Vulnerable person in Hampshire waited more than eight years for decision on whether carer could make decisions on their behalf

Across the country, thousands have experienced a prolonged wait for their deprivation of liberty applications, which allow a third party to act on behalf of those judged to be unable to make decisions for themselves.

Care homes, hospitals, and other organisations must seek permission from the local authority to use the policy, which is generally only deployed for people with dementia or severe mental health issues.

NHS Digital figures show one vulnerable person in Hampshire had to wait for eight years and approximately 141 days for their carer to be able to make decisions on their behalf.

The average time it took for an application to be completed in Hampshire was 191 days. There were 5,875 applications, only 790 of which were processed within 21 days, which is the legal time limit.

The 21-day time frame was also exceeded the year before, when patients saw average waits of 173 days.

Across England, the average wait time for all completed applications was 156 days, an increase of three days on the previous year.

The 1,345 applications in the Portsmouth local authority area, meanwhile, took an average of 38 days to be completed – down from 49 the previous year and a big improvement on the Hampshire figure.

One vulnerable person, though, still had to wait 195 days for their application to be processed.

Rupen Gahir Kalsi, senior policy manager at VoiceAbility, a charity which advocates for patients, said: "These figures are shocking, but not surprising. This is wholly predictable and is why DoLS (deprivation of liberty safeguards) was due to be replaced by Liberty Protection Safeguards earlier this year – legislation which has now been shelved.

"LPS is not the perfect solution, but implementing this would make a huge difference to people, the majority of whom are older people, stuck living in places they don’t want to be, separated from friends and family. They need urgent action from the Government now."

Overall, there were 5,875 applications in Hampshire, 2,180 of which were 'urgent'. They were completed for an average of 132 days — longer than applications classified as 'standard', which took 102 days to be granted.

Over half (56%) of the 289,150 applications completed in England were not granted due to a change in the person’s circumstances or not meeting the assessment criteria.

In Hampshire, there were 3,790 DoLS not granted — 65% of all applications.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “To assist local authorities, the Government is providing up to £7.5 billion of additional funding over two years to support adult social care and discharge.

“Local authorities will have the flexibility to use this funding to meet local needs.”