Attorney General Dame Brenda King has said her office is dealing with up to 54 deprivation of liberty cases a day.
During a briefing to the Justice Committee, Dame Brenda explained the functions given to her office under the Mental Capacity Act Northern Ireland 2016.
Under section 47 of the Act, the attorney is empowered to refer to the Review Tribunal whether the authorisation of a deprivation of liberty is appropriate.
The attorney general said the relevant provisions came into effect at the end of 2019 and initially led to a small number of cases being reviewed by her office.
She said: “The number of cases has ramped up to approximately 25 cases a day, and on occasion we may receive up to 54 authorisations to be reviewed in a single day.
“I have a small team of paralegals, headed up by a lawyer, who looks at those authorisations initially, and then they come to me.
“The Review Tribunal, formerly known as the Mental Health Review Tribunal, is an independent judicial body.
“It functions regard those who are detained under the mental health legislation and those whose care arrangements have to be such that an authorisation depriving them of their liberty is required.
“That is a fairly extreme thing to do and there needs to be judicial superintendence of that.
“That might be because a person has dementia or a severe learning disability or for other reasons.
“My role is to review those authorisations and refer them if necessary to the Review Tribunal.”
Committee member Justin McNulty drew attention to the number of cases being dealt with by the Attorney General.
He said: “On a 48-week year that amounts to 6,000 a year. How on earth do you accommodate that burden and how does the system accommodate that burden of cases?”
Dame Brenda said: “It doesn’t just have an impact on my office, but the trusts, the doctors, the nurses, the social workers and the tribunal.
“There has had to be a huge increase in the number of members appointed to those tribunals.
“Twenty thousand cases in the last four years. That’s a very large number of cases going through the system.
“It is very time and resource intensive because there over 20 forms which have to be assessed. If there is an irregularity in the forms that may affect the legality of the detention of the person.”
Mr McNulty said: “A shocking statistic; 20,000 in the last four years, that is extraordinary.
“My heart goes out to all those people and to the teams who are dealing with them.”
