Facts: Mr C, who had been detained under section 3 of the MHA 1983, after his wife had been displaced as his nearest relative, complained of delay in securing a hearing before the Mental Health Review Tribunal for the hearing of his application to be discharged: it took eight weeks.

Judgment: the Court of Appeal (Lord Phillips MR, Lord Mustill, Jonathan Parker LJ) allowed Mr C’s appeal and held that the tribunal had a practice of fixing hearing dates eight weeks after the date of the application and that this was a matter of administrative convenience rather than necessity, in that some cases the requisite evidence could be available, and the case heard, much sooner. That inevitably meant that some applications did not get the speedy hearing required by Article 5(4) ECHR, so the eight-week practice was unlawful.