My research focuses on the rights of people with long-term cognitive impairments (e.g. intellectual disabilities, autism, dementia, brain injury) to make key decisions about their lives, and enjoy rights to home, liberty and relationships with others. As a socio-legal academic, I am interested in how different laws governing contemporary social care have developed to regulate caregiving relationships in 'community' settings. 

My recent monograph, Deprivation of Liberty in the Shadows of the Institution (Bristol University Press, 2022), told the story of how and why we have come to regulate a growing number of care arrangements in 'community' settings as a 'deprivation of liberty', and with what consequences. I argue that 'liberty' is in some ways a distraction from a more productive focus on deinstitutionalisation and securing meaningful homes for people.

I am an interdisciplinary researcher, with a BA in Psychology with Philosophy (Oxford University, 2005), an MSc in Psychology Research Methods (Bristol University, 2007) and a PhD in law (Exeter University, 2013). Prior to my PhD in law, I worked for many years in a range of health and social care settings with people with cognitive impairments and social care needs.

I joined the School for Policy Studies in 2022.  I was previously a senior lecturer and senior research fellow at the School of Law and Politics at Cardiff University, where I held a Wellcome Society and Ethics research fellowship between 2017-2022, taught health and social care law. Our Nuffield funded research on the Court of Protection formed the basis of an impact case study (2013-2017). At the Centre for Disability Law and Politics, NUI Galway,  I worked on international projects concerning disability rights (2013).