A lasting power of attorney (LPA) is a legal document that lets someone (the ‘donor’) appoint one or more people (‘attorneys’) to help them make decisions or to make decisions on their behalf.

The LPA was introduced in 2007. It was designed to provide more flexibility than its predecessor, the enduring power of attorney (EPA), and additional protections. However, the LPA kept many of the paper-based features and protections of the EPA. In its essence, the LPA is over 35 years old.

The protections in the current paper-based system are founded on decades, if not centuries, of tradition, case law, and social conventions, such as signing and witnessing.

However, the world is changing. Digital has transformed the way many people think, act and want to act. They’re increasingly requesting digital access to all sorts of services from banking to grocery shopping. This extends to services provided by government, such as tax returns and passport renewal.

Digital channels provide many opportunities to improve access and speed of service, but they also require us to think anew about the safeguards we put in place in such systems.

The old paper practices are not appropriate for a new digital world and new ways of achieving the same, or better, levels of protection have to be identified before we can move forwards.

With these things in mind, the Ministry of Justice and the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) have begun work on a project to modernise lasting powers of attorney (MLPA).

The MLPA project aims to:

• increase safeguards for the donor

• improve the process of making and registering a lasting power of attorney (LPA), for donors, attorneys and third parties

• achieve sustainability for OPG whilst keeping LPAs as affordable as possible for all people in society

Although these aims appear simple, we know that they are not. To achieve them, we’ll need to find a careful balance between freedom of access for everyone who wants an LPA, ease of creation, and protection against fraud, abuse and coercion.