SG3 mental capacity

The SG3 tables record counts of concluded safeguarding enquiries broken down by the age band and mental capacity of the adult at risk.

SG3 General notes

The information in these tables relates to safeguarding enquiries that concluded during the reporting year 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025.

Multiple counts are not permitted in these tables; only one entry per enquiry should be recorded.

White cells in the data tables relate to mandatory categories or metrics, blue cells relate to the voluntary ones.

‘Mental capacity’ means a person’s ability to make their own choices and decisions.

Under UK law, someone’s capacity is judged according to the specific decision to be made, so a person may have sufficient capacity to make simple decisions but not more complicated ones.

In England and Wales, the Mental Capacity Act says that a person lacks capacity to make a decision if they cannot do one or more of:

understand the information relating to this particular decision (including its benefits and risks)
retain the information for long enough to make this decision
weigh up the information involved in making this decision
communicate their decision in any way (this could be by any possible means, such as talking, using sign language or even simple muscle movements like blinking an eye or squeezing a hand)

And the reason they cannot do one or more of the above is because of an ‘impairment of or disturbance in the function of their mind or brain’ (either temporary or permanent).

Age definition

Please record the age of the individual on the last day of the reporting period or age at the time of death if an individual has died. Where the age of an individual has not been recorded, please record them in the Not Known column. We only expect this category to be used in a minority of cases.

The description and tables which use ‘Age Band are included in the Data Dictionary.

Fluctuating mental capacity

The reason for counting concluded enquiries is that capacity can fluctuate between enquiries. For every enquiry in which an individual lacks the capacity to make decisions about the safeguarding incident, practitioners should ensure that appropriate support is provided by an independent advocate. Independent advocates can include friends, family, carers and Independent Mental Capacity Advocates (IMCAs).

Capacity can also fluctuate during the safeguarding enquiry. If at any point during the safeguarding enquiry a Mental Capacity Act assessment is completed and the individual is found to lack capacity, please record this as ‘Yes’ for that concluded enquiry.

SG3a - Mental capacity table for concluded Section 42 safeguarding enquiries

This table is mandatory to complete and should only include counts of concluded Section 42 safeguarding enquiries.

List of mental capacity categories

Classification	Definition
Yes, the individual lacks mental capacity	Where a Mental Capacity Act assessment has taken place and found the individual to be lacking capacity.
No, the individual does not lack mental capacity	Where a Mental Capacity Act assessment has taken place and found that the individual does not lack capacity or Where no-one has reason to believe that the individual lacks capacity.
Don’t know	Where the safeguarding officer does not know whether the individual at risk lacks capacity or not. This could be because the individual at risk died or became seriously ill before they could be spoken to.
Not recorded	Where the capacity of the individual at risk has not been recorded on the local system.
Of the enquiries recorded as yes in row 1, in how many of these cases was support provided?	For every enquiry in which an individual lacks the capacity to make decisions about the safeguarding incident, practitioners should ensure that appropriate support is provided by an independent advocate, friend or family member. This row should be a subset of row 1.

The description and tables which use ‘Mental Capacity Status’ are included in the Data Dictionary.

SG3b - Mental capacity table for other concluded safeguarding enquiries

This table should only include counts of other concluded safeguarding enquiries. Completion of this table is voluntary.

Last edited: 10 October 2024 11:36 am