Court of Protection blocks council attempt to force contraception on woman with low IQ

The Court of Protection has ruled that an unnamed local authority is not able force a woman with a low IQ to use contraception, describing the plan as an “horrendous prospect [with] shades of social engineering”.

According to a report in the Times, Mr Justice Bodey said that he could not see how it could be acceptable for the court to impose contraception “by way of physical coercion”, adding that the attempt by the local authority to prevent the married woman – who has already had two children given up for adoption - having more children raised “profound questions about state intervention in private and family life”.

The council said that it brought the proceedings to enable them to physically remove the woman, who has an IQ of 53, from her family home and taken to have contraception “under restraint and anaesthesia”. It was doing so to protect her from her “violent and bullying” husband, who wanted a baby.

The judge said that while he accepted that the woman's decision to stop using contraception was not the product of her own free will, he said that he could not approve court-sanctioned coercion in this case.

He ruled: “It is obvious, on the facts of this case, that any step towards long-term court-imposed contraception by way of physical coercion, with its affinity to enforced sterilisation and shades of social engineering, would raise profound questions about state intervention in private and family life. Whilst the issue of the use of force has not been argued out at this hearing I cannot, on these facts, presently see how it could be acceptable.”

He added that if Mrs A became pregnant “so be it”. In this case, there would be an assessment of the couple and the council would have to take such steps as it thought appropriate, the Times reported.