A long-standing question in offshore trust practice concerns the role of the protector and the nature of their power. When a trust instrument requires a protector's consent before trustees can act, does the protector simply check that the trustees' decision is lawful and rational, or can the protector form its own independent view on whether the proposed course of action serves the beneficiaries' interests? These two competing positions have become known as the "Narrow Role" and the "Wider Role." Under the Narrow Role, the protector satisfies itself only that a reasonable and properly informed body of trustees could lawfully take the decision in question and, if so, must consent. Under the Wider Role, the protector may decide for itself whether to consent by reference to its own assessment of the beneficiaries' interests and the merits of the proposal, even where the trustees' decision is perfectly rational. This debate, which has divided courts and commentators across trust jurisdictions, has now been squarely addressed by the Privy Council in A and 6 Others v C and 13 Others (Bermuda) [2026] UKPC 11. Facts and judicial history The case arose from a group of family settlements, many of which had been amended in the early to mid-1990s. Those amendments introduced common-form protector provisions requiring the protector's prior written consent for two categories of high-impact decision: capital appointments and dealings with (including the voting of) what were called "Specified Securities" (primarily a large, coordinated shareholding in a family operating company). The trustees proposed a substantial reorganisation that would allocate the trusts' aggregate assets between two family branches in a broadly two-thirds to one-third split. The protectors, having been consulted, indicated they were minded not to approve the proposal. Their objection was not that the trustees' proposal was unlawful or irrational, but rather that, in their own independent assessment, the proposal did not best serve the beneficiaries' interests. This distinction went to the heart of the dispute: under the narrow view, if the protectors could only withhold consent on the basis of the legality and rationality of the trustee's proposed action, and there were no legality or rationality concerns in this proposed split, then the protector's objection had no proper basis; whereas, under the wider view, if the Protector's could bring their own judgment to bear on the merits, it did have proper basis. The trustees responded by seeking the Bermuda court's blessing under Public Trustee v Cooper jurisdiction and, subsequently, a declaration on the proper scope of the protector's role. At first instance, Justice Kawaley held that the protector possessed only the Narrow Role. The reasoning emphasised the trustees' paramount substantive powers, the ancillary character of the consent requirement, the unanimity requirement among joint protectors, and concerns that a Wider Role would create duplication and deadlock. The Court of Appeal for Bermuda affirmed, describing the protector as a "watchdog" whose function was to supervise trustee legality and rationality rather than to substitute its own independent judgment. The appeal to the Privy Council squarely presented the same binary choice. One branch of the family contended for the Wider Role; the other urged the Narrow Role. The trustees and protectors remained neutral. The Privy Council's decision The Board's reasoning proceeded in two stages. First, it addressed the correct analytical framework. Second, it applied that framework to the particular trust instruments before it. The Board's starting point was to reject the premise that courts must choose a single, universal "default role" for protectors in the abstract. Instead, the proper question is always one of construction: what constraints, if any, does the particular trust instrument impose on the protector when exercising a power of consent, bearing in mind any ...