Tag Archives: interim care order

The oddest argument about an Interim Care Order

Posted on March 21, 2024 by suesspiciousminds

I’ve seen lots and lots of cases about whether or not the Local Authority should have an Interim Care Order and loads about whether interim separation should be granted, but this is the first time I’ve seen a case where the Local Authority ASKED for an Interim Care Order and interim separation, got it, then reunited the child with a family member without consulting with the Guardian or IRO and were arguing with the Court that the child SHOULD be with the mother, just five weeks after securing judicial approval for removal.

What seems to lie at the heart of this is the nationwide difficulty with foster placements – there being a significant disparity between the supply of them and the demand that exists. Most people who do public children work are aware of occasions when placements are sought but not found.

Luton Borough Council v R & Ors [2024] EWFC 52 (13 March 2024)

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/HCJ/2024/52.html

The case came before MacDonald J, the Circuit Judge who considered the case having been understandably very concerned about the Local Authority’s change of plans for the child and their reluctance to row back on it.

The judgment sets out a lot of the background and issues at ICO stage, whilst of course being mindful that no findings had yet been made on the allegations, they are very succinctly summed up here:-

the allegations made by X that, whilst in the care of the mother and the father, she was subjected to sexual abuse by three relatives over the course of at least five years, including repeated rapes.

The placement that X was in had broken down shortly after the ICO was made, and the Local Authority were not able to find any alternative foster placements. She was initially placed in a Travelodge with one of her older siblings, that broke down after 2 weeks because the sibling had work committments that could not be resolved, and X’s mother then became the carer – initially at the Travelodge and then at an Air B&B.

The Local Authority were not able to produce documentary evidence of the decision-making around this, nor the decision to place with a parent under the Care Planning Regulations and the matters that need to be satisfied before a Local Authority can do so.

The Head of Service and Operations Manager became involved and the Court was critical of the evidence that they gave, whilst acknowledging that their attendance at Court to give evidence was at quite short notice. They placed reliance on what they asserted to be a robust risk assessment. MacDonald J observes that having read the document it could not be said to be robust, further describing it as cursory and superficial.

The purported risk assessment deals only in the most cursory manner with the allegations of sexual abuse, with a brief summary of the allegations that misses out any account of X’s recent allegations against the paternal grandfather. In particular, the superficial and incomplete narrative account set out in the purported risk assessment does not deal with the precise nature and extent of the allegations made by X and makes no reference to the views expressed by the mother concerning the source and credibility of those allegations. The narrative makes no reference at all to the fact that on 31 January 2024 the court was satisfied, pursuant to s.38(2) of the Children Act 1989, that there were reasonable grounds for believing that X had suffered significant harm, that the allocated social worker and the Children’s Guardian were each of the view that the parents were not able to protect X from a risk of sexual abuse, that in those circumstances the local authority had sought the removal of X from the care of her parents or that there was an ongoing police investigation following the arrest of the X’s brother, brother-in-law and paternal grandfather. Both parents informed the social worker that they have longstanding mental health issues, the mother suffering from chronic depression and anxiety and the father having severe anxiety, panic attacks, hallucinations and paranoia. These are not dealt with. The hurried and inadequate narrative is followed by a series of tick boxes that have themselves been inaccurately completed. Finally, the purported risk assessment that the Head of Service and the Operations Director advanced as the forensic foundation of their conclusion that the mother is now able to protect X from the risk of sexual abuse in the interim contains no analysis whatsoever of the nature and degree of the risk of sexual harm to X or of the extent of the mother’s ability to protect from risk of sexual harm in light of the evidence available. The risk assessment does not deal at all with X’s allegations of physical abuse against her family members, including the mother. In the foregoing context, the conclusion of the risk assessment is limited to the following, grammatically incorrect, observation:

“Although mother is able to care for X and meet her needs, and is able to keep her safe. The likelihood of X running away, not listening or following instruction, or making other allegations against her mother may be high if X does not get her own way.“

(I’d note here that your day in Court is not going well when the key document that you rely on for your case is described as a ‘purported’ X.)

Things were compounded when it appeared to the Judge that the move from the Travelodge to an Air B and B was an alteration to the interim care plan that was being devised during the course of giving evidence in real-time and that the social worker did not seem to know that the interim care plan had changed and that she should have been rewriting this.

The Court was in a difficult position legally – there are authorities that say that where the Court and Local Authority have a different view of the correct care plan / interim care plan, the Court can and should convey that to the LA and the LA should carefully take account of this and consider whether they accept the invitation to change the plan. But ultimately the general position is that the final power for the Court is to not grant the ICO – that doesn’t help here. (And obviously wardship isn’t an option to secure accommodation by the Local Authority)

The LA here were invited to change their interim care plan and decided not to do so.

This is the judicial analysis of a really desperately difficult situation

50. In these circumstances, what is a manifestly inadequate and flawed document cannot possibly be said to support the decision making of the Head of Service and the Operations Director or the revisiting by the court of its risk and welfare assessments. Robust risk assessment in the context of alleged sexual abuse is not derived from vague assertions about families “going on a journey with respect to disclosures of sexual abuse”. It is derived from the careful, detailed, evidence based social work practice that is articulated in, and has been repeatedly emphasised since, the Cleveland Report and which I summarised in Re P (Sexual Abuse: Finding of Fact Hearing) [2019] EWFC 27 at [599]. The purported risk assessment relied on by the Head of Service and the Operations Director in this case fails to measure up in every respect to that long-established guidance.

51. The decision of the Head of Service and the Operations Director to place X in the care of her mother in an Airbnb, also has no forensic foundation in any other evidence. Before deciding to place X in the care of her mother in an Airbnb, r.17 of the Regulation 17 of the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010 required the local authority to assess the suitability of mother to care for X, including the suitability of the proposed Airbnb accommodation, taking into account the matters set out in Schedule 3 of the Regulations. The matters defined in Schedule 3 include the mother’s ability to protect X adequately from harm or danger, including from any person who presents a risk of harm to X, and to ensure that the home environment is safe for X. Whilst the Head of Service asserted that approval for the placement of X with her mother pursuant to r.17 of the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010 had been given, neither the Head of Service and the Operations Director were able to provide the court with any documentary evidence of this decision having been considered, taken and recorded.

52. Regulation 17(c) of the of the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010 further required the local authority to determine whether, in all the circumstances and taking into account the services to be provided by the local authority, the placement would safeguard and promote X’s welfare and meet X’s needs set out in the care plan. However, once again, neither the Head of Service nor the Operation Director was able to provide the court with an amended interim care plan with respect to X. Indeed, the care plan for X appeared to evolve during the course of the evidence, and in particular the evidence of the Operations Director. As I have noted, as at 5 March 2024 the local authority’s position was that it would continue its search for a foster placement for X. At the outset of this hearing, counsel for the local authority did not suggest that position had changed and nor had the other parties been put on notice of any change of position. The social worker appeared completely unaware that the interim care plan had changed and the fact that, on the Operations Director’s evidence, she should have been drafting a new care plan. Whilst the Operations Director stated during her evidence that the interim care plan had changed from foster care to placement with the mother as the result of a considered discussion and between her and the Head of Service, I regret that I was left with the distinct impression that the Operations Director had revised the interim care plan during the course of her evidence in order to give the appearance of rationality to a decision making process that had in fact driven by a shortage of resources.

53. Within the foregoing context, it appeared that the sole argument advanced by the Head of Service and the Operations Director to support their assertion that the mother was now able to protect X from the risk of sexual and physical abuse centred on the improvement in X’s behaviour, and thus to depart from the risk and welfare assessments of the court, was that X’s behaviour had improved in the care of her mother. In this respect, the Head of Service and the Operations Director each argued that this improvement in behaviour was evidence of the mother’s capacity to protect X from sexual and physical abuse to a greater degree than was the case when the local authority sought the removal of X from her mother’s care. There are obvious difficulties with that contention.

54. There is no robust assessment demonstrating that the genesis of X’s improved behaviour is the result of any improved capacity on the part of the mother to protect her from sexual and physical harm as opposed to, for example, the fact that X is simply happier in the care of her mother than in foster care. In this context, time and again the Head of Service and the Operations Director mistakenly conflated improvements in X’s behaviour, which have not yet been the subject of formal assessment and may derive from any number of factors, with a reduction in the risk of harm arising from the allegations made by X that, whilst in the care of the mother and the father, she was subjected to sexual abuse by three relatives over the course of at least five years, including repeated rapes. In the circumstances, I am satisfied that the noted change in X’s behaviour over a short period of time is not a sufficient foundation to depart from the risk and welfare assessments of the court.

CONCLUSION

55. Alleged sexual abuse is a complex and grave safeguarding issue that demands a careful and precise forensic approach to evidence based risk assessment. The casual and cavalier approach adopted by the local authority to risk assessment and decision making for X in this case is the antithesis of the correct approach and one which manifestly fails to safeguard X. On 31 January 2024, this court assessed X to be at risk of sexual and physical abuse and assessed the mother and the father as being unable to protect X from that risk. In that context, the court further assessed X’s welfare as requiring the removal from her parents’ care. The local authority has to date placed nothing before the court that justifies those conclusions being revisited.

56. In the foregoing circumstances, it is the expectation of this court that the local authority will accord the highest respect to the risk assessment and welfare assessment of this court and will now implement the decision made by the court in these proceedings consequent on its assessment of risk and welfare on 31 January 2024. I shall list the matter for further hearing on 14 March 2024 before Arbuthnot J for the local authority to confirm to the court that this is the course of action that it now intends to take or to seek to persuade the court on proper evidence that the court should now revisit its risk and welfare assessments. I will make further directions accordingly.

By the time of writing, that hearing before Arbuthnot J should have taken place, and I shall watch out for the decision. I suspect that the phones of the people who find placements for children will have been glowing red hot in the frantic efforts to find a placement, which as I said at the outset is not a problem unique to this Local Authority.

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Posted in Uncategorized and tagged Court disagreeing with Interim Care Plan, interim care order, Interim Care Plan, Luton Borough Council v R 2024, MacDonald J. Bookmark the permalink.

Can you make an Interim Care Order that lasts beyond the child’s 17th birthday?

Posted on March 7, 2019 by suesspiciousminds

Long term readers of the blog will be familiar with Betteridge’s Law – questions posed to which the answer is “no” – as much beloved by sub-editors at The Daily Express et al (Can Pomegranate Juice cure Cancer? Did the Ghost of Diana speak to Meghan? etc)

The heading of this blog post is a Betteridge’s Law question – the answer is no, but in this case it is helpful to have the answer.

[To the chagrin of our former President, I’m going to say “The High Court” when I mean “The Family Division of the Court, sitting in the High Court” because the latter is too much of a mouthful. ]

The question has been bubbling around since the 2014 Children and Families Act – that Act introduced the change in law that Interim Care Orders (which used to last for 8 weeks for the first order, and 28 days for each subsequent order, meaning lots of admin in long-running cases) could now last until the conclusion of the case or further order.

So in pre 2014, even if the Court made an interim care order at just before the child’s 17th birthday, the ICO would run out at most 2 months later. Whereas now, technically, it could run right up to the child’s 18th birthday.

It is settled law that the Court can’t MAKE a CARE ORDER for someone who is over the age of 17 (or, if they are married, over the age of 16) but it hasn’t been clear whether that also prohibited an Interim Care Order. [The Care Order can LAST until their 18th birthday, but you can’t MAKE one on a child who has passed the age of 17]

Section 31 (3) Children Act 1989 No care or supervision order may be made with respect to a child who has reached the age of seventeen (or sixteen in the case of a child who is married).

So the theoretical argument went

I can’t make a CARE ORDER on a child who is 17, but if I can make an INTERIM CARE ORDER then that can last until the end of proceedings, which will suffice.

If I had a pound for every time someone had asked me if that was okay, I would not have zero pounds.

I’ve always said “No, because section 31 (11) says that for the purposes of the Children Act, any reference to a Care Order ALSO means an interim care order, unless the reference specifically excludes that”

And if they persist

“Well, the point of an interim order, is a holding position until the Court can decide whether to make the full order. The interim care order is made because the Court has adjourned the application for a full order under s38 (1) (a). And if there’s no jurisdiction post 17 to make the final order, how can that be a legitimate use of an interim order?”

(Okay, sometimes I just say ‘no, trust me, you don’t want me to explain , it is just no‘)

s31 (11)In this Act—

“a care order” means (subject to section 105(1)) an order under subsection (1)(a) and (except where express provision to the contrary is made) includes an interim care order made under section 38; and
“a supervision order” means an order under subsection (1)(b) and (except where express provision to the contrary is made) includes an interim supervision order made under section 38.

s38 “(1) Where –

(a) in any proceedings on an application for a care order or supervision order, the proceedings are adjourned or

(b) the court gives a direction under section 37(1), the court may make an interim care order or an interim supervision order with respect to the child concerned.

The High Court, in Re Q (A Child: Interim Care Order) 2019

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2019/512.html

Also say no, but they didn’t reference s31 (11) (They put it in to their citation of the statute, but don’t use it in their reasons)

They go on the second limb of my answer

I endorse Mr Barnes’ submissions that Parliament chose in passing the Act to demarcate seventeen or sixteen (if married) as the age after which a child could not be placed in the care or supervision of a local authority without a full disposal of the case having been achieved. That was a recognition of the growing autonomy of the individual child. Likewise, the ability of a final care order to persist until the age of eighteen is a recognition of the obligations placed on a local authority, once parenting has been established to fall below the reasonable standard expected, to ensure a child is not left without appropriate care before becoming an adult. Those matters support my analysis of section 38(4) as amended.
All the above brings me to the conclusion that no interim care or supervision order will endure beyond the date of a child’s seventeenth birthday or the date of a child’s marriage if aged sixteen. To be clear, interim care and supervision orders made for a period during which the child turns either seventeen or gets married (if aged sixteen) are impermissible. If, prior to the 2014 amendments, interim public law orders were being made which extended beyond the child’s seventeenth birthday, they should not have been given (a) the absence of an explicit power to continue such orders beyond a child’s seventeenth birthday and (b) the age thresholds set out in the Act. The dicta of McFarlane LJ in Re W [see above] support this proposition.
If my interpretation of section 38(4) is correct, where does that leave the existing section 31 proceedings? Mr Woodward-Carlton submitted that an interim care order which continued beyond a child’s seventeenth birthday led nowhere. It was not a precursor to a final section 31 order as there was no jurisdiction to make such orders after a child turned seventeen. Mr Barnes strongly supported those submissions, suggesting that it would be absurd if an interpretation were given to section 38 which permitted the imposition of compulsory care arrangements on an adjournment of proceedings without purpose. Such an approach would conflict with section 1(2) of the Act and the court’s overriding objective. Contrariwise, Mr Devereux QC submitted that the continuation of the existing section 31 proceedings may have a purpose in that the court might be able to make findings of fact which might inform either the making of other orders or future local authority decision-making.
I observe that the jurisdiction to make an interim care or supervision order only arises on an adjournment or in the event of a direction pursuant to section 37 of the Act. It is thus not available as a freestanding remedy. Lord Nicholls in paragraph 89 of Re S (Care Order: Implementation of Care Plan) [2002] UKHL 10 noted that the source of the court’s power to make an interim care order arises on an adjournment of section 31 proceedings and in paragraph 90 he stated as follows:

“90. From a reading of section 38 as a whole it is abundantly clear that the purpose of an interim care order, so far as presently material, is to enable the court to safeguard the welfare of a child until such time as the court is in a position to decide whether or not it is in the best interests of the child to make a care order. When that time arrives depends on the circumstances of the case and is a matter for the judgment of the trial judge. That is the general, guiding principle. The corollary to this principle is that an interim care order is not intended to be used as a means by which the court may continue to exercise a supervisory role over the local authority in cases where it is in the best interests of the child that a care order should be made.”

Those words support the proposition that interim public law orders are not freestanding remedies but take their life from proceedings in which the court has the jurisdiction to make substantive public law orders. Where those remedies are not available, the continuation of the proceedings appears, at first glance, illogical

HOWEVER, the High Court did consider that there would be jurisdiction to continue the care proceedings themselves, if issued before the child’s 17th birthday. (I’m not sure I agree, but where the High Courtand I disagree, hot newsflash the High Court win that argument)

The thinking, I believe, is where the proceedings might be used to determine contentious findings of fact, and of course, the Court in care proceedings also have the power to make no order, or a section 8 order as to where a child would live and how much time they would spend with a parent.

(I think the rationale for saying on an application for an order the Court can no longer make, the proceedings can stay open once the Court can no longer make those orders is thinner than Christian Bale in The Machinest, but the High Court win this one). Obviously if there are younger children in the same set of proceedings, the need for them to remain live for the 17 year old falls away a little, but the advantage to keeping them open is that the 17 year old has a voice as to what happens to their siblings.

In my view, there is a distinction between the making of interim public law orders on an adjournment where a child has turned seventeen and the continuation of the section 31 proceedings themselves. I remind myself that no court seised of public law proceedings is required to make either interim or final public law orders. It may decide that a section 8 order or indeed no order is an appropriate disposal at either an interim or final stage. Whilst no interim or final public law order would, on my analysis of section 38(4), be available in respect of a seventeen year old child (or sixteen if married), I am not persuaded that these welfare-driven proceedings themselves would necessarily lack purpose and must fall away once the jurisdiction to make either interim or final public law orders is lost. In some cases, it may be crucial to establish whether the threshold criteria have been met because this might determine the basis for future decision making by a local authority, for example, as to the type of support available to the child or family concerned. Whether that exercise is necessary and proportionate will be a matter for the good sense of the judge managing/determining the proceedings. For example, it might not be where a child of seventeen wishes to be accommodated against the wishes of those with parental responsibility. Additionally, although final public law orders would not be available to the court, the court might conclude the proceedings before the child is eighteen by making other orders available to it such as a section 8 order (assuming exceptional circumstances applied) or by making orders under the inherent jurisdiction. Whilst the latter could not operate to require a child to be placed in either the care or supervision of a local authority or to require a child to be accommodated by a local authority, other orders under the inherent jurisdiction may be entirely suitable in the circumstances of the individual case. I conclude that, when the jurisdiction to make interim and final public law orders is no longer available, careful scrutiny of the circumstances of each case is required by the court in order to discern whether the proceedings themselves lack merit and whether it is proportionate and in the child’s welfare interests for them to continue. Discontinuance of the proceedings is likely to be the proportionate, welfare-driven outcome in many such cases and, if that is so, the local authority should be permitted to withdraw its application. There will, however, be some cases where a useful forensic and welfare-driven purpose might be served by the continuation of public law proceedings albeit without the structure provided by interim public law orders.

I don’t think the LA could legitimately ISSUE care proceedings on a child who was now 17, but if the proceedings are already in force, this paragraph does create an argument for keeping them open until the Court is in a position to make final Children Act 1989 orders, notwithstanding that the Court can’t make the orders that were actually applied for.

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Posted in case law and tagged can court make orders on a 17 year old?, interim care order, interim care order post 17, re q a child interim care order 2019, [2019] EWHC 512 (Fam). Bookmark the permalink.

In the pool or not in the pool?

Posted on February 28, 2019 by suesspiciousminds

This reported case is a Circuit Judge decision, so not binding on any other Judges, but it is interesting and raises a potentially important issue.

C (Interim threshold not crossed) [2019] EWFC B5 (15 February 2019)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/OJ/2019/B5.html

A child C, was 6 1/2 and had lived, for all but four months of his life, with his maternal grandparents, who held a Child Arrangements Order. C’s cousin, D, was admitted to hospital with fractures to both legs, she being a non-mobile baby. A police investigation was taking place in relation to D’s injuries. As part of that, the police informed the Local Authority that for a period during the time when those suspicious fractures had occurred, D had been spending time with the grandparents.

In the vernacular, the grandparents (whilst by no means the main suspects for those injuries) were in the ‘pool of perpetrators’ – or were they?

On 8 ^thOctober 2018, [the] police apparently advised the local authority that C should be removed from the care of his maternal grandmother and placed with his aunt R, while further and urgent investigations were undertaken. The grandparents reluctantly gave their section 20 consent to this, feeling they had no option. The local authority applied for emergency protection orders for D and her brother E on 11 ^thOctober, and subsequently care proceedings were issued. Those two children are subject to interim care orders and are currently in foster care. HHJ Owens has listed a fact-find hearing to determine the cause of D’s injuries, due to take place in the week before and after Easter, in April 2019.

The LA issued care proceedings for C (I don’t know that I would have done that, prior to a decision being made about D’s injuries, but the LA were obviously worried that C’s carers may have been responsible for such serious injuries to a baby. It rather depends on whether that’s a theoretical possibility that they might have been responsible based just on timing, or some evidence that pointed more strongly towards them)

The Court had originally made an EPO and later ICO for C.

This was the judgment from a later contested ICO hearing. It was complicated further because the LA were proposing that C be placed with his father (who was not involved in D’s life at all and thus absolutely not under any suspicion about D’s injuries)

#spoiler alert – the title of the case rather gives away the judicial decision, but read on to find out why.

An argument deployed at Court was that the Court, faced with a father and grandparents, could apply a private law filter to the case and decide which placement was better for the child in the interim while D’s injuries were being assessed (in effect, a ‘beauty parade’ exercise)

The Court, rightly, did not agree. The legal position had to be that the child be with grandparents unless the LA could satisfy the Court that there were reasonable grounds to believe he was likely to suffer significant harm in the grandparents care and further, that the risk of harm was such that C’s safety required separation from the grandparents.

I have found this application difficult to determine because it was initially presented to me as a simple exercise of my discretion in respect of weighing up the pros and cons of two competing placement options, but, for the reasons I have given, I do not regard that as the correct approach as a matter of law. I am grateful to all counsel who have shown flexibility in dealing with the issues that were troubling me, but I have received no written submissions about the question of interim threshold, and no evidence or submissions in respect of the application of the welfare checklist. Because there has in my judgment been inadequate formulation of the nature of the risk that each of the grandparents is said to present to C, there has been inadequate consideration as to how those risks might be contained so as to enable C to continue to be cared for by his grandparents. The case law is clear that the key to any application for an interim care order in which it is proposed that a child is separated from his primary care givers is proportionality. I have had no evidence or submissions to enable me to consider whether the course of action proposed by the local authority is necessary or proportionate in safeguarding C’s welfare.

Threshold

The threshold document is very short on factual detail and does not explain why it is said that C, who it is accepted has never suffered any harm in his grandparents’ care, is at risk of significant harm from either of them.

Paragraphs one to nine set out the history of D’s admission to hospital and the local authority’s concerns about the care she and her brother E received in their mother’s care.

Paragraphs 10 to 16 concern the grandparents, although there is not a single specific allegation against the paternal grandfather.

At paragraph 10 it is said that E has spent a considerable amount of time in the care of his maternal grandparents. It is then pleaded:

The maternal grandparents have, therefore, had, at the very least, very regular contact and extensive contact with their grandchildren and have failed to protect them from suffering significant harm.

There can be no doubt that D has suffered significant harm. However, this paragraph does not plead when either of the grandparents had regular or extensive contact with D, or in what way they should have acted in order to prevent her serious and significant injuries. The threshold document does not identify which, if any, of the injuries allegedly sustained by E amount to significant harm. It is not pleaded in what respect either of the grandparents should have prevented his injuries being sustained.

At paragraph 11(a) the local authority pleads that it considers that C would be at immediate risk of significant harm if he returned to the care of his grandparents at this time, because:

(i) D’s treating clinicians consider that her injuries were inflicted non-accidentally;

(ii) None of the adults who had care of her or were in contact with her at the time have been able to provide any explanation for the injuries;

(iii) The paternal grandparents and extended family, are reluctant to acknowledge the possibility of the injuries being inflicted non-accidentally … and show a lack of acceptance around the severity of D’s injuries and the need for local authority involvement with the children.

In my judgment, this paragraph fails the President’s test in Re A . It does not set out why the A + B + C of D’s injuries and the grandparents’ reluctance to contemplate their being inflicted non-accidentally amounts to the X + Y + Z of an immediate risk of significant harm to C if he was in their care. Within the evidence, I have not seen a specific reference to either of the grandparents suggesting that there should not have been local authority involvement with D. There is a reference in the first social work statement to the maternal grandmother expressing her reluctance for C to be living with his aunt stating that ‘she had done nothing wrong’ , but if this is what is relied upon, it is not explained why this would mean that C is at risk of significant harm.

It is not specifically pleaded whether either of the grandparents was caring for D or in contact with her at the time her injuries were sustained, or whether they were specifically asked to give an explanation or not. If they were not there when the injuries were sustained I am not sure why they should be criticised for not having an explanation for their cause.

If proved, showing a lack of acceptance around the severity of D’s injuries and the need for local authority involvement, is of course a valid concern in general, but in my judgment not on its own sufficient to stand as an explanation that C is at ‘immediate risk of significant harm’ from his grandparents.

Paragraph 11(b) includes the statement that ‘one of the adults within the potential pool of perpetrators is the maternal grandmother’.

It was repeated to me a number of times in submissions that the grandmother is ‘ in the pool of perpetrators’ . She is not. A person is ‘in the pool’ only after a finding of fact has been made to that effect. I understand that an allegation has been made against her within D and E’s proceedings, but findings have not yet been made. The threshold is for the local authority to prove. If the grandmother is alleged to be in the pool of perpetrators as part of these proceedings, it is not because she accidentally found herself there, or someone else put her there, it must be because the local authority positively asserts that she had the opportunity and the motive to cause these very serious injuries, and that she was there at the time the injuries thought to have been sustained. In support of its assertion, and in order for the Court to come to the conclusion that there are reasonable grounds to believe that C is at risk of suffering significant harm from his grandmother, the local authority must spell this out in its threshold document and provide evidence in support.

(*On first reading, I thought that HHJ Vincent was saying a person is only ‘in the pool of perpetrators’ if a finding of fact about the injury has been made, but he is saying that actually a finding of fact has to be made that ‘X and Y and Z are the people who could have caused the injuries to C, if the Court later goes on to find that C was injured deliberately’ – that doesn’t usually arise, because the issue of whether someone is ‘in the pool’ is not itself contentious. But of course here, and in any case where a child is potentially being placed with family members whom the LA assert may be ‘in the pool of perpetrators’ – the issue really should be whether the LA satisfy the Court that this person is reasonably likely to be ‘in the pool’ and they are not just placed ‘in the pool’ on the LA’s say so. The remarks about ‘motive’ are interesting, because there’s barely ever evidence as to motive in physical harm to children. But of course, it is relevant for the Court to consider a 6 year period of problem-free care of C, the limited time the grandparents would have spent with C and lack of evidence as to say – substance misuse, anger management, violence, or being overwhelmed or frustrated, because those are the usual causes of physical abuse – it is very rare to see actual evidence of sadistic intent)

I have not found any other evidence within these proceedings to suggest that the maternal grandmother had care of D in the week or so before her admission to hospital.

Nonetheless, SW still asserts in her conclusion that ‘MGM is currently in the pool of perpetrators for causing injuries to D and/or failing to protect her’.

A perpetrator does not fail to protect, they perpetrate. The pleaded allegation is that MGM is in the pool of perpetrators.

I am unaware of what is pleaded against MGM in the proceedings concerning D and E, and I accept there may be specific allegations and evidence that puts her in the frame more clearly. However, I am concerned with C, and the pleaded threshold document in respect of him. The threshold document does not explain upon what facts it relies to suggest that the grandmother could reasonably be believed to be in the pool of perpetrators, and scrutiny of the local authority evidence in this case does not assist.

At paragraph 12 it is pleaded that D’s injuries are so severe, ‘with no explanation as to causation and no clarity, at present, around the possible perpetrator, that the local authority does not consider that it can be safe for C to return to his grandmother’s care’. Again, this allegation does not explain why it is that the severity of D’s injuries and the fact of the perpetrator remaining unidentified pose an immediate risk of harm to C from his grandmother.

This next paragraph, it took me a while to work out who “Q” was – it is the mother’s partner.

At paragraph 13 it is alleged that the presentation of the maternal grandmother and mother’s presentation at the hearing of the EPO were ‘extremely alarming’. They were seen to physically and verbally restrain Q by sitting on him and putting their hands over his mouth, while he clenched his fist. This allegation may well need to be explored further, but whether true or not and whatever the reasons for and the significance of this behaviour is, again, the threshold document does not explain why this means that C is at immediate risk of significant harm from his grandparents.

In conclusion

Is interim threshold crossed?

I have looked at the threshold allegations carefully.

I have considered all the evidence in the bundle and I have listened carefully to the oral evidence of Y and of the guardian.

I am not satisfied that threshold is pleaded with sufficient clarity to set out why it is said that either the maternal grandmother or the maternal grandfather present an immediate risk of significant harm to C. I have reviewed all the evidence and I am not satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing that on the date protective measures were taken, C had suffered or was at risk of suffering significant harm as a consequence of the care given by his grandparents, which or that the care given by them was not the level of care one would reasonably expect a parent to give.

I do not accept that asserting repeatedly that the grandmother is in the pool of perpetrators with respect to D’s injuries, and being concerned that there is insufficient information and clarity around the circumstances of D’s injuries is sufficient to form the basis of a threshold allegation against the maternal grandmother. so far as C is concerned. If the local authority wishes to put forward a positive case in respect of the maternal grandmother then it is required to set out in the threshold document what facts are relied upon and then to provide the evidence in support of its contention. They have not done so. The evidence is at best equivocal. While at an interim stage there is of course no requirement to prove the section 31 final threshold is crossed, there must be evidence to satisfy the Court that there are reasonable grounds to believe the section 31 circumstances exist.

There is no single specific allegation against the maternal grandfather in the threshold document.

All the remaining allegations are generalised and none of them provides an explanation as to why it is said that the care that has been given to C or is likely to be given to him by his grandparents should he return to their care, is below what one would reasonably expect from a parent, and why it would put him at risk of suffering significant harm.

Because I do not find interim threshold to have been crossed, I have no jurisdiction to make an interim care order in respect of C and he should in my judgment be returned to his grandparents’ care.

In reaching this conclusion I am not suggesting that the local authority’s concerns about the grandparents are baseless, and I accept that SW and the guardian have genuine concerns about the grandparents’ ability to work co-operatively with them, their insight and acknowledgment of the severity of D’s injuries and the existence and impact of domestic abuse upon their grandchildren. However, the case law is clear, the local authority must meet a high standard when seeking to justify the continuing separation of C from his grandparents. I must only consider making an order which interferes with their right to a family life where the strict statutory grounds are made out.

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Posted in assessment of risk, case law and tagged grandparents, interim care order, pool of perpetrators, separation. Bookmark the permalink.

And the office boy kicked the cat

Posted on March 3, 2016 by suesspiciousminds

You don’t often get law reports of Interim Care Order hearings, especially now that the senior Courts have finally stopped tinkering with the wording/putting a gloss on the statute / clarifying and refining the law. This one was a High Court decision, and the Judge (Keehan J) was investigating delay in issuing.

Big practice note for everyone – because this is High Court and we all need to follow it :-

The message must go out loud and clear that, save in the most exceptional and unusual of circumstances, local authorities must make applications for public law proceedings in respect of new born babies timeously and especially, where the circumstances arguably require the removal of the child from its parent(s), within at most 5 days of the child’s birth.

[If I may suggest – draft the bloody statement before the birth, and add to it, rather than start writing it after the baby is born. I know nobody wants to do that, just in case they win the lottery and are able to quit their job and avoid writing the statement, but seriously – have it ready in draft in advance. Babies have a nasty habit of arriving at a time that is least convenient]

Nottingham City Council v LW and Others 2016

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2016/11.html

You can get the tone of how this case is going to go from this very early paragraph.

A birth plan was prepared. It is not, however, worth the paper it is written on because, as it now transpires, it was ignored by everyone connected with the local authority

The mother had had a previous child who had been the subject of care proceedings. In fact, it looks as though those proceedings might have been ongoing into at least the late stages of pregnancy, because those proceedings were issued in May 2015. The judgment doesn’t say that the proceedings had actually ended by the time that the new baby was born in January 2016. (It ought to have ended, on the 26 week rule, but to quote Neil Gaiman “Intent and outcome are rarely coincident”

The hospital, where LW was born on 16 January, notified the social workers of her birth on Monday 18 January.
It then took the social workers until 21 January to place the papers before the local authority’s solicitors for consideration of the issue of care proceedings. It took a local authority solicitor until 28 January to issue care proceedings and to apply for an ‘urgent’ interim care order.
The local authority’s application, interim threshold criteria and social work statements in support were not served on the parents’ respective solicitors nor on the children’s guardian and her solicitor until about 12.30pm on 28 January. The case was called on before me at 3pm, there being no justices, district judge or circuit judge available to hear the matter at such short notice.

It is hard to see an excuse for a hearing taking place in a rush on 2 1/2 hours notice when the baby had actually been born 12 days earlier.

It is not therefore a shock that the Judge wanted to hear from the Director of Children’s Services and the Head of the Legal Department as to why this had happened. [For my part, I can’t say I’m happy that the legal department tried to throw one of the secretaries under the bus. I would NEVER EVER do that to any of the hard working people in my office who do so much to make things run smoothly and well.]

The Director of Children’s Services said this:-

“….I would like to offer my sincere apologies to the court for the delay in issuing proceedings. I understand this caused a number of challenges for those responsible for allocating court time and to all the parties involved who represent the parents and others involved in this case.

In this particular case, I understand however that there had been ongoing communication with the parties legal representatives about the Local Authority’s intention to issue proceedings.

I believe all parties worked on the premise that issuing should take place once all the paperwork including statements from health colleagues had been submitted and the social worker statement had been amended to include the new information from the hospital in relation to father’s alleged overdose, the withdrawal symptoms of baby and the anonymous referral received following LW’s birth. This contributed to the delay in issuing.

I fully accept that the ideal course of action would have been to issue proceedings as soon as possible after the first working day following the birth, namely the 18^th January and the Local Authority could have filed a statement making it explicit that further information had come to light which required immediate investigation and seek the court’s permission to submit an updated statement once these investigations had taken place. Again, the social worker statement could have included information reported by health colleagues, making it clear that health colleagues would be required to submit statements as soon as possible following the lodging of the care application.

Furthermore, the Local Authority will ensure that team secure emails are checked on a frequent basis by the team’s Business Support Officer or the team’s duty social worker so they can alert managers when important documents have been received. This will prevent documents “sitting in the inbox” when social workers/ case holders are absent from work due to sickness or annual leave.

Again, please accept my apologies for this delay. The staff involved in this matter take their roles very seriously and did work hard to produce all the materials required by the court, as expeditiously as possible. However, we have all learnt from this experience and will ensure that issuing is done in a timely manner. The staff involved also offer their sincere apologies for the delay and did not wish to cause the court and parties any offence. They were working hard to gather all the necessary evidence and ensure all parties had full and up to date records of recent events. Again the team recognises the need to issue proceedings as soon as possible following the birth of the baby and will ensure this message is shared across their team…..

….LW’s half-brother is currently subject to care proceedings on the basis of concerns arising from domestic violence. The pre-birth assessment of LW concluded that the risks remained as the mother had not changed or accepted the concerns, but instead minimised the domestic abuse and impact this would have on her as yet unborn child’s development and safety.

A Legal Planning meeting was held on the 16^th December 2015 chaired by a Children’s Social care service Manager with legal advice and support from the Team leader of the Local Authority’s Children and Adults Legal Team. The decision to issue proceedings was then ratified by me as Head of Service for Children’s Social Care.

It would be usual practice to issue proceedings on the day of birth and I have investigated this matter to try and ascertain why in this case, proceedings were not issued until the 27^th January, 8 working days following LW’s birth. I met with the Team Manager, SD, and her covering Service Manager on Friday 29^th January and with the Children and Adults Legal Team Leader on Monday 1^st February in order to review events and determine reasons for this delay. I set out below the key events as they unfolded and which contributed to the delay in issuing proceedings….”

It isn’t great that the social work team took five days (less working days, obviously) to produce their statement, given that all concerned knew that the intention was to issue proceedings and that a baby would be born in January. Having said that though, having the statement ready on 21st January would still have allowed for a hearing on notice, and the delay of seven days to get the application issued once the statement was prepared is hard to understand. [The longest and toughest part of issuing an application is of course the social worker writing the statement. The actual application is a horrible soul-crushing bout of tedium, but it really doesn’t take that long. In one dreadful day in December, I did three of these in a morning]

So what did the legal department have to say? Well, as indicated earlier, they threw the lowest paid person in the room under the bus.

“On 19^th January 2016, Legal Services were updated by the social worker following her hospital visit to see mother, father and the baby. The social worker advised there had also been an anonymous referral to the hospital made the previous evening stating that the mother had used opiates throughout her pregnancy. The hospital had also expressed concerns about the baby’s health and they would be undertaking a Rivers chart assessment as they were concerned the baby was experience withdrawal symptoms. I refer to the statement of TN for an explanation regarding what the Rivers Chart assessment is.

In light of the recent information, the social worker needed to update her statement and this was sent to Legal Services on 21^st January 2016. By this point there were and had been some difficulties between the social worker and hospital in obtaining medical information regarding LW’s withdrawal and also the father’s overdose. Legal services confirmed that they would assist in seeking this information from the hospital.

On Friday 22 January the hospital emailed over a midwife’s report to the social worker’s team secure email. Unfortunately as the social worker was off sick on Monday 25^th January, this statement was not picked up by the social worker until Tuesday 26^th January, when it was forwarded on to Legal Services. Unfortunately the allocated solicitor was not in work on the 26^th as she works part-time so the first that the solicitor saw of both the midwife’s report and the final paperwork from the Social Worker (the chronology) was on Wednesday 27^th January, when the matter was issued. As the hospital was not pressing for discharge until the end of the week the Court were notified with the application that the matter could wait until Friday 29^th January for listing if that would assist the Court…..

…the final updated social worker documents were received by Legal on 26^th January and the case was issued with the court during the afternoon of 27^th January and the court was advised that a hearing the following day was not necessarily needed and the matter could wait until the day afterwards, namely Friday 29 January if that would assist the Court. In the meantime the hospital emailed over further health evidence, a second midwife report and chronology, once again to the chronology, once again to the social worker until the morning of 28^th January and then passed on to Legal Services.

The court duly issued the matter during the afternoon of 27^th January and listed the case to be heard before a District Judge at 2pm on Thursday 28^th January2016. The allocated solicitor left instructions with the team legal secretary to inform CAFCASS and also provide them with copies of the local authority application and also to counsel who would be representing the Local Authority on 28^th January.

Unfortunately, the team secretary did not file and serve the Local Authority’s application on the Parent’s solicitors at the same time. I apologise on behalf of the Local Authority for their regrettable oversight. To give this error some context, due to an unexpected absence and vacancies within the secretarial team, the secretary was working on her own that day in a secretarial team which usually consists of four secretaries and was inundated with work. She is very sorry for the problems her oversight caused.

It is also further regrettable that it was not noted that the parents’ solicitors had not been served with the Local Authority’s application until late in the morning on 28^th January. It was immediately rectified but unfortunately this was less than two hours before the hearing. Once again I apologise on behalf of the Local Authority for this delay. The Local Authority has been made fully aware of the dissatisfaction expressed by Mr Justice Keehan who heard the matter on 28^th January and has not taken this matter lightly. There has been a full review into the circumstances surrounding the issue of this matter both by legal Services and also Children’s Services.

It is accepted that there has been a delay in the issuing of this matter and no disrespect was intended to the court and parties. It is hoped by providing a chronology in respect of what has happened in the conduct of the matter since the birth of LW that Mr Justice Keehan and the court can be reassured that this matter was continually worked and as a result of the critical new information and concerns around events that took place around the birth of LW involving the father’s suspected overdose and also the anonymous referral that the mother possibly had been using opiates through pregnancy that such concerns had to be rigorously investigated and also further evidence adduced in order for the Local Authority to rely on this, particularly, as the Local Authority’s Care Plan was to seek an Interim Care Order with removal of LW from her parents’ care.

In addition, the Parties solicitors were updated as regards progress with the matter. Sadly for LW the hospital had concerns that she maybe experiencing withdrawal symptoms and the hospital were obviously keen to keep her in hospital for monitoring. LW also suffered a seizure on 25^th January. Therefore, any delay in the matter being heard before the court had thankfully not caused any inconvenience to the hospital.

Nevertheless in reviewing this matter I accept that should this scenario happen again in the future the appropriate course of action would be for the matter to be issued at the earliest possible opportunity following the baby’s birth. There would then be liaison with the court around further evidence being sought by the Local Authority to assist the court as to how urgently the matter needed to be listed, particularly as in this scenario the Local Authority were seeking an interim Care Order and removal which was and is still to be contested by the parents. The Team Leader for the Children and Adults legal team will ensure that the team is fully aware of the need to take this approach in future cases….”

Hmmm. I’m struggling with the Judge’s opening summary, where he says that the social work documents were with legal by 21st January, because the legal chronology here says 26th January.

The Judge accepted the apologies, but still felt that there was some egregiously poor practice here – and indicated that as there were some failings here which were not unique to this authority but things that happened too often in cases, it was worth highlighting them. In particular, he was concerned at the practice of delaying issuing an Interim Care Order application because a hospital was willing to keep a child for a longer period than would usually take place. (It is fairly usual to seek an ICO in 4 or 5 days after birth, to allow the notice period and the hospital be asked to keep mother and baby together in the hospital with mother’s agreement. The Court can’t always accommodate that, and this is particularly an issue where those 4 or 5 days would encompass a weekend, or worst still a Bank Holiday weekend)

I also note that having accepted the Local Authority apologies, the Judge did still take them to task for being a serial offender in late applications, and also ordered them to pay the costs.

[I can’t help but note that Keehan J was a lot harder on this authority than he was on the one in last week’s case who sought an injunction effectively labelling a man as a sexual exploiter of children having got the wrong man…]

Local Authority – Failings and Poor Practice

In my experience the errors made in this case are not an isolated example nor is the factual matrix of this case either unique nor even exceptional: on the contrary this case is fairly typical of the type of case in which local authorities propose or plan to seek the removal of a baby at birth. Thus, what principally concerns me is that such fundamental and egregious errors should be made in, what may colloquially be termed, ‘a run of the mill case’. In paragraph33 below, I consider what steps should be taken by a local authority when it plans to seek the removal of an unborn child immediately or shortly after his/her birth.
Before I do so, I wish to make certain observations on the flawed approach apparently endorsed by both the senior children’s services manager and the local authority’s senior lawyer in this case. First, both made reference to the willingness of the hospital to keep the baby as an in patient pending the issue of care proceedings. Plainly the period of time for which a hospital is prepared to keep a new born baby as an in-patient, either on medical or welfare grounds, maybe a material consideration for a local authority on the timing of the making of an application for an interim care order, but must not place too great a reliance on these indications or assurances. The fact that a hospital is prepared to keep a baby as an in-patient is not a reason to delay making an application for an interim care order. The following should always be borne in mind:

a) a hospital may not detain a baby in hospital against the wishes of the mother or a father with parental responsibility;

b) the capability of a maternity unit or a hospital to accommodate a healthy new born child may change within hours, whatever the good intentions of the unit or hospital, depending upon the challenging demands it may be presented with;

c) the ability to invite the police to exercise a Police Protection Order, pursuant to s 48 of the 1989 Act or for a local authority to apply for an Emergency Protection Order, pursuant to s.36 of the 1989, are, of course, available as emergency remedies,

d) but such procedures do not afford the parents nor, most importantly, the child, with the degree of participation, representation and protection as an on notice interim care order application;

e) the indication of a maternity unit as to the date of discharge of a new born baby should never, save in the most extraordinary of circumstances, set or lead the time for an application for an interim care order in respect of a new born child.

Second, where the pre birth plan provides for an application to be made for the removal of a child at or shortly after birth, it is neither “usual” nor “ideal” practice for an application for an interim care order to be made on the day of the child’s birth, rather it is essential and best practice for this to occur.
Third, once it is determined by a local authority that sufficient evidence is available to make an application for an interim care order, on the basis of the removal of a new born child, the availability of additional evidence from the maternity unit or elsewhere, must not then cause a delay in the issue of care proceedings; the provision of additional evidence may be envisaged in the application and/or provided subsequently.
The local authority should have adopted good practice and the following basic, but fundamental, steps should have been taken:

a) The birth plan should have been rigorously adhered to by all social work practitioners and managers and by the local authority’s legal department;

b) A risk assessment of the mother and the father should have been commenced immediately upon the social workers being made aware of the mother’s pregnancy. The assessment should have been completed at least 4 weeks before the mother’s expected date for delivery. The assessment should then have been updated to take account of relevant events immediately pre and post delivery which could potentially affect the initial conclusions on risk and care planning for the unborn child;

c) The assessment should have been disclosed, forthwith upon initial completion, to the parents and, if instructed, to their solicitors to give them an opportunity, if necessary, to challenge the assessment of risk and the proposed care plan;

d) The social work team should have provided all relevant documentation, necessary for the legal department to issue care proceedings and the application for an interim care order, no less than 7 days before the expected date of delivery. The legal department must issue the application on the day of birth and, in any event, no later than 24 hours after birth (or as the case may be, the date on which the local authority is notified of the birth);

e) Immediately upon issue, if not before, the local authority’s solicitors should have served the applications and supporting documents on the parents and, if instructed, upon their respective solicitors.

f) Immediately upon issue, the local authority should have sought from the court an initial hearing date, on the best time estimate that its solicitors could have provided.

If these steps had been followed in this case, unnecessary delay and procedural unfairness would have been avoided.

Conclusions

The local authority was inexcusably late in making an application for an interim care order. The consequences of this contumelious failure were that:

i) The parents’ legal representatives were served with the application and supporting, albeit deficient, documentation only some 2-3 hours before the hearing;

ii) The court was unable to accommodate a 1 day contested hearing for an interim care order before a circuit judge, a recorder or a district judge until some days hence;

iii) The parents legitimately wished to have a fully contested interim hearing with the benefit of oral evidence to cross examine the social worker and the guardian and to enable the parents to give oral evidence;

iv) The hospital was ready to discharge the child and, for wholly understandable reasons was unwilling and unable to care for the baby for a further prolonged period;

v) The stance of the hospital and the principal, but unchallenged, evidence of the local authority was that the baby would be at risk of suffering significant harm if she were discharged into the care of either the mother and/or the father;

vi) Accordingly and acting in the best welfare interests of the baby, as advised by the children’s guardian, the court had no choice but to make an interim care order in favour of the local authority on the basis of a plan to place the baby with foster carers; but

vii) On the basis that the local authority, at whatever cost and inconvenience to itself, would arrange contact to take place five times per week between the child and her parents.

I am in no doubt that the parents in this case have been done a great dis-service by this local authority. It may well be that the outcome would have been the same whatever the length of notice that they and their respective legal advisors had had of this application; that is not the point. It is all a question of perceived and procedural fairness.
The actions of this local authority, in issuing an application for an interim care order so late in the day, have resulted in an initial hearing before the court which, I very much regret, is procedurally unfair to the parents. Of equal importance, it is unfair to the children’s guardian who was only appointed on the morning of the issue of this application. The fault for this unfairness lies squarely at the door of this local authority.
I am in no doubt that if this application for an interim care order had been issued timeously by the local authority then the hearing before me on 28 January 2016 could have been an effective contested hearing.
In the premises I have no hesitation in concluding that the costs of this abortive hearing should be borne by the local authority. Accordingly I shall order the local authority to pay the costs of all of the respondents to be assessed if not agreed.
This local authority is, I am told and accept, a ‘serial offender’ in issuing late and ‘urgent’ applications for care proceedings and/or interim care orders in respect of new born babies. Save in respect of clandestine pregnancies and/or births, I simply do not understand why this local authority issues proceedings so late and so urgently. In this case it was a most spectacular and contumelious failure.
The message must go out loud and clear that, save in the most exceptional and unusual of circumstances, local authorities must make applications for public law proceedings in respect of new born babies timeously and especially, where the circumstances arguably require the removal of the child from its parent(s), within at most 5 days of the child’s birth.
Given that in the vast majority of cases a local authority will be actively involved with the family and/or aware of the pregnancy and the estimated date of delivery, I cannot conceive how such a requirement places an unreasonable and/or disproportionate duty upon a local authority. Further it is likely that a local authority’s failure to act fairly and/or timeously will be condemned in an order for costs.
In this case the local authority wholly and unreasonably failed the child, her parents and the children’s guardian.

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Posted in case law, judicial spanking, social work, timescales and tagged 2016 EWHC 11, application for care order should be made within 5 days of baby's birth, delay in issuing proceedings, interim care order, keehan j, Nottingham City Council v LW 2016. Bookmark the permalink.

Shoe-throwing and Interim Care Order

Posted on July 31, 2015 by suesspiciousminds

This is a tricky case. It involves an appeal to the Court of Appeal about the Judge’s making of an Interim Care Order in relation to four children aged between 8 and 2 1/2

Re W-J (children) 2015

http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed146039

The mother in the case has what appears to be a form of personality disorder. She accepts that there are times when she is utterly unable to control her temper and can fly into an unmanageable rage. Generally during these rages, she takes it out on inanimate objects. She describes that the things that can set off these rages can be very trivial, giving the example of someone eating a packet of crisps loudly.

3…In short terms, from time to time she loses control of her behaviour, loses her temper, and the trigger for this is often a trivial matter which would not affect other people. On one occasion, for example, she describes losing her self control simply because she was irritated by the noise of someone eating a packet of crisps.

4. When she does lose control, she behaves in a physically violent way, normally towards inanimate objects, utensils in the kitchen, other matters of that sort. Sometimes she can detect the onset of these symptoms and make arrangements for the children, if they are at home, to go outside the house or go to be with someone else. On other occasions she is not able to have such foresight and it is plain from what the children have said that they have witnessed the distressing spectacle of their mother behaving in this way

Whilst that must be distressing and upsetting, what prompted the proceedings was that on two occasions, things went further than that.

what led to the proceedings being issued by the local authority were two instances relatively close together where the children reported on separate occasions being injured as a result of the mother’s behaviour. The first occurred on 2 February 2015, when the mother threw a shoe and it hit one of the older children. She accepted that and she indeed accepted a caution at the police station as a result of that behaviour. She accepted that she had thrown the shoe and thrown it at the child but she asserted that she was not deliberately intending to hurt him. She said she had lost control. The second occasion on 20 March 2015 was when the mother’s foot came into contact with the 7 year old girl. The judge heard some evidence about that. The mother accepted that, physically, her foot came into contact with her daughter but was not accepting that this was deliberately in order to cause injury. The child nevertheless was injured, albeit not very seriously. Following the second of those two outbursts, the local authority issued the proceedings.

What the Court had to do at that interim care order hearing was to determine whether the test for separation had been made out, and whether the risks could be managed in another way, applying the least interventionist principle.

Three of the children were found placements within the family, which were a decent compromise. That left one child, T, and a decision had to be taken about whether she could stay with mother, somewhere, or go into foster care.

There is a law geek point about whether the Court could have made an injunction under the Human Rights Act 1998 to make the LA manage the risk by keeping mother and child together. The Court of Appeal closed this down by saying that it wasn’t sufficiently argued before the Judge to be an appeal point, so it is not resolved (for my part, I think that the order that the Court can make in that regard is the straightforward Interim Supervision Order OR to compel them to place in residential assessment, a section 38(6) direction, and there’s no need to monkey around with esoteric HRA injunctions, but there may be a better case where the point really does arise)

10. In the course of the robust and constructive representation that the mother had at the hearing provided by Ms Kochnari, her counsel who represented her before the judge and before this court, Ms Kochnari drew attention to the jurisdiction that the Family Court may have in certain circumstances under the Human Rights Act 1996 to grant an injunction requiring a local authority to take a particular course of action. That jurisdiction in part is based upon, obviously, the wording of the Act itself but also decisions of this court, in particular Re: H (Children) [2011] EWCA Civ 1009 and a decision of the High Court: Re: DE (A child) [2014] EWFC 6. In short terms, Ms Kochnari’s submission was that the judge should grant an injunction requiring the local authority to keep the mother and child together, leaving it up to the local authority how that should be achieved.

11. That describes the position of the parties, mother and local authority, before the judge. The children’s guardian has plainly given this matter a great deal of anxious consideration. Both the guardian and the judge (and it is particularly important to stress that this was the judge’s perspective) saw the value for young T, particularly at the age she currently has reached, in remaining together with her mother. They have a good attachment and it would be seen as a detriment to that attachment, and a detriment to that important aspect of her best interests, for mother and child to be separated for any significant period at this juncture of her life.

12. But the question was how a maintenance of maternal care could be achieved. The guardian indicated that she would support a placement of the mother and child together in a foster home or some other form of residential accommodation if that could be achieved. The judge agreed with the guardian. The judge apparently said during the course of submissions that “heaven and earth” should be moved by the local authority to try to find a suitable placement and indeed an hour and a half or so was allowed during the course of the court day for the local authority to make enquiries. Those enquiries failed to identify any placement on the local authority’s books that could provide a mother and child placement at that stage. The local authority, however, took a more principled stand in addition to the practical difficulty of finding a particular placement. Their submission to the judge was that it was simply inappropriate to consider a mother and child foster home for this sort of case, this sort of case being one in which there is no real concern about the mother’s ability to provide day to day, hour to hour ordinary parenting, the concern being about her mental well being and the local authority indicated that it would be difficult to find a foster carer who would be prepared to accept the risk of having an adult, namely the mother, in the foster home when what is said about her behaviour is being said and is being said in the current period of time.

13. So the judge did not have an option before him for a mother and baby placement if he was to make an interim care order.

That left a rather stark choice

1. Grant the ICO and separate T from mother

2. Make no order / ISO and the child remains with mother at home

3. Make no order, but adjourn for fuller enquiries about a placement that might have allowed a section 38(6) application for residential assessement to get off the ground.

The Court of Appeal set out why option 3, the adjournment, was not feasible

20. Dealing with the question of adjournment, the position before the judge is not altogether plain. It is clear that Ms Kochnari invited the judge in her closing submissions to afford more time for a more comprehensive search to be undertaken. She, in her submissions to us, urges us to interpret that as being really a request for the judge to consider adjourning the case for a period of a day or more to allow the sort of search that has now been undertaken to be conducted. The judge may have interpreted it simply as a matter of a further short time. For my part, given no doubt (although we have not got information about this) that that submission was made late during the course of the court day because this process will have taken up most of the court day, a request for more time almost inevitably meant more time when office hours are open and therefore another day, so in Ms Kochnari’s favour I assume that was the import of her submission to the judge.

21. But, in my judgment, the judge had to face up to the application before him and he did so without any consideration that another day or two could change the landscape and produce a firmed up and clear alternative for him to consider. He, with the reluctance that the choice of words that he used in his judgment clearly demonstrates, considered that it simply was not safe for this child to be at home with the mother for any period of time after the day on which he was giving judgment. In my view, he was entirely justified in coming to that view. I have referred to the psychiatric evidence, such as it was, that was available to him. He had evidence of the two recent episodes where the mother’s behaviour had flared up to the detriment of the children. A factor that I have not mentioned is that the older children had indicated a clear wish not to return to their mother’s care. He will have understood that for children, even if they were not physically injured by any particular deterioration in the mother’s behaviour, simply to watch their mother, the person upon whom they relied, behaving in this way, will have been totally bewildering and frightening. The judge did expressly take account of the fact that the older children had been able to be protected by the actions of the local authority because they had spoken up, they had gone to school or they had gone to other carers and said that their mother had behaved in the way that is now established she had behaved. But young T, aged two and a half would not be in a position to blow the whistle, as it were, on any such behaviour.

22. The final factor, and to my mind it is the crucial factor, is that it is impossible for an outsider to predict whether the mother will or will not flare up at any particular moment of any particular day. It is not a risk that can be predicted, contained or controlled, either by the mother or by any outside agency.

23. With all of those factors in mind, the judge was, in my view, entirely justified in saying that the risk was not one that could be taken in T’s best interests and immediate separation was required. So, even on the basis that a fully formed application for an adjournment had been made, in my view the judge’s decision not to adjourn but to make the order that day could not be said to be wrong and indeed on his analysis of the evidence it would seem hard to justify an alternative conclusion.

What could, perhaps, have been done but that wasn’t expressly considered here was for the Judge to make a short order – say a week, to allow that search for an alternative placement to take place and then revisit if there was any way to safely manage mother and child together.

The Court of Appeal, whilst acknowledging how difficult a situation this was and expressing hope that a longer term solution to mother’s difficulties might be found so that the other very good aspects of her parenting could prevail, were driven to conclude that the Judge’s decision to make an Interim Care Order was not only not wrong but actively right.

27. We are therefore left with the judge’s decision to make the interim care order in the circumstances that he did. This is a worrying case. I explained the basis of the worry at the very beginning of this short judgment. It is a case that will require very careful evaluation by the authorities and by the court over the course of the next 2 or 3 months as material is prepared for a final hearing. Crucial will be a full psychiatric assessment of the mother’s underlying mental health difficulties. At the end of the case, a judgment will have to be made as to the long term welfare of these children and as part of that judgment the many positives that can be said about this mother will come into play. But all that the judge was doing and, all that we are contemplating, is making a decision about the child’s welfare for the very short term under the interim order. In that context, important though the decision is, I regard the judge’s determination as being unremarkable. It was a decision made carefully by a judge on the correct legal test, supported by the evidence and one which amply was justified by the welfare of this young child.

I’m sure that all of us would wish this mother well for the future and hope that a solution can be found that would let her parent in the way that she would wish to and be free of what must be a terrible inability to control those outbursts.

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Posted in case law and tagged appeal, Court of Appeal, human rights injunction, ico, interim care order, mother and baby foster placement, outbursts, personality disorder, re w-j 2015, residential assessment, section 38(6), separation. Bookmark the permalink.

Syria, children and electronic tagging

Posted on July 30, 2015 by suesspiciousminds

In what has been a challenging month, I have to confess that my heart sank right into my boots when I saw Sir James Munby, President of the Family Division, had published a judgment about Emergency Protection Orders. I’m still recovering from Re X, his last major contribution to this legal domain, and that was nine years ago.

But Re X (children) and Y (children) (Emergency Protection Orders) 2015 http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2015/2265.html

[Weird, the link doesn’t seem to be working. Try again

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2015/2265.html ]

is not actually about expanding the fourteen point guidance into a two-hundred and nine point guidance, so you can read on without fear or dread.

Note, I am lying. This is a judgment from the President. Have you ever seen a judgment from the President that made a Local Authority lawyer happy? If I wrote the Top Ten list of case-law that had made my job harder, the President’s fingerprints would be on seven of them – going right back to seven days a week contact. This does not buck that particular trend.

It is one of the cases where a family are accused/suspected/found (delete as relevant to the particular case) of trying to take their children out to Syria to join up with ISIS (or whatever David Cameron thinks that we should call them this week), and what the State can do about it.

At the moment, this responsibility rests on the shoulders of Social Services and the Children Act 1989, and Parliament is more than welcome to produce some proper legislation that takes that off us and gives it to someone else, any time now.

A lot of this case is very factual about the circumstances, and I daresay that it will be very helpful to all the LA’s who are making applications to Court about such families.

[I have always wondered where the families go after that EPO. If a Court has ruled that you intended to take your child into a warzone and join up with terrorists and removes the child, what sort of assessment gets you the child BACK at the end of the final hearing? Aren’t the EPOs basically determinative of final outcome? Well, that was the thrust of this case, whether there was some sort of arrangement that would allow the children to be back in the parents care with some form of cast-iron guarantee that they would not leave the jurisdiction. The important thing to remember here is that the Court had not conducted a finding of fact hearing about the parents intentions and plans and thus what risk the children were at – they had just determined that there were REASONABLE grounds to believe that the children were at risk of significant harm requiring interim protections]

However, the President would not be the President if he didn’t try to stretch the law a bit, and so that’s the point of interest. [Occasionally, the President’s approach to the law reminds me of the year at school where all of us were given a brand new white plastic ruler to replace the wooden ones – the rulers were each labelled “Helix – Shatterproof” , an ill-thought out boast, which led to all of us industriously breaking them that very morning to demonstrate that they were not in fact Shatterproof. I say ill-thought out, but of course, the school had to get on to Helix and order another 250 that same day, so for Helix it was a profitable claim]

Thinking about the cases over the intervening weekend, it occurred to me to think about the possibility of electronic tagging. Accordingly, on 5 July 2015 I sent the following email:

“I am sending this email to the advocates in both … cases. Please make sure that it is communicated as soon as possible to all concerned.

It has occurred to me to wonder whether in these cases it may be appropriate to consider the making of electronic tagging orders: see Re C (Abduction: Interim Directions: Accommodation by Local Authority) [2003] EWHC 3065 (Fam), [2004] 1 FLR 653, and Re A (Family Proceedings: Electronic Tagging) [2009] EWHC 710 (Fam), [2009] 2 FLR 891 (setting out a form of order).

Could counsel please consider this possibility.”

This time there are precedents (though fairly obscure ones, which I had to go and read). They relate of course to the powers under the Child Custody and Abduction Act 1985. Those powers aren’t exactly delineated to require someone to submit to electronic tagging, but in the modern era of law as they don’t say that they DON’T give that power, it could be interpreted thus

5 Interim powers.

Where an application has been made to a court in the United Kingdom under the Convention, the court may, at any time before the application is determined, give such interim directions as it thinks fit for the purpose of securing the welfare of the child concerned or of preventing changes in the circumstances relevant to the determination of the application.

Of course here, though, there is not an application before the Court under the Convention. These are EPO applications, governed by the Children Act 1989. It is beyond my working knowledge to consider whether an attempt by the persons who hold PR (when there are no Children Act 1989 orders) could find themselves foul of the Child Custody and Abduction Act 1985 (if everyone with PR agrees that the children will go to Syria, who are the children being abducted FROM?). It would be different if the Court had made Children Act 1989 orders, or were seised with such an application, since there’s authority to say that the Court can go on to make orders compelling the children’s return to the jurisdiction.

Anyway, let’s see what the President does with the idea of electronic tagging.

It is worth noting that the parents were keen on the idea – because it was obviously their best shot of having the children returned to their care – this being a case where the Court had not found any evidence that the children had been exposed to radicalisation. So the Court did not have to consider whether there was power to impose it on the family. (Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward were counsel representing the parents)

Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward take as their starting point the fact that, the precipitating events apart, the parents are, in other respects, good parents who are bringing up their children lovingly and well. Although it would seem that all the children are doing as well as might be expected in foster care, there is no doubt that they are missing their parents very much and that they are, in consequence, suffering harm. In these circumstances Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward question both the necessity and the proportionality of the children remaining in foster care. Their safety, both physical and emotional, can, it is submitted, properly be met while the children remain at home; their safety, whether physical or emotional, does not necessitate their remaining in foster care.
In the final analysis, say counsel, my task is to evaluate the risk of harm deriving from the possibility of flight and balance that against the undoubted harm the children are suffering because of continued separation from their parents. Given the adequate safeguards against the risk of fight which they assert can be put in place, the balance, they submit, comes down in favour of returning the children to their parents.
Both local authorities are clear that they feel unable to exercise the parental responsibility vested in them by the interim care orders unless the children remain in foster care. That being so, Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward say that the appropriate order is, in each case, an order discharging the interim care orders, making the children wards of court, and placing them in the care and control of their parents, subject, however, to a raft of stringent protective orders.
What Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward propose is in each case an order containing: passport orders in the usual wide-ranging form and an all-ports alert; injunctions restraining the parents removing the children from the jurisdiction and requiring them to live with the children at a specified address; and provisions for the monitoring of the parents and the children by a combination of unannounced visits by the local authority, regular reporting to a specified police station or local authority office and, in the case of the parents, electronic tagging. It is proposed that the order should include a provision requiring the parents to swear on the Quran that they will abide by each and every provision of the order and that the order should spell out the consequences (including but not limited to committal for contempt of court) in the event of any non-compliance.
There is no need for me to consider whether I would have power to impose such orders on unwilling or recalcitrant parents, for all the parents here are willing to submit to whatever restrictions, including electronic tagging, I think it necessary to impose for the safety of the children. That said, I am inclined to agree with the views expressed by Singer J in the passage from his judgment in Re C (Abduction: Interim Directions: Accommodation by Local Authority) [2003] EWHC 3065 (Fam), [2004] 1 FLR 653 , para 46, which I refer to below.
Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward realistically accept that, however stringent the protective measures which might be put in place, there will always be some risk that the parents will be able to flee with the children. But they counsel me against being too concerned by remote or fanciful possibilities. An order the court makes is not, they submit, to be measured by the standard of certainty or infallibility but by reference to what Mr Rowley called real-world possibilities. Judged by that standard, he says, the risk is slight indeed, in reality reduced to an effective nullity if the parents are, as they propose, subjected to GPS electronic tagging (as to which see below).
To get the children to Syria, he says, the parents would: have to cut the tag (thereby triggering an immediate alarm), having made arrangements to travel immediately to a point of exit from the United Kingdom; have to evade detection while in transit there; have to evade detection at the point of exit despite their being in a family group, the all-ports alert, and publicity about them being on the run; have to be able to pass through the immigration controls of a second country without detection; and have to be able to cross from that country (or some third country) into Syria. Whilst he accepts the possibility that the parents have the connections and means to achieve all this, Mr Rowley disputes that there is any evidence upon which I could reasonably infer it.
More tellingly, perhaps, Mr Rowley makes the point that if the parents do indeed have the means to achieve this, the children are not safe in their foster placements. For if they have the resourcefulness and determination postulated by the local authorities and the guardians, the parents would by the same measure be able to track the children down and abduct them. The reality, he suggests, is that nothing short of actual incarceration of the children would ensure the complete eradication of all risk of their being removed to Syria. In truth, he says, the local authorities and the guardians are prepared to countenance a level of risk in the present placements while requiring from the proposed placements with the parents the certainty that all risk has been eradicated.

Mr Rowley (and no doubt Miss Woodward) go high up on my list of people who have been able to develop a compelling argument from unpromising beginnings. They manage to make the parents position sound completely reasonable and the Local Authority’s anxieties utterly unreasonable. In an atmosphere where the pulbic concern about terrorisim and children going to Syria could not be higher. That takes some skill. One has to remember, of course, that the Court had not conducted any finding of fact hearing about the circumstances and intentions of the parents in making those trips or plans for the trips.

To Local Authority lawyers, I’m sorry that I wrongly suggested that you could read this judgment without dread. Of course you know what is about to happen now.

The law, even the criminal law in the days of capital punishment, has never adopted a standard of absolute certainty or infallibility. So the mere fact that there is, as Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward accept, some risk that the parents will, if so minded, be able to flee with the children, the fact that it is no doubt possible to construct hypothetical scenarios of how they might achieve this, is not determinative of the question I have to decide. That question, in the final analysis comes down, in my judgment, to two linked inquiries: how great is the risk that the parents will, if so minded, be able to flee with the children, and is that a degree of risk which the court is, in all the circumstances, prepared to accept as tolerable?
Given the potential consequences if the parents, being minded to flee with the children, were able to achieve their objective, it seems to me that what the court needs is a very high degree of assurance, albeit falling some way short of absolute certainty, that the protective measures put in place will be effective to thwart any attempted flight. This is ultimately a matter for judgement and evaluation, in relation to matters, in particular those dealt with DS Y, DS Z and Mr Fearnly, which I am in as good a position to assess as any of the social workers or guardians, none of whom can bring to this particular exercise in evaluation either professional training or (as they all accepted) any previous experience of any remotely comparable case. Accordingly, I have to come to my own conclusion, though obviously feeding into my overall evaluation the expert views of the social workers and the guardians as to the impact on the children of their continuing separation from their parents.
At the end of the day, and having given the matter the most anxious thought both during and since the two hearings, I have concluded that the comprehensive and far-reaching package of protective measures proposed by Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward does provide the necessary very high degree of assurance that the court needs, that I need, if the children are now to be returned to parental care. Taking into account all the points pressed upon me by those opposing such an order, I am at the end of the day persuaded by Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward that I should make the orders they seek, and essentially for the reasons they have articulated.
I accept that there is some degree of risk of successful flight. I cannot go quite as far as Mr Rowley when he asserts that it is reduced to an effective nullity by the protective measures he proposes, but taking a realistic view, though not forgetting that we are here in the realm of unknown unknowns, my considered assessment is that the degree of that risk is very small, indeed, so small that it is counter-balanced by the children’s welfare needs to be returned to parental care. I should add, to make plain, that in relation to their welfare (leaving flight risk on one side), the benefits all of these children will derive from being returned to their parents clearly, in my judgment, outweigh any and all of such contrary welfare arguments as have deployed by the local authorities or the guardians. Conclusion
I shall therefore make orders essentially in the terms proposed by Mr Rowley and Miss Woodward. The orders will contain the additional provisions proposed by Mr Crabtree and Mrs Crowley. The orders will spell out that nothing is intended to prevent the police exercising any powers which would otherwise be available to them, including, in particular, their powers under section 46 of the Children Act 1989. I invite counsel to consider two further matters: whether the proposed oaths on the Quran should be sworn before a notary or an imam, and what, if any, provisions should be included in the orders to enable the relevant local authority to remove the children in an emergency if there has been some breach of the order and there is no time to apply even by telephone tothe duty judge. I am inclined to think that the local authorities should have that power, but strictly confined to circumstances of emergency and subject to an unqualified obligation to make an application to the court immediately

The judgment then goes on to set out the protocol for such matters. It will, I’m sure, calm the nerves of every social worker who is now going to be driven to leave children like this at home under the protection of their parents wearing electronic tags that the tagging system is provided by Capita, whose record is flawless.

I am perhaps missing what actually stops these children’s uncles or cousins taking them to Syria if it is the parents who are tagged? Yes, the parewnts would be stuck her to face the music, but how great a feature is ‘fear of the consequences’ a major inhibitor to terrorism? I have always rather missed how one is to stop these things happening if the parents book a package holiday to Turkey and then just travel onwards once they are out there. Are we going to stop all families going to Turkey on holiday? Or only those who are on some sort of Watch list? And if only those on the Watch list, given that social workers don’t have access to that, how are they supposed to intervene?

Whilst of course, it can’t be imposed on a parent, I’m sure they will be queuing up to agree to it.

The judgment of course does not set out who will be paying for the tagging and monitoring, but we all know that it will be the Local Authority (or under what power the Court is apparently imposing this expense on the LA – it will be the theoretically limitless powers of the inherent jurisdiction, if anyone ever challenges it)

I wonder how any parent facing an ICO hearing for neglect, or consumption of alcohol will feel, knowing that they too are meeting the same “Reasonable grounds to believe” test as parents of this type, but that parents suspected of taking their children to join a warzone will keep them at home with electronic tags, whereas they may be separated from their own children.

Where exactly is the bar for removal under Interim Care Order, if a case like this isn’t over it?

And if tagging works in the interim, what stops these children being tagged for the remainder of their childhood at final hearing, even if the allegations are proven to be true?

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Posted in assessment of risk, case law, fact finding and tagged child custody and abduction act 2005, children being taken to syria, electronic tagging, emergency protection order, interim care order, president, president of the family division, separation of child and parent, sir james munby, syria, tagging of children, wardship, x and y 2015. Bookmark the permalink.

Who has the burden of proof?

Posted on May 25, 2015 by suesspiciousminds

Well, that’s a stupid title for a blog post. The burden of proof – whose job it is to prove whether something happened, and whose job it is to persuade the Court to make the order is the applicant. In public law cases, that’s the Local Authority (the social workers). It isn’t the parents job to prove that they didn’t injure a child, or that the Court should NOT make a Supervision Order. It is well known, and requires no thought or analysis at all by a lawyer – all of us know that already.

There is, of course, a reason why I am asking that question in the title. It is because a High Court decision has just emerged that makes me call that obvious truism into question.

Here’s the issue – in a case where consideration is being given to a child being removed from a parent under an Interim Care Order, there’s a specific question to be answered. That is, does the child’s safety require immediate removal. And in deciding whether to make any order at all, the Court has to consider that the child’s welfare is paramount. So, a Court won’t make an ICO with a plan of removal unless (a) the child’s safety requires immediate removal and (b) the order is the right thing for the child. The burden of proof would be on the applicant, the social worker.

In the case of Re N (A Child: Interim Care Order) 2015 decided by His Honour Judge Bellamy, but sitting in the High Court, here is how the social worker answered those questions.

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/HCJ/2015/40.html

46. On the key issue of removal, the social worker said that in her opinion ‘N’s immediate safety does not require separation’. On the contrary, she considers that any changes in the current care arrangements ‘will be detrimental to N’s well-being and emotional safety’.

So, no the child does not REQUIRE separation as a result of immediate safety risks, and no the child’s removal would not be in the child’s best interests.

If the Local Authority case was that the two tests were not satisfied (and that was the evidence given), and the burden of proof falls on them, then the order can’t be made, surely?

Well, that’s why this case is challenging, because the Court DID make the Interim Care Order, did say that that the child’s safety requires immediate separation and did say that separation would be in the child’s best interests.

Hmmm.

Let’s look at this logically. The ultimate decision as to whether the two tests are met is of course the Judge. If the social worker had said “yes, the test is met”, that isn’t the end of it. A Judge can hear all of the evidence and come to a different conclusion. So, surely the reverse must also apply – if a Judge hears all of the evidence and DOES think that the tests are made out, he or she does not have to accept the evidence given by the social worker as being right, or determinative.

The Judge can, as here, decide that the social worker’s analysis of risk and what is best for the child is wrong. It would obviously be wrong for a Judge, if they felt that, to simply ignore it and not give their own judgment and reach their own conclusions.

That’s the pro argument for a Judge making an ICO where the LA case hasn’t been made out on their own evidence.

The con argument is that the burden of proof is there for a reason – it is for the LA to prove their case. By the end of their evidence, they ought to be over the line. Yes, a parents evidence might retrieve the situation for the parents case and lead to a decision that the right thing is something else. Or the parents evidence might make the LA’s case even stronger. But by the time the LA close their case, there ought to be enough evidence to say “Yes, looking at everything at this snapshot moment, the tests are made out”. If the LA case isn’t made out by the time they close the case, and reliance is placed on the later evidence of the other parties, that is smacking of a reversal of the burden of proof.

Otherwise, why have a burden of proof at all? After all, hardly any cases end up exactly 50-50, with the Judge unable to make a decision, with the burden of proof being the final feather that tips the scales. (The only family case I’ve ever seen like that is the Mostyn J one A County Council v M and F 2011 https://suesspiciousminds.com/2012/05/04/a-county-council-v-m-and-f-2011/ ) so the burden of proof is more than simply how to settle a tie, it has to be about more, surely?

The case here is further complicated, because it wasn’t the Local Authority asking for an Interim Care Order and removal. It is one of those cases that started as private law proceedings, the Court became increasingly concerned about the child’s well-being (to be honest, the FACTS of this case probably warrant their own blog post and discussion – in a very short summary, they are about whether the mother had been indoctrinating the child into a form of Jehovah’s Witness belief and practice which was making it impossible for him to have a relationship with his father who did not hold those beliefs – it was an intolerance for non-believers that was the key issue, rather than what the mother and the child were choosing to believe in a positive sense) and made a section 37 direction. And an Interim Care Order with a direction to the Local Authority that the child should be removed and placed in foster care.

That order was the subject of an appeal, and the ICO was stayed pending that appeal. Five months passed, and the LA reported in the section 37, saying that they did not seek removal at an interim stage, but did intend to issue care proceedings. Mother withdrew her appeal.

Care proceedings were issued, and this contested ICO hearing came about as a result of a request from the child’s Guardian.

So, the LA weren’t seeking the ICO, or separation. Although both could only come about as a result of the application that they had lodged for a Care Order. So, was the burden of proof here on the Local Authority (who had applied for a Care Order) or on the Guardian (who was asking the Court to make an ICO and sanction removal)? Or was it an application that the Court simply had to hear and determine? I am honestly a bit legallly stumped on this. My brain says that the legal burden of proof has to be on the party seeking the order, so the Guardian. Just as within care proceedings where the LA is the applicant, a party seeking an adjournment has the burden of proof to persuade the Court to grant the adjournment, even though a formal application might not necessarily be lodged.

An additional complication here was that the LA were saying that not only did they not want an ICO and did not want the power to remove the child, they didn’t intend to exercise that power even if the Court sanctioned it.

In essence, the LA were saying that the religious messages being given to this child were messing him up, but that removing him from mother at an interim stage might mess him up even more. It might make his relationship with his father even more damaged, if he blamed his father for him being taken away from mother and put in foster care.

Given that all of this arose from the Judge originally making an ICO and sanctioning a plan of separation, who had the burden of proof for that order? It seems opaque. One presumes that the Court was being invited to do this by one of the parties, so the burden would fall upon them. But what if the Court was doing it of their own motion? Then the burden of proof falls upon the Court, who become then both player and referee in the contest. The section 37 ICO power is a very practical way to allow the Court to intervene to protect a child who seems to be at risk, but as the case law on removal has developed over the years, section 37 ICOs become something of an anomaly. It is very difficult to see how a Court making one of its own motion can avoid a perception that having raised it as a possibility themselves it is then fair to determine an application that they themselves set in motion…

The case is complicated STILL FURTHER, because both the LA and the mother indicated that IF the Judge was to make an ICO with a recommendation for removal, in the teeth of the LA saying that they did not want it, they would each appeal.

The Court however felt that the risks did warrant making an ICO and that the child ought to be removed, even if the LA were not willing to do so.

I am satisfied that N has suffered emotional harm. The social worker agrees. I am satisfied that the fact that N has been immersed by his mother in her religious beliefs and practices has been a significant factor in causing that emotional harm. The social worker is not convinced. I am satisfied that since the hearing last November N has continued to suffer emotional harm. The social worker agrees though attributes this to the conflict between the parents, not to religious issues. I am satisfied that in the absence of significant change in N’s circumstances there is a risk that he will continue to suffer harm.

Since the shared care order was made N has suffered and continues to suffer significant emotional harm. If the present arrangements continue I am in no doubt that N will continue to suffer that harm. Persisting with the present shared care arrangement is not in his present welfare interests at this moment in time.
I am not persuaded that placement with father is appropriate. For the reasons articulated by the guardian, I accept that the likelihood is that placement in the father’s primary care would have an adverse impact on N’s relationship with his father.
I am satisfied that the change required is that N be removed from the care of his parents and placed with experienced foster carers.
The social worker disagrees. As a result of the position taken by the local authority, if I make an interim care order there is no certainty that the local authority will remove N and place him in foster care. There is no clarity as to the time it will take local authority managers to decide how to respond to an interim care order. If they do not respond positively there could be an impasse between the court and the local authority. For the local authority, Mr Sampson has already indicated that if removal is required he anticipates that the local authority will consider whether there are grounds for appeal. Even if the local authority did not seek leave to appeal, experience suggests that the mother would seek leave. The last time she did so the appeal process took three months. The final hearing of these care proceedings is fixed to take place in mid-August. Against that background, acknowledging the uncertainty about whether an order requiring N’s removal into foster care would be implemented ahead of the final hearing, should the court adopt what might be called the ‘pragmatic’ approach and defer a decision about removal until the final hearing or should the court put that uncertainty to one side and make an order which reflects its assessment of the child-focussed approach required by s.1 of the Children Act 1989?

The Judge felt empowered by the remarks of the Court of Appeal in Re W (the Neath Port Talbot case) in imposing a care plan on a Local Authority who were resistant to it. The Judge concludes that if he makes an ICO with a care plan of removal, the LA’s reaction to it if they disagree must be to appeal and seek a stay NOT to refuse to execute it. (I think that respectfully, the Judge is wrong there, but I’ll explain why in a moment)

In resolving that issue I derive assistance from the decision of the Court of Appeal in Re W (A Child) v Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council [2013] EWCA Civ 1277. In that case the first instance judge made an assessment of risk which the local authority did not accept. On appeal, the question for the court was whether the judge was wrong to have made a care order on the basis of a care plan with which she did not agree and in the circumstance that the order was opposed by both the local authority and the mother. The leading judgment was given by Lord Justice Ryder. The following passages from his judgment are relevant to the problem which I have identified:

The courts powers extend to making an order other than that asked for by a local authority. The process of deciding what order is necessary involves a value judgment about the proportionality of the State’s intervention to meet the risk against which the court decides there is a need for protection. In that regard, one starts with the court’s findings of fact and moves on to the value judgments that are the welfare evaluation. That evaluation is the court’s not the local authority’s, the guardian’s or indeed any other party’s. It is the function of the court to come to that value judgment. It is simply not open to a local authority within proceedings to decline to accept the court’s evaluation of risk, no matter how much it may disagree with the same. Furthermore, it is that evaluation which will inform the proportionality of the response which the court decides is necessary.
…Parliament has decided that the decision is to be a judicial act and accordingly, the care plan or care plan options filed with the court must be designed to meet the risk identified by the court. It is only by such a process that the court is able to examine the welfare implications of each of the placement options before the court and the benefits and detriments of the same and the proportionality of the orders sought…
…The decision about the proportionality of intervention is for the court…It should form no part of a local authority’s case that the authority declines to consider or ignores the facts and evaluative judgments of the court. While within the process of the court, the State’s agencies are bound by its decisions and must act on them.

There is a second issue and that relates to the extent of the court’s power to enforce an interim care order requiring removal in circumstances where the local authority disagrees with that plan and comes to the decision that although it is content to share parental responsibility it is unwilling to remove because, notwithstanding the court’s evaluation, it considers removal to be disproportionate. The law is clear. Although the Family Court dealing with care proceedings can make a care order (whether a final order or an interim order) and express its evaluative judgment that the child should be removed and placed in foster care, it has no power to order removal. If the local authority decides not to remove the child the only mechanism for enforcement of the court’s evaluative judgment is by separate process in the form of judicial review.
On this issue, in Re W (A Child) Ryder LJ makes the following observations:
…once the no doubt strong opinions of the parties and the court have been ventilated, it is for the family court to make a decision. That should be respected by the local authority. For the avoidance of doubt, I shall be more plain. If the local authority disagree with the judge’s risk evaluation they must in a case where it is wrong appeal it. The appellate court will be able to consider such an appeal, where that is integral to the order or judgment of the court. If the welfare evaluation is not appealed then it stands and the local authority must respect it and work with it while the proceedings are outstanding. To do otherwise risks disproportionate, irrational or otherwise unlawful conduct on their part.
There is no purpose in Parliament having decided to give the decision whether to make an order and the duty to consider the basis upon which the order is made to the judge if the local authority that makes the application can simply ignore what the judge has decided and act as if they had made the decision themselves and on a basis that they alone construe.

In Re W (A Child) the issues related to a final care order. In this case I am concerned not with a final care order but with an interim care order. Does that make a difference? In my judgment it does not. The observations made by Ryder LJ are equally relevant to interim orders. Parliament has determined that it is for the court and not the local authority to evaluate, on the basis of its assessment of the evidence, whether an interim care order on the basis of removal into foster care is necessary and proportionate. The way to challenge that decision is by appeal and not by decision of senior managers not to remove.

100. At the hearing in November I came to the clear conclusion that in light of the emotional harm N had suffered and was continuing to suffer it was proportionate and in N’s best welfare interests for him to be removed into foster care under an interim care order. As a result of the mother’s appeal against that order (an appeal which was subsequently withdrawn) N has remained in the care of his parents. Six months later, I find that N has continued and still continues to suffer emotional harm in the care of his parents. I am in no doubt that the child-focussed approach required by s.1 of the Children Act 1989 requires that he be removed from the care of his parents and placed in foster care without further delay. I accept that steps which may now be taken by the local authority and/or the parents may have the effect that my order may not be implemented ahead of the final hearing in August. I am satisfied that that possibility should not deter me from making orders which I consider to be in the best interests of N’s immediate welfare. I shall, therefore, make an interim care order. I make it clear that that order is premised upon an expectation that the local authority will immediately remove N and place him in foster care

I don’t think that this strong reading of the dynamic between Court and LA survives either the statute, the House of Lords decision on starred care plans or the President’s own guidance in the Court of Appeal case of Re MN (an adult) 2015 which corrected any misapprehension that might have been caused by Re W a child. (I have always felt that Re W went far too far with its concept of mexican stand-offs and judicial reviews, and that Re MN puts the relationship between judiciary and Local Authority on care plans in the correct way)

MN (adult) 2015 – Court of Appeal pronouncements

It is the duty of any court hearing an application for a care order carefully to scrutinise the local authority’s care plan and to satisfy itself that the care plan is in the child’s interests. If the court is not satisfied that the care plan is in the best interests of the child, it may refuse to make a care order: see Re T (A Minor) (Care Order: Conditions) [1994] 2 FLR 423. It is important, however, to appreciate the limit of the court’s powers: the only power of the court is either to approve or refuse to approve the care plan put forward by the local authority. The court cannot dictate to the local authority what the care plan is to say. Nor, for reasons already explained, does the High Court have any greater power when exercising its inherent jurisdiction. Thus the court, if it seeks to alter the local authority’s care plan, must achieve its objective by persuasion rather than by compulsion.
That said, the court is not obliged to retreat at the first rebuff. It can invite the local authority to reconsider its care plan and, if need be, more than once: see Re X; Barnet London Borough Council v Y and X [2006] 2 FLR 998 . How far the court can properly go down this road is a matter of some delicacy and difficulty. There are no fixed and immutable rules. It is impossible to define in the abstract or even to identify with any precision in the particular case the point to which the court can properly press matters but beyond which it cannot properly go. The issue is always one for fine judgment, reflecting sensitivity, realism and an appropriate degree of judicial understanding of what can and cannot sensibly be expected of the local authority.
In an appropriate case the court can and must (see In re B-S (Children) (Adoption Order: Leave to Oppose) [2013] EWCA Civ 1146 , [2014] 1 WLR 563 , para 29):

“be rigorous in exploring and probing local authority thinking in cases where there is any reason to suspect that resource issues may be affecting the local authority’s thinking.”

Rigorous probing, searching questions and persuasion are permissible; pressure is not.

The Court can, as explained in the next passages of Re MN, give a judgment setting out how they perceive the risks and how they could best be managed, and invite the LA to file a care plan addressing those matters. BUT, if there remains resistance, the Judge cannot compel the LA to remove. The Court CANNOT dictate to the Local Authority what the care plan is to say.

The division of powers is very plain – the Local Authority CANNOT remove a child unless there is a Court order and the Court decides whether to grant such an order. But the Court cannot impose a removal on a Local Authority who do not want to remove.

Of course, in a very practical sense, a Judge who gives a judgment saying that having heard and tested the evidence, he considers the child to be at danger if the child were not removed, places the LA in a huge predicament. If the Judge is right on his analysis of risk (and Judges get paid to be right and to analyse risk), and something goes wrong, then the LA will be absolutely butchered at an Ofsted Inspection, a civil claim, a Serious Case Review or heaven forbid, an inquest. It really is an “on their head be it” issue.

It would be a courageous Local Authority who took a judgment forecasting dire consequences for a child and sanctioning removal and decided not to remove. But it has to be their choice. That’s the responsibility that they have.

The LA and mother both said that they would appeal this decision. I would expect that appeal to be successful, based on a reading of Re MN (a child) 2015. However, if the appeal is chaired by Ryder LJ, who had those strong views in Re W that the Court could exert considerable pressure on a LA to change their care plan and woe betide them if they did not, then I would expect them to lose the appeal. And frankly, I personally think that each of the major Appeals on the use or misuse of section 37 ICOs, the Court of Appeal has got each of them badly wrong, so I would not be marching down to the bookies on any prediction.

I wonder if the Court of Appeal will clarify the burden of proof issue, or whether it will just get bogged down in who has bigger muscles to flex on care plans, Courts or Directors of Social Services?

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Posted in assessment of risk, case law, emotional harm and tagged burden of proof, Court of Appeal, his honour judge bellamy, ico, interim care order, neath port talbot, re mn an adult 2015, re w (a child) 2013, removal, section 37, starred care plan. Bookmark the permalink.

Court deciding of its own motion to remove a child into care

Posted on September 4, 2014 by suesspiciousminds

I’ve been writing more or less since I started this blog about my concerns regarding the power in section 37 of the Children Act 1989 for a Court to place a child in foster care of their own motion. (for non-lawyers, ‘of the Court’s own motion’ means that the Judge decides to do this himself or herself, rather than there being a formal application by the Local Authority. There has been a lot of press attention on one young boy over the last week, but the Court of Appeal’s decision in Re K may have a considerable impact on a number of families. There’s a story here, if the Press care to tell it.

That power exists, that is beyond doubt. It is set out in section 37 of the Children Act 1989 that where a Court is dealing with a private law case (i.e two parents arguing about where a child should live or how much time the child should spend with either) they can direct that the Local Authority (social services) carry out an investigation and the Court can make an Interim Care Order for up to 8 weeks whilst waiting for that report.

Why does that matter?

Well, an Interim Care Order allows the child to be taken away from a parent and placed with another parent, or a relative or in care.

And why does it matter that the Court do it of its own motion rather than with the Local Authority applying?

Well, here are the protections you get if you are a parent, when the Local Authority apply for an Interim Care Order :-

(a) You get a period of notice – three days

(b) You get to see the Local Authority evidence – why should there be an Interim Care Order,

(d) You get FREE legal advice and representation

(e) The Court has to find that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the child has been harmed or would be likely to be harmed (the threshold criteria) and the reasons for this have to be set out in a 2 page document, that the parent can challenged

(f) There will be an independent Guardian, appointed to advise the Court on what is best for the child. They may challenge the social work view and have an alternative plan to put forward

(g) Finally and most importantly, the person who is asking for the application is NOT THE SAME PERSON as the one deciding whether to make the order.

With an Interim Care Order made under section 37 of the Children Act, these things do not necessarily happen. It might be that the parents have lawyers, but these days they probably don’t. There might be a Guardian (but as we’re about to see, the wrong type of Guardian can be worse than not having one at all)

Re K (Children) 2014

This case, just decided in the Court of Appeal, doesn’t set out all of these concerns, but it is dealing with a case in which the making of Interim Care Orders under section 37 of the Act went badly wrong.

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/1195.html

I will put the killer line in first, because I don’t want this point to get lost

33. The judge had in her mind from the beginning of the hearing the jurisdiction of the family court to make an interim care order under section 38(1) CA 1989 where a section 37 report has been directed. The procedural protections of notice and an opportunity to be heard apply to a jurisdiction that is available to the court of its own motion just as much as they do to a jurisdiction invoked on a party’s application.

That is a big deal – the Court of Appeal have never said that before. Within the last couple of years, the Court of Appeal take on ICOs made under s37 has included:-

If the Local Authority report says no need for a further order, the Court can just tell them to write another one, and another one, and keep making Interim Care Orders until the Local Authority writes a report that the Judge agrees with

It is lawful to make ICOs under repeated s37, I say it is lawful to make ICOs

And that it was okay for the Local Authority to turn up at Court, pop in to see the Judge on their own and suggest this route and for the Judge to make an Interim Care Order under s37 even though the mother and her lawyer were AT Court and knew nothing about it

“Ex parte removal by the back door”

The Court of Appeal in this case also added that the law on removal is the same under s37 as when the Local Authority apply for it (again, the Court of Appeal have been weak on this in recent years)

35. The tests to be applied where a removal into public care is being considered by this route are: a) whether the court ‘is satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing that circumstances with respect to the child are as mentioned in section 31(2)’ (the interim threshold as set out in section 38(2) CA 1989); b) whether the court is satisfied that the child’s safety demands immediate separation (see the authorities reviewed in Re L-A (Care: Chronic neglect) [2010] 1 FLR 80 CA); c) whether the court is satisfied that removal is in the best interests of the child (the welfare analysis required by sections 1 and 1(3) CA 1989; and d) having regard to a comparative welfare analysis of the options, whether the court is satisfied that removal is a proportionate interference with the child’s and other relevant persons’ article 8 ECHR rights

36.The interim threshold was satisfied by the determination made by the Recorder in his May judgment but that was not enough in itself to demonstrate an application of the other tests. The safety question described by Thorpe LJ in Re L-A was neither asked nor answered. It could not be because of the poor quality of the evidence before the court. In the absence of quality evidence on the point, not only was the safety issue not identified with sufficient clarity or particularity, but of necessity there could be no analysis of the evidence relating to it in order to conclude that a removal was justified.

37. Re L-A is the domestic legal test for the justification of removal that takes note of the Strasbourg jurisprudence i.e. the interference of the state in the article 8 rights of those involved in circumstances where there is an issue of safety. In order to identify the nature and extent of an alleged risk to the physical or emotional (psychological) safety of a child the court needs evidence relating to the prima facie facts. As has been explained by the President in Re G (Interim Care Order) [2011] 2 FLR 955, it is also necessary for the court to undertake a broad proportionality evaluation of the comparative welfare analysis of the options for each of the boys on the facts of the case to cross check whether a ‘more proportionate’ option than separation is available. That did not happen, but in fairness it could not happen, because those options were not identified and analysed in the evidence. The absence of this reasoning is fatal to the decision made in respect of A in this case.

So, yes, I think this is long, long overdue. If I were for a parent in private law proceedings and got a sniff of the Judge contemplating the atom-bomb answer of “If you two can’t sort it out, maybe the child should be put in care” you are going to want this authority to hand, and you are going to want to argue for three days notice.

Back to Re K

There were two children, one nearly 15 and one aged 12. The private law proceedings, as so often happens, had been emotionally fraught and acriminious. It was one of those cases where the children were saying that they didn’t want to see their father and there were doubts about whether that was a genuine belief or one instilled in them by their mother. The original Judge heard what was no doubt a very difficult case and decided to separate the children, one going to father, one going into care under an Interim Care Order made under s37 of the Act. The children had never been separated before.

No doubt because there was no agreement about how the removal and separation was to occur, a recovery order had to be made in accordance with section 34 of the Family Law Act 1986 and the removal happened late at night with the police in attendance. The circumstances were distressing to all involved, including at least one professional. B was so distressed that he evacuated his bladder and had to change his clothes. The removal was described by mother’s representatives as ‘violent’.

[This was not the first time, and sadly probably will not be the last time, that removal of children from a parent following a private law hearing has gone badly wrong]

The Court of Appeal upheld the appeal and decided that the Judge’s decision had been wrong. They were sympathetic as to how this had happened – the pressure of time to make a decision had caused everyone to rush into a decision without really taking everything into account that needed to be dealt with. It is a salutary lesson and the Court of Appeal treat it as such, that sometimes Judges need to step back from the time limits and pressures and say “This needs more time to consider”

The decision taken by the judge was an exercise by her of the ultimate protective functions that are available to the family court when it is exercising its private law children jurisdiction. Those functions have rightly been the subject of anxious and rigorous scrutiny in this court but it should not be forgotten that this decision, like others that have to be taken every day in the family court, was made in the context of asserted urgency of the most immediate nature relating to the safety of the boys concerned, poor quality evidence and little or no time to reflect upon the judgment that was to be made. Although, as I shall describe, this court allowed the appeal in part and set aside the orders made, we did so without criticism of anyone. If there is any lesson to be learned by everyone involved, it is that a judge has to give him or herself time regardless of what anyone else wants that judge to do. I would suggest that the decision that was made in this case would not have been made in the way that it was had time been taken to reflect on the history, the implications for the boys, the options available and the patent need for further and better evidence.

This is one of those family cases that a family court judge instinctively knows will cause harm to the children involved whatever decision is made. With that in mind, the analysis that has to be undertaken must bring to bear an acute focus on the balance of welfare factors given the facts of the case. The children are highly enmeshed in their parents’ conflict and the order that Judge Marshall came to have to re-consider was expressly made with the words in mind of Wilson J. (as he then was) in Re M (Contact: Welfare Test) [1995] 1 FLR 274:

“Whether the fundamental emotional need of every child to have an enduring relationship with both his parents (s 1(3)(b) of the CA 1989) is outweighed by the depth of harm, which, in the light inter alia of his wishes and feelings (s 1(3)(a)), this child would be at risk of suffering (s 1(3)(e)) by virtue of a contact order.”
An enduring solution to the problem that exists in a case like this depends upon a comprehensive welfare analysis derived out of specialist case management which identifies the problem with clarity, a well informed judicial strategy based on good practice and good quality evidence and a measure of good fortune. The building blocks for such a solution are rarely available in the context of an urgent safety enquiry i.e. in the heat of conflict and, as will appear from the circumstances of this case, it is not a dereliction of duty to stand back and take time to consider whether the building blocks exist. In this case, they did not.

As hinted earlier, the situation was compounded because being a private law case, the CAFCASS officer involved was very familiar with private law cases but had little or no experience in public law cases (i.e children being taken into care). They also had an expert who proposed a strategy, but had no suggestions as to what to try when that strategy went wrong. There had been no Plan B

It might have been thought that the solution to the problem that had occurred would have been within the skill and expertise of the guardian and the expert who had recommended the strategy to date: sadly, it was not. As I have described, the expert had written to the court and the parties some time before the summer placement had broken down to say that the circumstances were beyond anything with which his clinical guidance could assist. That was surprising but in fairness there was also the issue of trust that had arisen because of the dual function that the expert had been expected to perform. The result was that the court lost the expert that it had previously decided was necessary. To add to that unfortunate circumstance, the guardian conceded during questions put by this court that she had no public law experience and that the good practice, research based options and/or evidential materials which should be the meat and drink of any public law Cafcass practitioner were not part of her skill and expertise.

The consequence has been, as she informed this court, that she has asked the family court for her functions to be transferred to another more experienced public law guardian i.e., as I understand it, an application for the termination of her appointment and her substitution by another guardian will be made before the next hearing. With the benefit of hindsight, the children’s guardian should have asked Cafcass management for assistance and that should of course have been disclosed to the court, leading to an application to the court to add another guardian (which is possible under the rules) or substitute guardians for the hearing before Judge Marshall.

It is not at all clear how much of this the judge knew. Some of it she could not have known because it was revealed to this court when it asked questions which had the benefit of hindsight. In any event, it would have needed a more detailed and nuanced hearing to establish that which is now known or identified as respects the problem to be solved.

The failure to properly plan was compounded because of course when the Judge makes their own decision to grant an Interim Care Order without an application, there is no interim care plan

38.It is almost an aside in this case to remark that even where the court has rightly decided to make an interim care order, it should as part of the process consider what in practice will happen to a child if the order is made i.e. the local authority’s proposals or their care plan if by then it exists. That is not the statutory obligation imposed on a family court by section 31(3A) CA 1989 because the requirements relating to a section 31A care plan do not by section 31A(5) apply to interim care orders. It is simply essential good practice to ascertain how the local authority that finds itself in this position is going to exercise its statutory responsibilities. That evidence is bound to be relevant to the welfare analysis and proportionality evaluation. I do not believe that in this case the divergence of professional view between the children’s guardian and the local authority social worker on the point was sufficiently investigated in evidence. It is perhaps sufficient to record that this court was told that if one includes respite, A has experienced three foster care placements already.

39. There were no formed proposals in this case because the local authority did not at the stage the order was made accept that an order should be made. This was not a case of a local authority being difficult. The only time available to the local authority to put together their proposals was the time during which the hearing was taking place where the local authority was not a party and its witness was not its decision maker. What was needed was more time for mature consideration. A plan, using that word in its non-technical sense, would of necessity have been skeletal and would probably not have extended beyond describing the means of recovery, the immediate placement into which A would go and the assessment or other planning process to decide what to do next. At the very least the court should have found time to give consideration to this question.

The fact that the Local Authority were present and were saying that there shouldn’t be an order ought to have given someone pause for thought. This course of action was always likely to go wrong.

The Court’s failure to consider the effect on the children of being separated from each other was also damning

I need not do more than state the obvious in a case of this nature. As young people who have experienced family courts, public care and relationship breakdown make very clear in, for example, the proceedings of the Young Peoples Board of the Family Justice Board, the separation of siblings can be one of the most traumatic elements of their experience, particularly where no provision is made for the sibling relationship to be maintained so as to safeguard their long term welfare into adulthood. Generalisations are dangerous, the intensity of sibling relationships can be very different and this court has not been taken to any of the research studies that consider this issue. However, it is sufficient to say that a sibling relationship is central to both the article 8 respect for family life which is engaged in a decision to make a public law order such as an interim care order and welfare, which by section 1 CA 1989 is the court’s paramount consideration when it ‘determines any question with respect to the upbringing of a child’. It will be a relevant factor in all or nearly all of the section 1(3) factors to which the court is required to have regard.

The absence of a value judgment soundly based in evidence about the effects on each of them of the separation of the boys was, in my judgment, almost as fundamental a flaw on the facts of this case as the failure to consider the safety issue and the proportionality of interference in relation to A. It went directly to the quality of the outcome of the court’s intervention for each of the boys.

The Judge met with the boys (in the proper way) but unfortunately her impression and observation of the boys leaked into her judgment (Non-lawyers note, it is acceptable for a Judge to meet children for the purposes of explaining who she is and what the Judge’s role is, and possibly for very very general chat, but not for the purpose of gaining evidence. We wait to see whether the Ministry of Justices proposal that children should routinely be able to meet Judges will change this, but that’s the current law)

The boys saw the judge but were told this was not an opportunity to discuss any issues in the case including their wishes and feelings. It is plain from the transcript of the discussion that they could not believe what they were hearing and the judge observed that ‘they were very concerned and very disappointed’. The judge in seeking to avoid a discussion about the evidence clearly felt unable to listen to them. She entered into a discussion about the inadvisability of the boys’ written communications that it is difficult to characterise as being other than an admonition. They boys left the process distressed and apparently even more convinced in their view that no-one was prepared to listen to them.

This case has not been about judges seeing young people. I shall return briefly to the wealth of material on that topic. The question which arose out of the discussion with the boys was whether, despite her best intentions, the judge inappropriately relied upon her impressions of the boys and what they said to her to come to conclusions in the case. Sadly, perhaps as an inevitable consequence of the charged emotions in this case, the judge made that error. There are a number of passages in her judgment where the problem is highlighted. I shall choose three:

“[26] The findings that I make on this evidence need to be considered in the context of the opportunity I had to meet with the boys this morning. The parties are aware that I felt that they are at the moment presenting as being rather out of control, not subject to parental influence or indeed able to set appropriate boundaries for themselves. I also formed the view that they had perhaps rather lost touch with reality in relation to what was going on and I do have a concern that they are rather immature and may somehow view this as some sort of fantasy adventure.
[…]
[24] […] My own experience this morning is that these children could exhibit considerable distress and yet were able to calm themselves very quickly and the word ‘histrionic’ was exactly the one which I would have used in relation to their behaviour that I observed.
[…]
[47] I was particularly struck by something that the Guardian said, which is that “it is almost like the children expect someone to put their arms around them and to say ‘do not do this anymore'”. Again that exactly resonated with my own assessment after seeing the children this morning. They are out of control. “
I need go no further than the recent judgment of this court in Re KP (A Child) [2014] EWCA Civ 554 for a comprehensive statement of the law that takes account of the Family Justice Council’s [FJC] April 2010 ‘Guidelines for Judges Meeting Children who are Subject to Family Proceedings’ [2010] 2 FLR 1872, the FJC’s Working Party December 2011 ‘Guidelines on Children Giving Evidence in Family Proceedings’ [2012] Fam Law 79 and the recent decision of the Supreme Court in the Matter of LC (Children) (Reunite International Child Abduction Centre intervening) [2014] UKSC 1, [2014] 2 WLR 124. It remains an essential principle of the guidance and the relevant authorities that a meeting with a child is not for the purpose of gathering evidence. There is likewise an emphasis on the court hearing the voice of a child and of the court reminding itself that a child’s wishes and feelings may not be capable of being represented to the court by the adult parties. The court should ensure that the child’s access to justice is effective, whether that be through formal separate legal representation or the offices of a guardian, a family court advisor or a parent. Even where formal representation is appropriate there is a wide discretion in the court to determine the extent of a child’s participation.

I have regrettably come to the clear conclusion that the judge’s discussions with the boys strayed beyond reassurance, explanation and listening. It was certainly not the latter and to the extent that the boys needed it to be, the judge could and should have adopted the practice of listening, disclosing what was said and not placing reliance on it in her judgment. It is entirely possible to listen without gathering evidence. Where a process is intended to or as here inadvertently leads to evidence being gathered, including by very firm impressions and judicial assessments about the boys’ needs, wishes, feelings, behaviours and the risks which their own needs might occasion, then consideration should be given to whether that evidence should be gathered or considered by a suitable neutral person (an expert or a guardian who is not conflicted). In a case where the conflict that had arisen in this case does not exist, the children’s guardian could have been asked to sit in with the judge or read the transcript of the discussion to assess the material in context. A process needed to be agreed that permitted the evidence to be challenged without harming the boys themselves.

The judge’s reliance on her own assessments of the boys derived from her discussion with them was procedurally unfair and to the extent that her primary concern was that they were ‘out of control’ it dominated her thinking. That was a value judgment derived from evidence gathered by the judge in a discussion that was not intended for that purpose and which could not be effectively challenged by others.

Sadly, with a string of appeal points being upheld, there was never any doubt that this appeal would succeed. I think the Court of Appeal were right to recognise that there are cases in which Judges are urged and feel that a decision has to be taken (the politician’s syllogism – “Something must be done” – “This is something” – “Therefore we must do this” and that hard as it is to tell people that the decision needs more evidence, more analysis and more thought, with an unsatisfactory status quo remaining in the interim, sometimes that is the right thing for a Judge to do. The Court of Appeal also remind the parents that the extent of their adult quarrel has been very damaging to their two children.

55.The judge in this case was not well served by the evidence or the problems created in part by the history of the case and the supposed urgency of the situation. The circumstances that dominated the hearing were not those which were the most important in the case and she was left to make a decision with poor quality material. Although articulate and intelligent, the father was a litigant in person who would have been simply unable without legal assistance to pursue the legal issues that have been pursued before this court. I question whether in the absence of legal representation he is able properly to put forward a sustainable position to the court.
56. The absence of a determination on the question of separate representation and the severe conflict that has arisen between the boys and their guardian and solicitor mean that I am persuaded that they have not been afforded access to justice. A separate representation application must be properly considered with evidence as soon as possible. I say to the boys who should be asked whether they wish to read this judgment, that the degree to which they may be harmed by being even further enmeshed in their parents’ conflict and inappropriately being involved in the decisions that have to be made by adults, will have to be balanced by the harm that is being done by their perception that no-one is listening to them. The conclusion of an application is by no means clear but whatever the conclusion is, it must provide for them to be listened to and to participate to an appropriate extent.

57.I return in conclusion to the boys’ parents. Mother should not and must not continue to believe that she can override the repeated conclusions of the court. It is, as the court has repeatedly said, desirable that the boys should have a close parental relationship with their father. The mother’s approach has contributed to the damage that has been caused to the boys’ emotional welfare. This cannot continue. The father must understand that the court cannot achieve the impossible. He has been responsible for at least some of the conflict that exists and the boys have suffered because of that.

58. The problem in this case is the maintenance of a meaningful relationship between the boys and their father. As is too frequently the case, the problem was caused by the parents of the children who are locked into a damaging, deteriorating spiral of conflict which desperately needs to be resolved. Without that resolution, whatever the court orders and no matter what steps are taken to enforce the court’s orders, harm will continue to be caused to the children. Cases of this kind are unhelpfully and generically referred to as ‘implacable hostility’ cases because of the parental conflict that exists. The label provides no insight into or assistance with the myriad of circumstances and features that such cases present.

59. Mothers, fathers or both are just as likely to be responsible for the precipitating circumstances in such a case which may be far removed from and are sometimes if not often, irrelevant to the conflict which endures. Such research as there is into available and workable solutions suggests either a) that there should be a careful analysis of the reasons for the conflict by fact finding to identify and assess risk to the children and sometimes to one or other of the adults and/or b) that if the reasons for the conflict do not present identifiable risks to the children or their carer and sometimes even if they do, a resolutions approach to the conflict can be adopted to try and resolve it by professional intervention such as individual or family therapy, external support from local authority children’s services or education and assistance from the various parenting programmes and activity directions that are now available under the CA 1989 or otherwise. Sometimes it is necessary to fundamentally alter a child’s arrangements by removing that child from the adverse influence and control of one parent by placing the child with the other parent and making a child arrangements order that has the effect of limiting the relationship with the harmful parent. In an extreme case (and I emphasise they are and should be rare) where the child is suffering significant harm or is likely to suffer significant harm, the court can intervene and exercise its ultimate protective function by removing the child from its parents and by placing the child into public care so that the local authority shares parental responsibility with the parents.

60. The removal of a child from the care of a parent whether by a transfer of living arrangements from one parent to another or by placing the child into public care is not and must never be a coercive or punitive measure. It is a protective step grounded in the best interest of the child concerned. In so far as there was a perception in this case that either the transfer of the conditional residence of the boys to their father by the Recorder or their subsequent removal from their mother was a punishment of the boys for their behaviour and for being unwilling to accept contact with their father, then that was inappropriate.

61, For a family to be facing the possibility of a wholesale change of living arrangements between parents because of the harm that one or both of the parents is causing is bad enough, for a family to face the removal of children into public care when they are both capable of caring for their children is, frankly, sad beyond measure. This is such a family. I say that without attributing any causative blame to one parent or the other in the sense of saying that one or other parent is responsible for the problem that now arises. That may or may not need to be determined by a fact finding exercise. This court does not yet know. Where the parents are to blame is that neither of them has facilitated a joint approach to the resolution of their conflict for the benefit of their children. It is time for this court to start saying that which is obvious. The family court is empowered to make decisions for parents who cannot make them for themselves but it cannot parent the children who are involved. When parents delegate their parental responsibility to the court to make a decision, that decision will be in the form of an order. The court cannot countenance its orders being ignored or flouted unless an appropriate and lawful agreement can otherwise be reached. That is not simply to preserve the authority of the court, it is to prevent continuing and worsening harm to the children concerned. Parents who come to court must do that which the court decides unless they agree they can do better and there is no court order that prevents that agreement.
In this case, the parents were both to have a meaningful relationship with their sons. That should have involved active practical and emotional steps to be taken by both parents to make it work. Instead the case is suffused with anger and arrogant position taking that has nothing to do with the children. There has undoubtedly been mutual denigration, true allegations, false allegations, irrelevant allegations, insults, wrongly perceived insults and the manipulation of the boys to an outrageous degree. The idea that the court can wave a magic wand and cure all of those ills is dangerously wrong. It cannot – its function is to make a decision. It does not have available to it a supply of experts, be they psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, counsellors, drug, alcohol and domestic violence rehabilitation units, social and welfare professionals or even lawyers who can be ‘allocated’ to families. Experts that the court relies upon are either forensic experts i.e. they are specifically instructed to advise upon the evidence in a case or they are experts who are fortuitously already involved with the family through one agency or another. Their role in proceedings is to advise the court. There is no budget to employ them or anyone else to implement the court’s decision save in the most limited circumstances through the local authority, Cafcass or voluntary agencies.
One can only sympathise with any family court judge who is faced with such a case. There are no right answers but inevitably there are many wrong answers. To make it worse, in this case, the proceedings had to be re-allocated because of judicial indisposition so that the new judge came to the case without the detailed knowledge of the previous ten years of litigation. The hearing was said to be urgent so that, no doubt, all other judicial work stopped and the case took priority. It was said to be a case that needed an immediate order. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and the nearest a first instance family judge can get to it is to take time for reflection.

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Posted in cafcass, case law, private law and tagged acrimonious private law dispute, Court of Appeal, interim care order, re k (children) 2014, removing a child under an ICO made under section 37, section 37, section 37 Children Act. Bookmark the permalink.

“The peril of Auntie Beryl”

Posted on June 3, 2013 by suesspiciousminds

As the 26 week time limit comes upon us (being introduced by Parliament, the President’s revised PLO guidance and behind the scenes pressure on Courts and Local Authorities via the “Stick of Statistics” ^TM– not necessarily in that order), I have been musing about the elephant in the room, of what happens when late in the proceedings, the Court is presented with a suitable relative, Auntie Beryl.

For what it is worth, I think delays in court proceedings are caused by one or more of these things :-

(a) Parties (including the LA) being late in filing documents and this having a domino effect

(b) The expert report being late, and the whole carefully built timetable collapses round people’s ears

(c) There is a material change in circumstances (an unexpected dad emerges, or a relationship ends or begins, or someone you thought was going to be fine relapses into drug misuse, or falls pregnant, or has some sort of unpredictable illness or disease)

(d) A relative comes forward at the eleventh hour and has to be assessed

(e) The evidence is all ready, but the combination of accommodating social worker, Guardian, expert and more importantly Court time, means that you have to wait 3 months for a hearing

I think the intention of the revised PLO (which you can find here http://www.adcs.org.uk/news/revisedplo.html ) is to try, as much as one can, to eliminate (a) and (b), and the hope is clearly that if you have much crisper and tighter and fewer Court hearings, there will be less backlog and more judicial availability for (e) – though it would have been nice to see something spelling out exactly what the Court service is going to do about (e) – save for having Listings offices run by Capita…

(c ) is probably the stuff that ends up coming into the bracket of exceptional cases that get an extension to the 26 week limit, or at least where this is actively considered.

So that leaves the elephant in the room, where it looks as though a child MIGHT be able to be placed with a family member, but doing that assessment will take the proceedings outside of the 26 weeks, because the family member has been put forward late on.

I suspect, and am already seeing this, that the Courts will try to tackle this by very robust directions at early Court hearings, along these lines :-

“The parents shall, by no later than , identify in writing to the Local Authority (to be copied to all parties) the names and contact details of any person that they put forward as a potential permanent carer of the child. Any person put forward after that date will ONLY be considered with the leave of the Court and the parent would need to apply to Court for leave for such assessment evidence to be filed and would need to provide VERY cogent reasons as to why they were not put forward within the deadline period set out in this paragraph”

That looks pretty strong, and will no doubt be backed up by the Court leaning forward and stressing to the parents just how important it is to focus their minds right NOW on who might be able to care for the children, if the assessments of them are not positive.

But, human nature being what it is, at some point, lawyers and parents and Judges will be faced with an Auntie Beryl coming forward at week 18 or 19, when the LA have announced that they won’t be rehabilitating to parents and will be seeking an adoptive placement. Auntie Beryl, on the face of it, seems like she might be suitable – she doesn’t have any convictions, or history of children being removed, or any major health issues, she has a house in which the child could live, and so forth. So there is a positive viability assessment, but still a lot to be done – more than could be done in the time we have left.

The six million dollar question, which the Court of Appeal will be grappling with pretty quickly after the revised PLO comes into force I suspect, is

When a parent puts forward a family member late, and the assessment of that family member would push the case outside 26 weeks, what does the Court do?

The immediate “26 weeks or bust” approach suggests that the Court will say, “too late, you had your chance, you had the stern warning on day 12 to cough up the names, you can’t leave it until the assessments are in and the LA are talking about adoption”

So, what happens if they do that?

For these purposes, we will assume that the assessment of the parents is negative (since if it were positive, there would be no need to delay matters to assess Auntie Beryl) and that we are dealing with a child under six.

The alternative care plan is therefore adoption.

Can an application for a Placement Order be made when there is a viable carer who has not been assessed?

The Local Authority have a duty, pursuant to section 22(6) of the Children Act 1989

s22 (6) Subject to any regulations made by the Secretary of State for the purposes of this subsection, any local authority looking after a child shall make arrangements to enable him to live with—

(a) a person falling within subsection(4); or

(b) a relative, friend or other person connected with him,

unless that would not be reasonably practicable or consistent with his welfare.

The LA can’t, it seems to me, determine that placement with Auntie Beryl isn’t consistent with the child’s welfare if all they have is a positive viability assessment, they have to go on to do something more, EVEN IF the Court has made a Care Order.

Before the adoption agency can decide that adoption is the plan for the child, and thus make the application for a Placement Order, they have this duty under the Adoption and Children Act 2002

Section 1 Considerations applying to the exercise of powers

(4)The court or adoption agency must have regard to the following matters (among others)—

(f)the relationship which the child has with relatives, and with any other person in relation to whom the court or agency considers the relationship to be relevant, including—

(i)the likelihood of any such relationship continuing and the value to the child of its doing so,

(ii)the ability and willingness of any of the child’s relatives, or of any such person, to provide the child with a secure environment in which the child can develop, and otherwise to meet the child’s needs,

(iii)the wishes and feelings of any of the child’s relatives, or of any such person, regarding the child.

And again, how can the adoption agency decide that Auntie Beryl can’t provide the child with a secure environment if all they have is a positive viability assessment? They have to have a full assessment.

Thus, even if the Court determined that they were not going to allow time for Auntie Beryl to be assessed, because she has come late into the proceedings, that won’t allow the LA to simply discount her and issue a Placement Order application.

Unless they have done sufficient to satisfy themselves that Auntie Beryl is NOT suitable, they can’t commit to a plan of adoption and no such plan could be put before the Court. Neither can they commit to “Placement with Auntie Beryl” until they have sufficient information to be satisfied that this has good prospects of success.

Therefore, the Court cannot have a hearing by week 26 at which a Placement Order could be made.

If the Court can’t consider a Placement Order application, what can it do?

The Court would be left, I think, with these three options :-

1. Taking the information that is available about Auntie Beryl and taking a punt on her, by making a Residence Order (or an SGO – but bear in mind that the Court cannot make a Special Guardianship Order without a Special Guardianship report – and the Court won’t have one of those between week 18 and 26 RE S (A CHILD) NO.2 (2007) [2007] EWCA Civ 90 )

2. Adjourning the proceedings in order for a Special Guardianship report to be filed and served, which will push the proceedings outside of 26 weeks.

3. Determining that the Court is in a position to make a Care Order, with the care plan being that the Local Authority will assess Auntie Beryl and the child will remain in foster care pending that assessment.

[And of course option 4 of placement with parents, but we are dealing here with those cases where the Court has the material to determine the issue of rehabilitation to parents, since in those cases Auntie Beryl isn’t important]

My concern is that option 3, in a post PLO world (and more importantly a world where the Judges know that their performance on timescales is being gathered and measured), becomes superficially attractive. The case concludes, it concludes in time, the Care Order is made, and Auntie Beryl becomes the Local Authority’s problem.

Of course, it doesn’t actually resolve the future for the child, or end the proceedings with the parents knowing what will happen, and it almost invariably will lead to satellite litigation (either the assessment of Auntie Beryl is positive, whereupon the LA will want to shed the Care Order and get an SGO or residence order made, OR it is negative, in which case the LA will put the case before their Agency Decision Maker and in due course make an application for a Placement Order)

The only advantage option 3 has over option 2 is determining the proceedings within a 26 week timetable. There might have to be a judgment that works hard to say that the no delay principle is more important than the no order principle – but that isn’t the only problem.

Get your inchoate, you’ve pulled

Is a care plan which at heart is “either this child will be placed with a family member OR adopted, and we don’t yet know which” actually a legitimate care plan? Is it in fact, an inchoate care plan?

Inchoate care plans are bad, m’kay? Not good for the Court to hand over the keys to that sparkling vintage E-type Jag to the Local Authority without having a clear idea of where they intend to drive it.

It seems so to me, even on the new Children and Families Bill reworking of care plans as being “don’t sweat the small stuff” model

Section 15 of the draft Children and Families Bill

(1) For section 31(3A) of the Children Act 1989 (no care order to be made until court has considered section 31A care plan) substitute—

“(3A) A court deciding whether to make a care order—

(a) is required to consider the permanence provisions of the section 31A plan for the child concerned, but

(b) is not required to consider the remainder of the section 31A plan, subject to section 34(11).

(3B) For the purposes of subsection (3A), the permanence provisions of a section 31A plan are such of the plan’s provisions setting out the long- term plan for the upbringing of the child concerned as provide for any of the following—

(a) the child to live with any parent of the child’s or with any other member of, or any friend of, the child’s family;

(b) adoption;

(c) long-term care not within paragraph (a) or (b).

And it does not seem to me that even with that more limited scrutiny, a care plan which doesn’t identify whether the plan for the child is to live with a family member or in an adoptive parent, is sufficiently clear.

Let’s see what the law says about inchoate care plans (underlining mine) and from Re S and others 2002:-

99. Despite all the inevitable uncertainties, when deciding whether to make a care order the court should normally have before it a care plan which is sufficiently firm and particularised for all concerned to have a reasonably clear picture of the likely way ahead for the child for the foreseeable future. The degree of firmness to be expected, as well as the amount of detail in the plan, will vary from case to case depending on how far the local authority can foresee what will be best for the child at that time. This is necessarily so. But making a care order is always a serious interference in the lives of the child and his parents. Although article 8 contains no explicit procedural requirements, the decision making process leading to a care order must be fair and such as to afford due respect to the interests safeguarded by article 8: seeTP and KM v United Kingdom [2001] 2 FLR 549, 569, paragraph 72. If the parents and the child’s guardian are to have a fair and adequate opportunity to make representations to the court on whether a care order should be made, the care plan must be appropriately specific.

100. Cases vary so widely that it is impossible to be more precise about the test to be applied by a court when deciding whether to continue interim relief rather than proceed to make a care order. It would be foolish to attempt to be more precise. One further general point may be noted. When postponing a decision on whether to make a care order a court will need to have in mind the general statutory principle that any delay in determining issues relating to a child’s upbringing is likely to prejudice the child’s welfare: section 1(2) of the Children Act.

101. In the Court of Appeal Thorpe LJ, at paragraph 29, expressed the view that in certain circumstances the judge at the trial should have a ‘wider discretion’ to make an interim care order: ‘where the care plan seems inchoate or where the passage of a relatively brief period seems bound to see the fulfilment of some event or process vital to planning and deciding the future’. In an appropriate case, a judge must be free to defer making a care order until he is satisfied that the way ahead ‘is no longer obscured by an uncertainty that is neither inevitable nor chronic’.

102. As I see it, the analysis I have set out above adheres faithfully to the scheme of the Children Act and conforms to the procedural requirements of article 8 of the Convention. At the same time it affords trial judges the degree of flexibility Thorpe LJ is rightly concerned they should have. Whether this represents a small shift in emphasis from the existing case law may be a moot point. What is more important is that, in the words of Wall J in Re J, the court must always maintain a proper balance between the need to satisfy itself about the appropriateness of the care plan and the avoidance of ‘over-zealous investigation into matters which are properly within the administrative discretion of the local authority’. This balance is a matter for the good sense of the tribunal, assisted by the advocates appearing before it: see [1994] 1 FLR 253, 262.

It seems very clear to me, that waiting for the assessment of Auntie Beryl removes that obscurity and uncertainty in the case, and that this uncertainty is NEITHER inevitable or chronic – it can be resolved by making a direction for the filing of the report.

So, the revised PLO doesn’t erode this, nor would the introduction of the Children and Families Bill as currently drafted – the Court still have a duty to look at the ‘placement’ aspect of care plans, and it appears very strongly that a care plan that is “either Auntie Beryl OR adoption” is inchoate.

Well that’s fine, we can just overturn the decision about inchoate care plans, and say that it is fine to have “either or” care plans. Just let’s not worry about inchoate care plans anymore, we’ll just airbrush the whole concept out. The slight stumbling block there is that the passages above are from the House of Lords, and thus it isn’t open to lower Courts to overturn it.

Oh-kay, so we are just going to interpret Re S very widely, to mean that a Court can and should think about whether it is right to make a Care Order rather than an interim care order where the care plan is inchoate, BUT it is not a prohibition on making a Care Order where the plan is inchoate, they don’t go that far.

And, you know, before Re S, the former President (Wall LJ) had made Care Orders in a case where he declared the care plans to be inchoate but still decided that making care orders was the right course of action RE R (MINORS) (CARE PROCEEDINGS: CARE PLAN) (1993) [1994] 2 FCR 136

Although that predates Re S, it was specifically referred to by the House of Lords (though they call it Re J, it is the same case) and endorsed, so it is good law for the proposition that a Court is not BARRED from making a Care Order with an inchoate care plan. [Or is it? The House of Lords seem to draw a slight distinction between inchoate care plans, and care plans where the future is not certain because there are things which can only be resolved after the care order is made]

This is what the House of Lords say about Re R/Re J

97. Frequently the case is on the other side of this somewhat imprecise line. Frequently the uncertainties involved in a care plan will have to be worked out after a care order has been made and while the plan is being implemented. This was so in the case which is the locus classicus on this subject: In re J (Minors)(Care: Care Plan) [1994] 1 FLR 253. There the care plan envisaged placing the children in short-term foster placements for up to a year. Then a final decision would be made on whether to place the children permanently away from the mother. Rehabilitation was not ruled out if the mother showed herself amenable to treatment. Wall J said, at page 265:

‘there are cases (of which this is one) in which the action which requires to be taken in the interests of children necessarily involves steps into the unknown … provided the court is satisfied that the local authority is alert to the difficulties which may arise in the execution of the care plan, the function of the court is not to seek to oversee the plan but to entrust its execution to the local authority.’

In that case the uncertain outcome of the treatment was a matter to be worked out after a care order was made, not before.

I suspect there may be dancing on the head of a pin to try to make ‘auntie beryl cases’ the Re J style of uncertainty, rather than the Re W style of uncertainty that is neither inevitable nor chronic.

It seems then, that it is POSSIBLE for a Court to make a Care Order, even where the care plan is “either Auntie Beryl OR adoption” and even though it achieves nothing of value for the child (since the uncertainty is there, the timing of the assessment and any applications will be no longer controlled by the Court, there will be the inevitable delay of reissuing and listing for the second wave of litigation – whether that be for SGO or Placement Order application.

But even more importantly, and from an article 6 point of view – how certain is the Court that the parents (who would be represented and able to challenge the making of SGO or Placement Orders if the care proceedings continued, under their existing certificates) would get public funding in “stand-alone” applications for an SGO or a Placement Order?

My reading of the Funding Code (and I am not a “legal aid” lawyer) suggests that it might well not be a “non-means, non-merits” certificate for a parent faced with an application for Special Guardianship or Placement Order that is a “stand alone” application, rather than one taking place within ongoing care proceedings -where the public funding, or “legal aid” is covered by non-means non-merits certificates – for the uninitiated, “non-means, non-merits” means that a person gets free legal representation in care proceedings by virtue of the sort of proceedings they are NOT based on what money they have (means) or the chances of them being successful (merits)

Again, underlining to assist with clarity, mine

20.28 Other Public Law Children Cases

1. Other public law children cases are defined in s.2.2 of the Funding Code Criteria. The definition of these proceedings excludes Special Children Act Proceedings and related proceedings. The fact that proceedings involve a local authority and concern the welfare of children will not, of itself justify the grant of Legal Representation. The Standard Criteria and General Funding Code (as varied by s.11 of the Code and including criterion 5.4.5) will apply. The proceedings include:

a) appeals (whether against interim or final orders) made in Special Children Act Proceedings;

b) representation for parties or potential parties to public law Children Act proceedings who do not come within the definition of Special Children Act proceedings in section 2.2 of the Funding Code – this includes a local authority application to extend a supervision order (which is made under Sch.3 of the Children Act 1989);

c)other proceedings under Pt IV or V of the Children Act 1989 (Care and Supervision and Protection of Children);

d) adoption proceedings (including applications for placement orders, unless in the particular circumstances they are related proceedings); and

e) proceedings under the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court in relation to children.

(d) seems to me to cover stand alone Placement Order applications, and they would be a matter for the discretion of the Legal Aid Agency (oh, also, they wouldn’t be a devolved powers application, where the lawyer can just say “yes” and get on with it, it would need to be a full-blown application and waiting for the Legal Aid Agency to say yes or no)

Special Guardianship orders as stand-alone would be classed now as private law proceedings, and I think you can guess how the parents funding on that would go

20.36 A special guardianship order is a private law order and the principles in s.1 of the Children Act 1989 will apply as will the Funding Code criteria in 11.11. This includes the no order principle which will be taken into account when considering prospects of success. Regard will also be had to the report of the local authority prepared in accordance with s.14A of the Children Act 1989 when considering an application for funding. When considering an application for funding to oppose the making of a special guardianship order, the way in which the proposed respondent currently exercises their parental responsibility and how this will be affected by the making of an order will also be considered.

To quickly sum up then :-

(a ) Declining to extend the timetable to assess Auntie Beryl won’t let the Court go on to determine a Placement Order application

(b) The Local Authority would be legally obliged to assess Auntie Beryl before they could even ask their Agency Decision Maker to make a decision about adoption

(d) It almost certainly opens the door to parents to challenge that decision, given what the House of Lords say about inchoate care plans and specifically “If the parents and the child’s guardian are to have a fair and adequate opportunity to make representations to the court on whether a care order should be made, the care plan must be appropriately specific.”

(e) There seems to be a very foreseeable chance that if the Court make the Care Order, the parents may not get the public funding to be represented to subsequently challenge or test any application for SGO or Placement Order, funding that they would have had as of right if the Court had made Interim Care Orders and had the assessment of Auntie Beryl before considering those orders

(f) There must be scope for an article 6 claim that losing the ability to be legally represented to challenge whether your child might be adopted PURELY so that the Court could make a care order (on an inchoate care plan) just to satisfy the 26 week criteria is, you know, slightly unfair.

(g) Changing this so that it is workable only requires changes to – a House of Lords decision, two pieces of Primary legislation (maybe 3, if you just want to allow Courts to make SGOS in cases where they feel it is right without having a full blown SGO report), the private law funding code and the public law funding code.

So, job’s a good un.

[If you are representing someone in a case where the Auntie Beryl issue crops up, “you’re welcome!” I think the answer for the Court is to identify what issues it would need the LA to deal with in a report on the carer and to get this done as swiftly as is fair and reasonable]

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Posted in case law, family justice modernisation, timescales and tagged 26 weeks, 26 weeks timetable, adoption, assessment of family members, care order, care plan, Court of Appeal, family and friends assessment, house of lords, inchoate care plan, interim care order, legal aid, placement order, public funding, Public Law Outline, re W 2002, special guardianship, special guardianship report, supreme court. Bookmark the permalink.

“The driver cannot ignore the passengers”

Posted on April 15, 2013 by suesspiciousminds

The judicial review case of H R v Kingston Upon Hull 2013 – where the Court found that a failure to consult with parents BEFORE making a decision to move children under an ICO was unlawful

The case is here

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2013/388.html

This is, I think, the pivotal passage from the judgment (hence the title) – underlining mine

When an ICO is made the local authority and the parent share parental responsibility for the child – albeit the local authority is usually the one in the driving seat particularly when removal has been sanctioned. This plainly does not mean the parents or others are of little or no consequence. Although the local authority may be driving the vehicle, on a journey approved by the court, it does not mean it is able to ignore the views of the passengers as to the route to follow. There needs to be consultation; and concurrence (if possible). The consultation must be genuine and not merely a process whereby decisions are merely the subject of information to parents. I repeat a parent with parental responsibility does not surrender that when an ICO is made, nor when removal is permitted by the court. The weight to be attached to the views of parents and others is a different question. A local authority must always work in a carefully calibrated manner and act in a proportionate way commensurate with the issues involved and those involved… A sense of reality and a sense of proportion are key to the concept of consultation; however, consultation there must be, save in exceptional circumstances where child safety or other pressing reasons are present. I should also add that proper records are an essential aspect of consultation and decision-making.

In this case, the Local Authority had initially sought to remove the children from the parents, and at Court (as is often the way) a compromise was reached, whereby the parents agreed to an Interim Care Order if the children were placed with grandparents, and the LA agreed to place the children with grandparents. As often is the way with compromise, regrets followed.

Thereafter, the LA had doubts about whether that was the right placement, and they conducted their fostering assessment, which became available on 30^th January. This was very negative, and it considered that the grandparents attitude towards the concerns about the parents care was worrying. Sufficiently worrying for them to decide on 31^st January that they would seek to move the children into foster care.

They met with the parents on 1^st February, and told them that this was the plan. The parents reacted badly, particularly the father, who said (inadvisably) that he would kidnap the children.

The LA then moved the children, earlier than they had intended to.

The parents made an application for judicial review, seeking to overturn two decisions :-

That the decision on 31^st January that the children would be moved was unreasonable, it having taken place without consultation
That the decision on 1^st February to move them forthwith was unreasonable

The parents triumphed on ground 1, but lost on ground 2 – the Court determining that the events of 1^st February (although they had arisen purely because of the LA’s failure to properly consult) did legitimately give rise to a reason to implement a move.

The LA had claimed that they had not MADE a decision on 31^st January to move the children, but the Court rejected that.

I gave a short judgment announcing my decision in which I set out the following:

(1) The decision made by the LA on 31^st January 2013 to remove the children was unlawful.

(2) The LA was the author of the very unhappy events of 1^st February 2013 (the Riverside Incident); and, had they acted lawfully, those events may have been avoided.

(3) Having created that situation, as a result of that unlawful decision, the LA acted reasonably in taking the immediate action to remove the children during the afternoon of 1^st February 2013. The LA are much to be criticised for creating the situation (due to an unlawful decision); but having created it, acted in a way that many other local authorities would have acted.

(4) The proposal to remove the children is one that would have received the support of the guardian providing appropriate planning had been undertaken (it was not). In consequence the children entered foster care in a rushed and unseemly manner. The guardian was not in fact consulted.

(5) At no stage did the decision of the LA have the approval of any court. The decision not to refer the case back to the FPC or any family court was unlawful.

The Court placed quite a lot of emphasis on the LA not consulting with the Guardian (perhaps working on the basis of five years ago, when all Guardians communicated much more regularly with social workers and would give a view on events) , and in this case the children were between Guardians, leaving responsibility solely with CAFCASS. Nonetheless, this LA did not notify CAFCASS or the Court, or the child’s solicitor that a move was afoot.

The Court summed up the human rights position in relation to interim care orders, and this is a helpful summary. Underlining again mine, for emphasis.

An interim care order is exactly what it says – interim; and does not bring in its wake all that flows from a final order. An ICO may only be made when a court is satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing the basis for making a care or supervision order are present. In short terms the full case for a care order does not have to be established – simply reasonable grounds for believing that position exists. A wholly separate question arises in many cases whether removal from the parent is justified. There is much Court of Appeal authority upon that which I have no intention of setting out, but essentially the court considering such a course must: (i) only do as much as is really necessary to secure the safety of a child; (ii) only decide what really needs to be decided at the interim stage (as the concept is purely to hold the ring until the full hearing); and (iii) only remove a child if it appears truly necessary to do so in the interests of the child’s safety.

The interim care proceedings are not a dress rehearsal for the final hearing. An ICO is an interim protective order and requires renewal from time to time under the present statutory arrangements. That does not mean regular reappraisal of the living arrangements, but it does mean the court is keeping a watchful eye on developments. The interim process of care proceedings is judicially controlled and the more so with the advent of recent family justice reforms. I feel it always needs to be remembered that the removal of any child from a parent is a very serious step that should never be made lightly. That similarly applies to the removal of a child from another family member to a foster carer. These observations are particularly significant when such a course is postulated prior to full investigation at a final hearing.

There can be no doubt that Articles 6 and 8 of the European Convention on Fundamental Freedoms and Human Rights 1951 (the Convention) are engaged when an application for an ICO is made – and all the more so when removal is in issue. This issue was addressed by the Court of Appeal in Re S (Care Proceedings: Human Rights) [2010] EWCA Civ 1383 [2012] 2 FLR 2009, where Sir Nicholas Wall P (with whom Arden LJ and Wilson LJ, as he then was, agreed) said that a useful formulation of the test to be applied in questions of removal was: whether the removal or continued removal of the child from the care of his or her parent(s) is proportionate to the risk of harm to which he or she will be exposed if the child is allowed to remain or return to parental care [see paragraphs 8 and 9 of the judgment]. The articulation of the test by the President in Re S is a valuable lodestar for courts deciding whether an ICO should be made and removal countenanced. It will be understood that making an interim order when not all is known about the family dynamic is one of the most difficult decisions a family court is asked to make (particularly when removal of a child from a parent or other family member is proposed). There is a volume of Convention jurisprudence which emphasises the invasive and draconian nature of an ICO and removal of a child from the family.

When an ICO is made the local authority and the parent share parental responsibility for the child – albeit the local authority is usually the one in the driving seat particularly when removal has been sanctioned. This plainly does not mean the parents or others are of little or no consequence. Although the local authority may be driving the vehicle, on a journey approved by the court, it does not mean it is able to ignore the views of the passengers as to the route to follow. There needs to be consultation; and concurrence (if possible). The consultation must be genuine and not merely a process whereby decisions are merely the subject of information to parents. I repeat a parent with parental responsibility does not surrender that when an ICO is made, nor when removal is permitted by the court. The weight to be attached to the views of parents and others is a different question. A local authority must always work in a carefully calibrated manner and act in a proportionate way commensurate with the issues involved and those involved. Calibration and proportionality are highly fact specific. The level and manner of consultation with one family will inevitably differ to that of another family depending on the issues and circumstances. The weight to be attached to the views of a father who murdered the mother of his child is likely to be rather less (if any) to be attached to the views of grandparents who are looking after a child in a difficult family situation. A sense of reality and a sense of proportion are key to the concept of consultation; however, consultation there must be, save in exceptional circumstances where child safety or other pressing reasons are present. I should also add that proper records are an essential aspect of consultation and decision-making.

During the course of argument I was referred to the case of Re G (Care: Challenge to Local Authority Decision) [2003] EWHC 551 (Fam) which was a decision of Munby J (as he then was: now the President) involving a challenge to a decision of a local authority to remove a child from parents after a final care order was made. Munby J reviewed the convention cases and domestic law in a comprehensive judgment which has continuing relevance. He drew attention to the fact that social workers (in 2003 when the Human Rights Act 1998 was still in comparative infancy) needed to be more aware of its terms and import (see paragraph 3 of the judgment). Given the events of this case that is a paragraph that needs repetition. Let there be no misunderstanding: the convention applies to local authorities in respect of their decision making in care cases and all social workers need to be alive to its provisions and import; moreover they must apply the convention. The texture of decision-making needs to have the weave of the convention visible and palpable.

In my judgment it is possible to distil the relevant law in the following way by reference to the expansive and helpful judgment of Munby J in Re G which has resonance today in this case. I particularly call attention to paragraphs 28 to 55 of the judgment which I say, with profound respect, were both learned and graphical – making it all the more readable. The distillation of relevant considerations applicable to the facts of this case are:

(1) It is always important (usually vital) for any decision-maker to consult with all relevant parties to be affected by the proposal before making the decision. The weight (or none) to be attached to the responses is a matter for the decision-maker providing the decision is legally rational.

(2) In the context of the removal of a child from a parent (and I would add any other family member) should not be countenanced unless and until there has been due and proper consultation and an opportunity to challenge the proposal.

(3) Article 8 not only provides substantive protection for parents and other family members, but requires procedural safeguards too.

(4) Article 8 is not something that applies simply to the judicial process, but to other decisions made by the local authority too.

The passage of the judgment at paragraph 36 is apposite to this case:

“So Article 8 requires that parents are properly involved in the decision-making process not merely before the care proceedings are launched and during the period when care proceedings are on foot (the issue I was concerned with in Re L), but also —- after care proceedings have come to an end and whilst the local authority are implementing the care order.”

This is interesting – there are occasions, when representing a Local Authority that the concerns the LA have are so high that care proceedings are certain to be commenced. In those circumstances, it is traditional to send the Letter Before Action, making it plain that care proceedings will be commenced. [Though of course, the parent is able to obtain legal advice and contest the ICO application]

Is the upshot of this judgment that it is unlawful to DECIDE to commence proceedings before consulting with the parent about this? It seems to me that it probably is.

The Court then went on to consider the interplay between interim care orders and judicial review – mindful that there is of course a remedy in the care proceedings (to challenge the ICO, or to appeal a court decision to continue it)

56. There have not been – in so far that counsel and I have been able to determine – any reported case of judicial review proceedings in relation to ICO’s. It was felt by counsel – and I am inclined to agree – that challenges whilst care proceedings are in train are usually made within the confines of the family court when an application to revoke the ICO is made or a renewal application is made. Ordinarily, the Administrative Court will not countenance judicial review proceedings when there is an alternative remedy – especially so when that alternative is a judicial remedy. However, that does not mean that judicial review cannot apply to decisions made by local authorities whilst care proceedings are in train. I am of the view that there are limited – perhaps very limited circumstances – where an application can be made justly. This would be so when a person affected by a decision is not actually a party to the care proceedings and might not have a sufficiently good reason to be made an intervener in those proceedings. It might equally apply where (as here) a party (the mother) does not wish to challenge the basis of the ICO, but merely a decision made by the LA as to its implementation. It may be that a local authority has reached a conclusion in respect of which it refuses to alter (despite the request of the family court). All the family court can do is to exhort (it usually works – but it does not always) or revoke the ICO. The family court is not exercising the jurisdiction of the High Court in, the now infrequently used, wardship procedure where by the court makes all important decisions about all aspects of a child’s life as used to be the case. In my judgment the circumstances whereby judicial review is applicable whilst care proceedings are in progress (and there is an extant ICO) are likely to be rare and distinctly fact specific. The Administrative Court is very alive to the concept of an alternative remedy.

The Court also covered the duty to consult – and made it plain that there is a spectrum of consultation, not merely ‘agreement’ at one end, and ‘informing the parents of the decision’ at the other – there has to be a genuine dialogue which allows for the potential for a parent or other interested party to bring something to the conversation which might result in a different outcome.

I have made it clear that there is a duty upon a local authority to consult with all affected parties before a decision is reached upon important aspects of the life of a child whilst an ICO is in force. I have been shown the guidance issued by HM Government to local authorities in 2010 [The Children Act 1989 Guidance and Regulations] where there is valuable material available to social workers about how to approach their difficult task in this regard. Paragraph 1.5 provides (inter alia):

“Parents should be expected and enabled to retain their responsibilities and to remain closely involved as is consistent with their child’s welfare, even if that child cannot live at home either temporarily or permanently.”

Further:

“If children are to live apart form their family, both they and their parents should be given adequate information and helped to consider alternatives and contribute to the making of an informed choice about the most appropriate form of care.”

Whilst it is not spelled-out quite as starkly as perhaps it should, there is contained therein a plain message that a local authority must consult and, in my judgment, that is even more crucial during the interim phase of proceedings when final decisions as to the threshold criteria and outcome have not been made by a court. The question as to whom the local authority needs to consult is distinctly fact specific. In my judgment that should ordinarily include the parents. If capacity is in issue or there are safety issues or other genuinely powerful reasons not to embrace them, then different considerations apply. It should also embrace the guardian (if appointed and available). It should also embrace any other family member who has a material interest in the children. This would include a family member who may be caring for a child or otherwise closely concerned with the child. This frequently involves grandparents who step-in to help.

The weight to be attached to the input of parents and others is for the local authority to judge – it may be no weight at all may be attached depending on the circumstances – but there needs to be consultation about fundamental decisions. Moreover, the concept of consultation does not mean concurrence at one end of the spectrum; nor information at the other. The “others” who need to be consulted may have a valuable contribution that might alter the proposal of the local authority. It does not mean the parents and other parties must concur with the proposal before it can be implemented. There can be no veto or casting vote. Equally, the parents and other parties are not mere vassals to whom information is given and nothing more.

It has to be acknowledged that there will be decisions to be made in some cases where it is impossible to engage with parties or even to consult where the local authority must act speedily in the interests of child safety and protection. When this is done there must be clear reasons for this and the decision must be objectively reasonable and justifiable. Such a decision needs careful justification and calibration. A full note of the reason for such an exceptional course must be made.

During the pre-final hearing stage (the interim phase of the case) the family court will be monitoring developments and where there is a fundamental disagreement as to an important decision, the parties need to have the issue adjudicated upon. This is of critical importance where the court has made an ICO upon a particular premise and that is to be changed, and changed where there is no agreement. Unless there a real need for an urgent decision (on proper grounds of child safety or protection) the family court should ordinarily be involved. The interim phase of care proceedings is now under even tighter judicial control than hitherto. I cannot emphasise enough the local authority is not allowed to act unilaterally upon important matters affecting a child in its interim care without proper consultation save in exceptional circumstances. There must be proper consultation and judicial input when there is a contested proposal. It must be equally emphasised that local authorities must act speedily and without express approval if exceptional circumstances obtain. The weight to be attached to the views of those consulted is a matter for the judgment of the local authority in whom trust for the management of the ICO has been reposed by the court.

Whether you represent a parent, or child, or Local Authority, this case has some important information, and reminders. I think that most Local Authorities would have had the case before the Court before the children were removed, but conversely, that most would probably have made the DECISION that they intended to remove once that negative viability report arrived. This case reminds us that the duty to consult goes far deeper than simply telling the parents that a decision has been reached, but actually to be a genuine discussion about the situation and the options available PRIOR to a decision being reached.

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Posted in case law, consultation, judicial review, Uncategorized and tagged duty to consult with parents, H, interim care order, interim care order and judicial review, judicial review, judicial review and interim care order, Kingston judicial review, moving a child from family members, R v Kingston upon Hull 2013. Bookmark the permalink.

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