If a child has the intelligence and ability to understand fully what is involved in a medical procedure, they are considered able to give their permission. In English law, anyone under the age of 18 is defined as a child.
No one except the courts can override the consent of a competent child. However, a person with parental responsibility for a child can override that child if they decline treatment. Such decisions are made based on the 'best interests' of a child. This means quality of life in all respects: not just length of life but the ability to enjoy it.
The mother of a child - and the father if he is married to the mother - automatically have parental responsibility. If the parents are not married, the father will have parental responsibility if he acted with the mother to have his name recorded in the child's birth registration, and the child's birth was registered after 1st December, 2003.
This is because the 2002 Adoption and Children Act changed the law regarding parental responsibility. However, the Act was not retrospective (covering the period before the Act was introduced) and so does not apply to children registered before the 1st December, 2003.
In this case, the father must make a parental responsibility agreement with the mother, or obtain a court order, as must fathers who did not act to register their name as the child's father. An unmarried father can also obtain parental responsibility by later marrying the mother.
Parental responsibility can also be granted to other people by the courts, such as a legally appointed guardian.
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