Sir, – The director of the Decision Support Service helpfully explains how the Assisted Decision Making (Capacity) Act 2015 will provide for advance healthcare directives (Letters, June 26th).
Under that legislation there is extensive provision for codes of practice that will apply to advance healthcare directives (and other matters), including an obligation that any such codes be accessible by members of the public. Not one of the envisaged codes has been published to date.
It is now five years since the Act of 2015 was passed, and the only provisions that, at the date of writing, have been implemented are those concerned with putting in place the infrastructure so that the Act can be brought fully into force. Making reference to the Act of 2015 without making this clear seems to me less than objective. By this oversight one could be forgiven for thinking that there was in place a target date for achieving the replacement of the current ward of court procedure. There is no such target date.
What is needed now is a “get it done by date” . – Yours, etc,
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NEIL BUCKLEY,
Malahide,
Co Dublin.