Passage to India (and laying the smackdown on the Legal Aid Agency)

There seems to be increasing amounts of litigation about children being taken on holiday to countries outside of the Hague Convention, particularly when the children are the subjects of private law dispute about contact and residence (or as I now have to call it but won’t ,  “Child Arrangements”)

[If you want to skip to the bit where the Judge rips the LAA a new one, I’ll understand, you can come back afterwards if you’re interested in the background. Scroll down to the bit that says “SMACKDOWN!”]

There was one about Iran recently,  Re H (a child) 2014   http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/989.html

This one is about a trip to India that the mother wanted to make with the children.  Re AB (A child: Temporary Leave to Remove from the Jurisdiction : Expert Evidence) 2014   heard by His Honour Judge Bellamy sitting as a High Court judge.

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/HCJ/2014/2758.html

Why this particular case is helpful is that the Court managed to get some expert legal advice from the Indian jurisdiction, notably on what might happen if the mother refused to return the children. This might save others in the same position hours of difficult research, so it is useful that the Court set it out here:-

ANSWER TO QUERIES

(i) What is the legal position in India if the Mother does not return to the United Kingdom with the child and remains instead with her in India? What impact, if any, would be made by pre-existing orders from the High Court in England making declarations of habitual residence in England and mandatory orders in relation to the return of the child by a certain date?
Answer

If the mother does not return to the United Kingdom with the Child, the father will have to bring a claim for custody in India under provisions of Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act 1956. The pre-existing orders from the High Court in England making declaration of habitual residence in England and mandatory order in relation to the return of child by a certain date will only be one of the factors to be considered and court will draw up independent judgment on merits having regard to welfare of the children.

(ii) What legal remedy would the father have, and what procedure would apply if he found himself having to take steps to effect the return of the child to the United Kingdom? What would be the likely timescale, cost and likelihood of success?
Answer

Father would have to file an application for custody of children under the provision of Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act. The proceedings may take from 1 year to 2 year and likelihood of success cannot be predicted as it will be dependent on Court’s fact finding to ascertain best interest and welfare of the children in deciding the custody rights.

(iii) As India is not a signatory to the Hague Convention, is there any other Agreement or Treaty in place with the United Kingdom which would assist in alleviating the Father’s concerns or in assisting if the child was not to be returned?
Answer

No there is no other treaty except treaty to enforce judgements passed by reciprocating courts in UK and India, however in matters of child custody, courts will not pass summary judgements and will pass independent judgement considering welfare of the children.

(iv) Is there scope for the mother obtaining a Mirror Order on her arrival in India? If so, what is the relevant procedure and what protection would such order give in ensuring the return of the child to the United Kingdom?
Answer

No, Courts in India will not pass mirror orders but will pass independent orders considering welfare of children.
 

(v) Are there other practical or legal safeguards which could be put in place before or on the Mother’s arrival in India? For Example (sic), requiring family members to take oath in relation to not assisting in the retention of the children, or lodging the children’s passport with a British Embassy or another place?
Answer

Since the foreign custody orders cannot be enforced mechanically, it is suggested that in the event of any litigation in the foreign country of habitual residence, a letter of request be obtained from the UK court in which litigation is pending for incorporating safeguards and conditions to ensure the return of the minor child to the country of normal residence.
This letter of request should be addressed by the UK court to the Registrar General of the High Court within whose jurisdiction the estranged spouse is residing with the minor child. It should also be specifically mentioned that the passports of the parent and the child should be deposited with the Registrar General of the state High Court to ensure that the child is not taken away from the jurisdiction of the [state] where he or she is confined.’

The answers are both technical and practical, so useful to others in the same position.

You might remember in the distant past, His Honour Judge Bellamy encountering much the same issues and having the ridiculous position of the Legal Aid Agency refusing to pay for the expert to answer those vital questions (presumably on the basis that English lawyers could magically find the answer to these questions in any other given national jurisdiction)   Re R (children : temporary leave to remove from the jurisdiction)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2014/643.html

So, it is impressive that the report was produced here. Let’s have a look at how.  Clue – it was not done simply, and the Legal Aid Agency showed a painful lack of knowledge of the Court of Appeal’s decision that their previous policy of insisting that they would only pay for reports if EVERYONE was paying an equal share was unlawful.

42. This is the second time this year that it has been necessary for me to consider the conduct of the Legal Aid Agency when dealing with an application for prior authority to incur the fees of an expert in an application for the temporary removal of a child to a non-Hague Convention state – see Re R (Children: Temporary Leave to Remove From Jurisdiction) [2014] EWHC 643 (Fam). In that case I was critical of the LAA (see paragraphs 81 to 97). Before deciding whether further criticism is merited it is necessary to consider the history of the application for prior authority.
 

The mother’s application for prior authority

43. As I have noted, the expert proposed by the mother was Mr Ravindra Kumar. Mr Kumar is a legal associate with Singhania & Co, a firm of ‘Solicitors & Indian Advocates’ with offices in India and London. In his curriculum vitae Mr Kumar says that he is ‘a consultant in Singhania’s litigation group, concentrates his practice on handling litigations in UK and in India. He has advised clients on Indian laws and India-specific issues including family laws and matrimonial laws issues. Maintenance and Adoption Laws issue. Mr Kumar had given expert witness evidence on issues pertaining to India laws on matrimonial matters, wills and contacts issues. Affiliations: Supreme Court Bar Association [SCBA], India. Delhi High Court Bar Association [DHCBA], India’.
 

44.  I heard the mother’s application for permission to obtain expert evidence on 13th June. I was satisfied that expert evidence was necessary and that Mr Kumar was an appropriately qualified expert. I decided that the cost of the expert evidence should be borne by the mother. In an extempore judgment I said,
 

8. There can, in my judgment, be no doubt as to the need for an expert’s report in this case. The law relating to the reliance upon expert evidence in Children Act proceedings is now to be found at s.13(6) of the Children and Families Act 2014 of which reads:
‘The court may give permission as mentioned in subsection (1), (3) or (5) only if the court is of the opinion that the expert evidence is necessary to assist the court to resolve the proceedings justly.’
There is in this case absolutely no doubt that expert evidence is necessary.
9. The issue that then arises is who is to pay. The mother is publicly funded and the father is a litigant in person. The father’s means are extremely straightened. He works for [a supermarket] and has an income of £1,200 per month out of which he has mortgage repayments of £500, car insurance of £28, fuel of £300, a mobile phone contract of £42, electricity of £76, food of £178 and finally a debt management payment of £76. The father has produced evidence from a debt management company which shows that the £76 per month that he is paying is for the payment of some eight debts which together amount to around £6,500. There can be, in my judgment, not the slightest doubt of this father’s inability to be able to afford to pay.
10. If the father cannot pay, is it appropriate to require the mother to pay for the whole of the costs of this report? In my judgment it is, and for two reasons. The first reason is the obvious one that it is her application for the temporary removal of AB from the jurisdiction. It is she who wants to do something that potentially could cause the breakdown of contact between AB and his father, and could potentially leave the father in an extremely difficult position in trying to right a wrong. Therefore, it is only just, in my view, that she should bear the costs of paying for that report, and that would be the case even if she were not publicly funded. The second reason why it is appropriate for her to pay the costs is because the father simply cannot afford to pay, of that I am in no doubt.
11. The position with respect to the Legal Aid Agency funding the entirety of the costs of an expert under one party’s public funding certificate is an issue that has been considered by the court twice over the course of the last twelve months. Firstly in the decision of Ryder J (as he then was) in JG v The Lord Chancellor & Ors [2013] 2 FLR 1174 and more recently by the Court of Appeal overturning the decision of Ryder J in that same case in JG v The Lord Chancellor & Ors [2014] EWCA Civ.656. In that case it was argued on behalf of the Lord Chancellor and the Legal Aid Agency that the normal rule was one of equal apportionment of expert costs amongst all parties to proceedings. At para.86 of the judgment of Black LJ in the Court of Appeal, she said this:
‘I do not accept that there is a normal rule of equal apportionment of the costs; in my view, like so many of the issues that arise in this appeal, it all depends on the particular circumstances of the case.’
At para.90, having referred to three authorities, she said this:
‘What I draw from the three authorities to which I have just made reference is that the court has discretion as to what order is made as to the costs of instructing experts in family proceedings and that that discretion must be exercised bearing in mind all the circumstances of the particular case.’
Then at para.93, she said this:
‘None of the authorities which I have just cited turned on the impecuniosity of the parties. Although they differ from the present case in that they were care cases, they are capable of providing assistance as to “the principles on which the discretion of [the] court is normally exercised” in relation to the cost of expert evidence. As I have explained, to my mind, they do not reveal the existence of a normal rule that costs be apportioned equally any more than Rule 25.12(6) does. Accordingly, in so far as the Lord Chancellor’s submissions proceed upon the basis that equal apportionment is the norm, I would question the premise. In order to decide whether a court order has fallen foul of s.22(4), a more sophisticated exercise is required. It is necessary to ask what order the court would make in its discretion on the particular facts of that case, leaving aside any resources problems. The answer may not uncommonly be an order for equal apportionment of the costs but that cannot be assumed. It may be that a full consideration of the circumstances of the case produces the result that the publicly funded party should be paying a greater share of the costs in any event, quite irrespective of any financial difficulties that the other parties may have in sharing the costs of the expert. In such circumstances, s.22(4) does not prevent the court from making an order accordingly, because the order is in no way affected by the fact of public funding.
The reference in her Ladyship’s judgment to s.22(4) is to s.22(4) of the Access to Justice Act 1999.
12. In light of her Ladyship’s comments, I am in no doubt at all that it is right to say in this case that even leaving to one side the ability to fund the costs of an expert report, the cost of the expert report proposed in this case should be borne entirely by the mother. The fact that she is publicly funded makes no difference to that conclusion. There is, as I have already said, the subsidiary point that the father simply cannot afford to pay.
13. It is my sincere hope that the problems encountered by the court and the parents in Re R (Children: Temporary Leave to Remove from Jurisdiction) will not be visited again upon this mother in this case. I shall make the order giving permission for the expert’s report. I approve the draft letter of instruction, and the costs will be limited to £1,000. The costs will be met by the mother and I deem that to be a reasonable and proportionate expense on her public funding certificate. I direct that there be an expedited transcript of this judgment at public expense to assist the mother in obtaining prior authority.
45.The Court of Appeal’s decision in JG v The Lord Chancellor & Ors was handed down on 21st May. The mother’s application for prior authority was sent to the LAA a month later, on 20th June. The application was made in the LAA’s prescribed form APP8A and was submitted together with relevant supporting documents. Following an enquiry as to progress, the application was re-sent by e-mail on 3rd July.

It seems pretty obvious that following JG v Lord Chancellor, that the Legal Aid Agency would have notified their front line staff that the previous policy was not going to fly anymore, and that a stock refusal to fund assessments that the Court had deemed necessary just because there was another party who wasn’t paying an equal share would not do at all. But no

46. An e-mail response from the LAA on 3rd July suggests that the writer of that e-mail was unaware of the Court of Appeal’s decision in JG v The Lord Chancellor & Ors. The e-mail reads:
 

47. ‘I can confirm on the information provided we would expect the costs to be apportioned between the parties as per S22(4) AJA 1999 which expects all parties to bear an equal share in the costs of an expert. The costs were originally being shared between the parties therefore it is not considered reasonable to transfer the burden of costs onto the publically (sic) funded party. We will need to see evidence to satisfy itself that the father should share in the costs and the court will need to undertake a robust assessment of the father’s means.’
The mother’s solicitors replied on 8th July. By then they had received the transcript of my judgment of 13th June and attached it to their response. Initially, it appeared that my judgment would help to resolve the issue. On 11th July an e-mail from Ann Davies, a senior caseworker at the LAA, said,
 

48. ‘Thank you for your e-mail and confirm I have reviewed our earlier decision. An authority will be issued in this matter however, despite my search of our completed applications I have been unable to find your APP8A…Please e-mail me a copy to enable me to consider this properly…’
The mother’s solicitor had already sent the LAA an application for prior authority in form APP8A on 20th June and on 3rd July. Form APP8A was sent to the LAA for a third time, by e-mail, on 14th July.

49. The optimism generated by Ms Davies’ e-mail was misplaced

The LAA refused the assessment, and refused it again, and again, and a fourth time. They moved on to a whole new area to get bogged down in, which was that the expert was a qualified solicitor, and thus wasn’t an expert.  The Judge disagreed

Is Mr Kumar an expert?

56. In proceedings in the Family Court, the position concerning expert evidence is clear. The Family Court Practice 2014 states (p.2009) that.
 

‘The general rule is that a witness may only give evidence as to fact observed by them. That rule is overridden in the case of opinion evidence given by a person whose expertise justifies the court in receiving that opinion.’
Hershman & McFarlane Children Law and Practice states (C3057) that,

‘It is for the court to determine in each case that the witness has the necessary expertise to come within the exception to the normal rule that opinion evidence is not admissible.’
Section 3(1) of the Civil Evidence Act 1972 provides that,

‘Subject to any rules of court made in pursuance of…this Act, where a person is called as a witness in any civil proceedings, his opinion on any relevant matter on which he is qualified to give expert evidence shall be admissible in evidence.’

57. Section 4(1) of the Civil Evidence Act 1972 is also relevant. It provides that,
 

‘It is hereby declared that that in civil proceedings a person who is suitably qualified to do so on account of his knowledge or experience is competent to give expert evidence as to the law of any country or territory outside the United Kingdom, or of any part of the United Kingdom other than England and Wales, irrespective of whether he has acted or is entitled to act as a legal practitioner there.’

58. In the circumstances of this case I am in no doubt that Mr Kumar is ‘qualified to give expert evidence’ (s.3(1) of the Civil Evidence Act 1972) and is properly to be regarded as an expert in Indian law.

I don’t know what the Latin for ‘stick that in your pipe and smoke it is’, but it probably should be inserted at the conclusion of this section.

[The joy of google – it is  Habeto eas solus, qui in vobis est, ut fumo et tibia canentium  – feel free to sprinkle that into your skeleton arguments if you feel bold ]

With all this in mind, those of us who read H H J Bellamy’s judgment in Re R are waiting for him to Etiam iuvat asinis  or indeed  ut in Republica, asini eorum,    [either  Apply Boots to Asses, or Get Medieval on their ass, depending on your preference]

I was not disappointed

SMACKDOWN  SMACKDOWN SMACKDOWN !!!!

Discussion and conclusions

It is a matter of concern that two months after the Court of Appeal handed down its decision in JG v The Lord Chancellor & Ors [2014] EWCA Civ 656 a senior case worker and a Director should both reject an application for prior authority by advancing arguments based on an interpretation of s.22(4) of the Access to Justice Act 1999 which had been so roundly rejected by the Court of Appeal. That, though, is not the only concern about the approach of the LAA in this case.
 

As I noted earlier, the 2013 Standard Civil Contract does not define the word ‘expert’. That is unsurprising. The determination of whether expert evidence is necessary in order to resolve a case justly and whether a particular witness ‘is qualified to give expert evidence’ (s.3(1) of the Civil Evidence Act 1972) are issues for determination by the court not by the LAA. I am concerned that in this case the LAA should have disregarded a decision by the court that Mr Kumar is an expert. In my judgment it was not open to the LAA to disregard a judicial decision on this issue.
 

The Standard Terms of the 2013 Standard Civil Contract define the term ‘Approved Third Party’ as someone engaged by a party to the Contract ‘to undertake non-legal work ancillary to Contract Work, including experts’. The expression ‘non-legal work’ is not defined. In my judgment, it includes giving expert advice on the law of any country or territory outside the United Kingdom. Whether the ‘expert’ is an academic specialising in that area or a person who is a practitioner in that foreign state is immaterial. It is equally immaterial if such a practitioner happens to have dual qualification enabling him also to practice law in England and Wales. I reject Ms Davies’ analysis and interpretation of the 2013 Standard Civil Contract.
 

I also reject Ms Davies’ attempt to pray in aid the provisions of the Civil Legal Aid (Remuneration) Regulations 2013. The regulations do not define the word ‘expert’. Ms Davies refers to the 63 different categories of expert set out in the Table which follows paragraph 1 of Schedule 5 of the regulations. The point made appears to be that there is some significance in the fact that nowhere in this list is there ‘provision for legal work’. It is clear from Schedule 5 paragraph 3 that the list of experts in the Table is not intended to be either an exhaustive list of the categories of experts for which fees will be paid by the LAA or an indicative list of the categories of expertise in which expert evidence will be funded.
 

All of the issues I have raised so far give rise to concern about the adequacy of training for those members of LAA staff responsible for determining applications for prior authority.
 

In addition to these particular issues I also have two general concerns. Firstly, I am concerned that the mother’s solicitors had to submit their application for prior authority three times before the LAA finally acknowledged that it had received a complete set of documents. I am also concerned that to arrive at the stage at which the LAA appeared to agree in principle to fund a non-solicitor expert in Indian law took more than four weeks and in excess of 20 letters and e-mails between the solicitor and the LAA. In Re R (Children: Temporary Leave to Remove From Jurisdiction) [2014] EWHC 643 (Fam) I expressed concern about a similar state of affairs in that case. I said that,
 

’95. The applications for prior authority to instruct an expert have been going backwards and forwards between the LAA and solicitors for some six months. Although I have not been given details of the time spent by the solicitors in pursuing this issue with the LAA, it seems to me to be self-evident that it must have been considerable. This process is wasteful and inefficient. Solicitors are being required to deal with a level of bureaucracy that is almost impenetrable. They are also being required to deal with the consequences that flow from decisions that are unappealable including explaining to their clients why they cannot have the expert evidence which the court has directed is necessary. This is unsatisfactory.’
When considered alongside Re R (Children: Temporary Leave to Remove From Jurisdiction) [2014] EWHC 643 (Fam) the facts of this present case strongly suggest that, administratively, the LAA is disorganised. The consequences of this for litigants and their hard-pressed solicitors are matters of concern.

Secondly, I am concerned about what appears to be resistance by the LAA to the granting of prior approval for the use of an expert as to the law of a foreign state in connection with an application for temporary leave to remove a child to a non-Hague Convention country. In Re R (Children: Temporary Leave to Remove From Jurisdiction) [2014] EWHC 643 (Fam) the correspondence between the LAA and the mother’s solicitor suggested that the LAA was highly resistant to meeting the cost of such an expert The correspondence between the LAA and the solicitor for the mother in this present case gives the same impression.
 

In light of my further criticisms of the LAA I direct that the mother’s solicitor shall forthwith forward a copy of this judgment to the Chief Executive of the LAA.

I will add, simply Solum versus est, et ut ‘quia, ut dicit Bellamy saxum iudicis gelu

[For non-wrasslin’  fans or non-Latin speakers  –  “And that’s the bottom line, cos Stone Cold Judge Bellamy says so” ]

Can I get a “Hell yeah!” ?