertained, required to be considered. None was determinative and the weight to be applied would vary from case to case in determining where P’s best interests lay (para 53(i)).

(10) It was a distortion of the framework of sections 4 and 5 of the 2005 Act to regard the appointment of a PWD as in any way a less restrictive option than the collaborative and informal decision-taking prescribed by section 5 (para 53(j)).

(11) Paragraph 8.83 of the code, which provided that deputies for personal welfare decisions would only be required in the most difficult cases where important and necessary actions could not be carried out without the court’s authority or where there was no other way of settling the matter in the best interests of P, was reflective of likely outcome and ought not to be regarded as the starting point. That paragraph of the code, in particular, required to be revisited (para 53(k)).