Mental Capacity Act and Consent Practitioner

Job overview

CTM UHB is seeking a skilled and motivated Mental Capacity Act & Consent Practitioner to support and strengthen lawful, person centred decision making across our services. This specialist role is central to ensuring compliance with the Mental Capacity Act 2005, associated case law, Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS), Court of Protection processes and organisational preparation for the Liberty Protection Safeguards (LPS).

You will act as an expert advisor and practitioner, providing hands on support to clinical teams, patients and families, particularly in complex or high risk cases. Working autonomously across inpatient wards, the role promotes human rights based practice, supports safeguarding processes and contributes to organisational assurance through audit, training and quality improvement.

We are looking for a registered professional with strong practical experience of the Mental Capacity Act, excellent communication skills, and the confidence to appropriately challenge practice to protect patients’ legal and human rights.

This post is fixed term/secondment until 31 March 2027 due to funding.

If you are interested in applying for the secondment position, you must obtain permission from your current line manager prior to applying for this post.

Main duties of the job

• Provide expert advice and hands‑on support to clinical staff on the application of the Mental Capacity Act 2005, consent, best interests decision‑making and deprivation of liberty processes, including DoLS and preparation for Liberty Protection Safeguards (LPS).
• Support and guide staff with capacity assessments, best interests meetings and documentation, ensuring decisions are lawful, proportionate and person‑centred.
• Provide specialist input to complex and high‑risk cases, including advising when Court of Protection involvement may be required and supporting COP processes where needed.
• Work autonomously across inpatient wards, actively supporting practice at ward level and appropriately challenging decisions where patient rights or legal compliance may be at risk.
• Deliver training, education and awareness sessions to clinical staff to improve confidence, understanding and compliance with MCA, DoLS and LPS requirements.
• Contribute to audit, monitoring and quality improvement, supporting organisational assurance and reporting risks or concerns through safeguarding governance structures.
• Work collaboratively with the Safeguarding Team, Senior MCA/DoLS/COP Nurse, Clinical Practice Educator and partner agencies to promote best practice and safeguard adults at risk.
• Promote a human rights‑based approach to care, ensuring dignity, respect and legal protections are upheld for people who may lack capacity.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

You will be able to find a full Job description and Person Specification attached within the supporting documents or please click Apply now to view in Trac.

Welsh Skills Desirable: This post is advertised as Welsh Desirable. This doesn’t mean essential; whilst the candidate doesn't need to have skills in Welsh, we'll consider it an advantage when short-listing and selecting candidates. This isn’t ‘fluency’, just Speaking & Listening skills at Level 3 (equivalent to CEFR B2) or above. Level 3 means basic conversations with patients about their everyday health. For more information, see ‘Welsh Language Guidance’ in the documents right at the bottom.

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Welsh language skills are desirable