About Care Sector Services

Care Sector Services is an independent practice specialising in mental capacity and welfare decision-making. Its work spans Mental Capacity Act 2005 assessments, Court of Protection reports, best interests and welfare reviews, Continuing Healthcare, and related advisory and report-writing services.

The practice is led personally by Mark Farnsworth, who has more than fifteen years’ specialist experience in mental capacity and Court of Protection assessment, investigation and welfare-visit work across England and Wales. He is legally trained — LLB (Hons); ILEX Civil Litigation Parts One and Two — with postgraduate study (MA) and several years of doctoral-level research. Since around 2013 he has also been instructed directly by private-client solicitors to provide capacity assessments and COP3 evidence in support of Court of Protection applications.

Every instruction is handled directly — not passed to a call centre or sub-contracted — so clients deal with one experienced professional from first contact to final report.

We work independently and impartially, are careful with evidence, and are clear about scope and cost from the outset. Where a matter falls outside our competence, we say so and, where we can, point you in the right direction.

Experience & expertise

Across more than fifteen years, Mark has carried out over 4,000 independent assessments and visits with some of the most vulnerable people in the country. That depth means he knows precisely where the system helps people — and where it quietly lets them down.

What Mark is expert in:

• Mental capacity assessments under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 — decision-specific, and prepared to the standard the Court of Protection expects.
• Best-interests assessments and decision-making for people who cannot decide for themselves.
• Independent welfare assessments and reviews — checking the care, support and arrangements around a person are right.
• Safeguarding — recognising neglect, abuse and financial abuse, and knowing how to act on it.
• Scrutiny of how attorneys and deputies are managing a vulnerable person’s affairs.
• Care funding and entitlements — NHS Continuing Healthcare, Care Act charging, and the benefits families so often miss.
• Working with people living with dementia, learning disabilities, autism and acquired brain injury, including those with complex communication needs.

What that means for you: a clear, impartial assessment prepared to a standard professionals and the court will accept — not a tick-box exercise — from someone genuinely independent: not selling a placement, not protecting a budget, just on the side of the person at the centre.