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This decision has wide-ranging implications for people in care settings across the UK, public bodies, and practitioners, and reframes the approach to deprivation of liberty under Article 5 of the European Convention of Human Rights (“ECHR”).
The decision originated with a reference brought by the Attorney General for Northern Ireland on the meaning of deprivation of liberty for adults (defined as those aged 16 and above) assessed as lacking mental capacity to make decisions about their residence and care arrangements, and living in community settings. The Minister of Health for Northern Ireland (“the Minister”) sought to revise a code of practice in Northern Ireland to provide that even where an adult had been assessed as lacking the relevant mental capacity, they could nevertheless provide valid consent to their care arrangements through the expression of wishes and feelings which go beyond mere acquiescence to their confinement. The Minister sought to issue the revised code of practice under section 288(4) of the MCA 2016 to replace the existing Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards Code of Practice issued under section 288(1) of the MCA 2016.
The issue for the Supreme Court to determine was whether this revised code would be incompatible with Article 5 of the ECHR. If so, the revised code would be unlawful.
On Friday, the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) published a report which found that government departments “still do not have a grip” on how to manage the asylum system [1], and that the Home Office has yet to demonstrate that it has learned from previous attempts to reform the asylum system.
The publication of the report follows the Government announcement in November 2025 of an “entirely new asylum model”, alongside plans to reduce costs by £1 billion a year by 2028-29 [4].
An analysis of the asylum system report identified a pattern of shifting, rather than reducing, backlogs. The PAC highlighted that increases in the speed of processing asylum claims led to a decline of decision quality, which contributed to backlogs in the appeals system. There was an increase from 27,000 people waiting for an appeal decision in April 2024 to currently “around 70,000” — an increase of over 150% [11].
The PAC also raised concerns about the Home Office approach to the Northeye site, which was deemed unsuitable for asylum accommodation but subsequently transferred to Homes for England to increase the UK’s housing stock [13]. PAC chair, Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, asked: “if it is not fit for asylum seekers, why is it fit for our homeless population?”.
In other news
On Wednesday, Labour MP Jess Asato launched a test case against xAI concerning the creation of non-consensual sexual deepfakes by its AI platform, Grok. Filed in the High Court, the claim alleges breaches of data protection law and misuse of her private information. The claim seeks a declaration of illegality, an order requiring xAI to stop all further illegality and damages.
The House of Lords Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee launched an inquiry on Tuesday into Article 2 of the Windsor Framework, which provides that there is no diminution of rights, safeguards or equality of opportunity in Northern Ireland as a result of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU. The inquiry follows the Supreme Court’s judgment in Dillon v Secretary of State for Northern Ireland [2026] UKSC 15, handed down last month, which held that the Northern Ireland (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 did not breach Article 2 of the Windsor Framework.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court overruled the decision in Surrey County Council v P; Cheshire West and Chester Council v P [2014] UKSC 19 (“Cheshire West“)on what counts as “deprivation of liberty” under Article 5(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) as it applies to individualswith impaired mental capacity and living in health or social care settings [207].
The Supreme Court replaced the “acid test” for determining a deprivation of liberty established in Cheshire West — whether an individual is subject to “continuous supervision and control” and is “not free to leave” [11] — with a multifactorial approach, taking account of factors including the “relative normality” of the placement, the purpose of the confinement and the individual’s compliance [53].
The Supreme Court unanimously held that an adult who does not have mental capacity to make their own decision about their residence and care arrangements can “validly consent” to their confinement and no deprivation of liberty arises [53] — a decision which departs from “the conventional understanding” of Cheshire West [12].
Mencap, Mind and the National Autistic Society submitted to the Court that narrowing the scope of Article 5 ECHR would “remove vital safeguards” from disabled people [29], including access to independent representation and access to a court to challenge the lawfulness of detention [31].
The case stemmed from a reference brought by the Attorney General for Northern Ireland regarding whether a revised code of practice would be incompatible with Article 5 ECHR. The draft revised code provides that even where a person lacks mental capacity to make decisions about their residence and care arrangements, they can give valid consent “through the expression of current wishes and feelings that go beyond mere acquiescence to the confinement” [15], including evidence of a “positive attitude to the care arrangements” [55].
The Supreme Court held that the Minister would not be acting incompatibly with Article 5 ECHR in issuing the revised code [53].
In Strasbourg
José Mourinho has filed a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) against Türkiye regarding the disciplinary sanctions that were handed down by the country’s football federation while he was in charge of Fenerbahce.
The complaint, lodged in March 2025 while he was still coach of Fenerbahce and published earlier this week, claimed Mourinho’s right to freedom of expression was infringed when in November 2024 when he was given a one-match ban and fined 900,000 Turkish lira ($26,200) by the Turkish Football Federation (TFF) for questioning the impartiality of referees and other match officials.
On the UKHRB
Rosalind English considers the judgment in Cork and another v Smith [2026] EWHC 1199 as a cautionary case on the use of AI in legal practice, highlighting lawyers’ duty to verify AI-generated information.
This was an unfortunate case of delegation, where the ultimate outsourcing ended up with an AI system. It started as a simple block transfer application to the Chancery Division. Such applications are almost invariably determined without a hearing but the judge gave directions for the matter to be listed as a result of concerns about “misleading statements” made by the applicants’ former solicitors, Pinsent Masons LLP in two letters to the court in connection with the application,
A junior associate solicitor (“Lawyer A”) at the firm had used AI to research a point of insolvency law. The AI generated false text purporting to be Insolvency Rule 12.37(5), suggesting that the court had an express power to grant release to outgoing liquidators. The problem is that this text did not exist.
Lawyer A had asked the AI what the relevant statutory provisions said, rather than checking the legislation directly. The AI itself apparently flagged that the answer might be inaccurate, but that warning was not properly acted upon., and the AI-generated material was not checked against an authoritative source.
There was a further problem; when the court identified the false wording, the response did not simply acknowledge what had happened. A second letter to the court attempted to explain the earlier error as a “summary conclusion” rather than squarely accepting that AI had generated wording which had not been verified. The judge considered that this had made matters worse, because it suggested not just an initial mistake but a continued failure to correct the record promptly and frankly:
“The Purported Text in the 30th March Letter had caused me to be concerned that a cavalier attitude was being taken as to the accuracy of the material that Pinsent Masons were putting before the court. As I say, it struck me as likely to be an AI hallucination, which had not been checked. The attempt to explain it away in what appeared to be an untruthful manner in the 14th April Letter only heightened my concerns.” [para 25]
“it is concerning”, the judge continued,
“that Lawyer A appears to have asked the AI what these sections said, rather than reading an authoritative online resource or book, and does not appear to have checked the AI’s response. Had Lawyer A done so, it would have been readily apparent that the AI was producing nonsense and was unreliable. It perhaps betrays a misguided faith in the AI on Lawyer A’s part but, if that is so, I cannot understand why Lawyer A did not heed the AI’s later warnings about the need to check the provisions to which it referred.” [para 38]
The judge concluded that the conduct looked more like serious lack of care and judgment than deliberate dishonesty, but it was still troubling because the material was presented in a misleading way.
The case reinforces a basic professional rule: AI may assist drafting, but it does not displace the lawyer’s duty to verify accuracy. That is particularly important where the output is used in correspondence or submissions to court and may be read as an authoritative statement of the law. It also sits in the same developing line of authority as earlier AI-related judicial warnings, especially Ayinde v London Borough of Haringey EWHC 1383 (Admin), which had already highlighted the risk of misleading courts with unverified AI-generated citations:
“Freely available generative artificial intelligence tools, trained on a large language model such as ChatGPT are not capable of conducting reliable legal research. Such tools can produce apparently coherent and plausible responses to prompts, but those coherent and plausible responses may turn out to be entirely incorrect. The responses may make confident assertions that are simply untrue. They may cite sources that do not exist. They may purport to quote passages from a genuine source that do not appear in that source.” [para 6 of Haringey]
For practitioners, the case is less about AI itself than about process. The key failures were the absence of source-checking, the failure to heed the tool’s own caution, and the failure to escalate or correct the problem once it was identified. The practical lesson is that any AI-assisted legal document should be treated as a draft only. A competent lawyer must still verify quotations, authorities, and propositions against primary sources before anything goes out under their name or the firm’s name.
The judgment is a strong reminder that courts expect lawyers to remain personally accountable for what they file or send. Even if the error arises from carelessness rather than bad faith, the consequences can still be serious because the justice system depends on reliability and honesty from legal professionals.
In short, Cork v Smith is now an important cautionary case on AI use in legal practice: it shows that generative tools can increase efficiency, but only if they are controlled by careful human checking rather than treated as a substitute for legal judgment.
Reform UK reported to the Equality and Human Rights Commission
On Wednesday, a group of 27 MPs wrote to the Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Dr Mary-Ann Stephenson, calling for a formal investigation into Reform UK over alleged Islamophobia. The signatories – 26 Labour backbenchers, co-ordinated by Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) – contend that the party has breached its obligations under the Equality Act 2010, and that it has no adequate internal process by which members can raise concerns. The letter points, among other things, to Nigel Farage’s criticism of a Ramadan event in Trafalgar Square. Reform UK rejects the complaint.
The referral is the latest test of the Commission’s appetite to deploy its enforcement powers against a political party. Dr Stephenson succeeded Baroness Falkner of Margravine as Chair at the end of November 2025.
Record drug-related deaths in prisons
On Monday, The Independent reported that drug-related deaths in prisons in England and Wales have reached a record high. Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, has warned that dealers are “operating with impunity” and that drones are used to deliver large consignments into prison estates. The figures sharpen the focus on the state’s positive obligations under Articles 2 and 3 ECHR towards those whom it detains, and on the increase of Prevention of Future Deaths reports concerning the availability of novel psychoactive substances in custody.
UN High Commissioner warns of escalation in Ukraine
On Thursday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, warned against a dangerous escalation in Ukraine amid Russian threats to intensify its attacks, urging both sides back to the negotiating table: “I strongly urge restraint. Resume negotiations and end the suffering.” His Office recorded 815 civilians killed and 4,174 injured in the first four months of 2026: a 21% increase on the same period in 2025.
The High Commissioner reiterated that international humanitarian law obliges the parties to a conflict to take all feasible precautions to spare the civilian population.
In the Courts
Mavrakis and Kasapoğlu v. Türkiye: religious-minority foundations in Strasbourg
On Tuesday, the ECtHR considered the position of two Greek Orthodox priests, both Turkish nationals: the late Father Gennaidos (born Nikolaos) Mavrakis, who died during the proceedings in August 2025, and Father Georgios Kasapoğlu.
Mavrakis and Kasapoğlu had been removed by Türkiye’s General Directorate of Foundations from the boards of three Greek Orthodox community foundations: the Beşiktaş Cihannüma foundation; the Aya Konstantin foundation in Samatya; and the foundation of the Phanar Greek Orthodox College, the historic ‘Great School of the Nation’.
The sole ground for their removal was that they were members of the clergy. The applicants relied on Articles 9 (freedom of religion), 11 (freedom of association) and 14 (prohibition of discrimination), together with Articles 6(1) and 13. The case is Mavrakis and Kasapoğlu v. Türkiye (apps. nos. 12549/23, 71/24 and 2023/24).
The Chamber found a violation of Article 11 read in light of Article 9. The case falls within the established Strasbourg jurisprudence on the institutional autonomy of religious communities. Although Türkiye had in 2008 introduced elections to the boards of non-Muslim foundations, the Directorate continued in practice to bar serving clergy from standing, permitting only the election of lay members of a community whose numbers are in decline. The Court awarded €2,000 in non-pecuniary damages to each applicant (the late Father Mavrakis’s award being payable to his widow and two sons).
The decisive point was that the exclusion had no basis in domestic law. No statute or regulation barred clergy from foundation boards: the eligibility criteria turned on matters such as citizenship, age, residence and education, rather than lay status. The General Directorate had no power to remove a duly elected member on account of his clerical status. The interference was accordingly not ‘prescribed by law’. The Court awarded €2,000 in non-pecuniary damages to each applicant (the late Father Mavrakis’s award being payable to his widow and two sons).
These modest damages belie the practical significance of this ruling for the Greek Orthodox community in Istanbul – as well as a fifteen-year battle through the Turkish courts and then to Strasbourg to secure it. Community foundations administer churches, schools, cemeteries and property around which Greek Orthodox life in the city is organised.
The decision has been welcomed by minority-rights observers as dismantling a long-standing administrative doctrine, said to be derived from the Treaty of Lausanne, that members of the clergy could not exercise administrative functions within minority foundations. The judgment affirms that a state cannot invoke religious identity as an administrative pretext for paring back a minority’s right to run its own institutions.
Tožičková v. the Czech Republic: the arrest of a journalist at an environmental protest
On Thursday, Strasbourg returned to freedom of expression in Tožičková v. the Czech Republic (app. no. 21512/23). The applicant, a journalist, was covering a September 2020 environmental demonstration at a coal mine, wearing a visible press badge. When some demonstrators entered the mine’s restricted operating area, she followed them. Police ordered those present to leave and, on her refusal, arrested her, releasing her some two hours later. The domestic courts found that the order to vacate and a ban on filming during her arrest had both been unlawful, but nonetheless upheld the arrest, and the Constitutional Court dismissed her complaint.
The Chamber unanimously found a violation of Article 10. A refusal to obey a police order did not, in and of itself, justify arrest: before detaining a journalist, the police had to weigh the alternatives open to them against her press status and the effect on her Article 10 rights, which they had not done. By treating her non-compliance with an order later acknowledged to be unlawful as automatic justification, and giving no adequate reasons, the domestic courts had sanctioned an arrest that was not necessary in a democratic society: the more so given the press’s watchdog role over the policing of protest and the correspondingly narrow margin of appreciation where a matter of public interest is in play.
The Court awarded €3,000 in respect of costs and expenses.
Kakar v London Borough of Harrow: access to justice and statutory time limits
Ms Kakar had sought council-tax discounts on two grounds: first, that her son, who had been suspended from his studies on medical grounds, should have been treated as a qualifying full-time student; second, that Ms Kakar was her son’s carer. The Valuation Tribunal for England held that time to appeal ran from a council email of 5 February 2024, rendering her October 2024 appeal some seven months out of time.
Before David Pievsky KC (sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge), counsel for Ms Kakar argued that to refuse an extension of time for a near-miss — the appeal having been filed only minutes after the deadline — was disproportionate. Counsel invoked the right of access to justice by analogy with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, and also relied on the Court of Appeal’s recent decision in Eskander v General Medical Council [2026] EWCA Civ 372.
The Deputy Judge distinguished Eskander, in which the appellant had adduced detailed evidence of the steps personally taken to comply, and observed that the council-tax context differed materially from the professional-regulatory appeals in which the Adesina line of authority had developed.
The appeal was dismissed. The case is a useful reminder of the limits of the discretion to relieve against rigid statutory time limits outside the regulatory sphere.
The former Philippine President is charged with three counts of crimes against humanity (murder and attempted murder) arising from the ‘war on drugs’. Duterte has been in the Court’s custody since March 2025, and was committed for trial following confirmation of the charges in April 2026.
Mr Duterte did not attend the first status conference, having waived his right to be present. He is now represented by a new defence team led by Peter Haynes.
The Chamber indicated that it was prepared to accede to the Prosecution’s application for the trial to open on 30 November 2026, sitting on a daily basis until the judicial recess. That date should, however, be treated as provisional: Judge Korner, citing Mr Duterte’s age and reported ill-health, directed that the three medical experts who had assessed his fitness at the confirmation stage be re-instructed to examine him afresh, a separate finding on fitness being required before trial can begin.
The Prosecution indicated that it intends to call between 60 and 70 witnesses.
Also this week, Rosalind English examines Rodoy v Optical Express Ltd[2026] EWHC 1219 (KB) (judgment available here), in which Griffiths J dismissed a libel claim over letters describing the claimant as a “self-confessed and known fraudster” who trolled the defendant’s staff online: the words had caused serious harm, but were substantially true and protected by qualified privilege.
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