Category Archives: case law

A tapestry of justice

Posted on October 12, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

 

A discussion of London Borough of Sutton and Gray 2012   – in which the High Court determined that an earlier finding of fact that a father had shaken a child, causing injuries (and for which father went to prison) was wrong and had been in effect a miscarriage of justice.

 

The children had been placed with a relative (fortunately) who cared for them under Special Guardianship Orders. Had they been instead, adopted, then the Court would have been faced with the same issue as in Webster, that children had been wrongly removed and adopted, but that such a step cannot be unpicked.  The LA had been seeking a Placement Order for the younger child.

 

 

The Judge in this case, Mrs Justice Hogg, dealt with the case in a very measured and compassionate way – the other judgment, which I don’t include, which deals with the aftermath of this finding of fact and the reconciliation of the family is moving in the extreme.

 

 

[I am very grateful to Ms Troy who was junior counsel for the children in alerting me that this case was forthcoming and to watch for it.  Ms Troy is a very able advocate, a thoroughly decent person and someone blessed with good taste in football; an all-round good egg. The title is a malapropism from a gentleman who left Court and informed myself and counsel that this had been “a tapestry of justice”]

 

The judgment is here:-

 

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2012/2604.html

 

 

You will notice the highly unusual step of the Court giving the full names of those involved, rather than anonymising them. That’s a marker of how important it is for this family to be exonerated, and the likelihood that there will be further media involvement – I note that journalists were present.

 

I would point out in this case, that the miscarriage is not a result of bungling or bad faith on anyone’s part,  nor crookedness, nor incompetence, nor overly dogmatic experts. It just reflects what is becoming increasingly understood – that in complex medical cases involving injuries to children, sometimes our best working diagnosis on the balance of probabilities, can still be wrong.  As the Judge says late on, with reference to Mrs Justice Bracewell – in effect the Judge has to make the best conclusions they can from the evidence as it is presented, but being aware that today’s certainties can be tomorrow’s grey areas.

 

In a case such as this, we can see the stark impact of that on the family. It would not be an overstatement to say that they have been torn apart by these circumstances.

 

  1. From a very early stage the spectre of Non Accidental Injury was raised to explain Ellie’s collapse and the findings of intracranial and retinal bleedings. The parents, in particular the father, was unable to give a history of an accident or other explanation as to why she had suddenly become limp and in a collapsed state. The various tests performed did not reveal any medical explanation. Suspicion therefore arose that Ellie’s condition was a result of an inflicted injury. The fact she had been injured previously added to the suspicions. The Local Authority and police were informed of the position.
  1. As a result the parents were arrested on suspicion of causing grievous bodily harm to Ellie and interviewed by the police on 6 March 2007. Both denied causing injury to Ellie on or about 15 February, and have continued to do so ever since.
  1. In the meanwhile the Local Authority decided to issue care proceedings in respect of Ellie in which a care order was sought on the basis that she had suffered an inflicted head injury and burns whilst in the care of her parents.
  1. The application was issued on 5 March 2007 in the Croydon Family Proceedings Court. The first Interim Care Order in respect of Ellie was made on 15 March 2007, and thereafter renewed on a regular basis. On that date the proceedings were also transferred to the Croydon county Court.
  1. The fact-finding hearing took place in front of HHJ Atkins culminating in his Judgment dated 29 January 2008, in which he made findings against the father in that he:

(i) caused the burns on 7 February 2007 to Ellie deliberately or recklessly or negligently;

(ii) caused the head and eye injuries and the consequences sustained by Ellie on 15 February 2007;

(iii) the mother failed to protect Ellie by leaving her in the father’s sole care on 15 February.

  1. On 28 April 2008 the Learned Judge made further findings against the parents that:

(i) neither had accepted his Judgment and findings on 29 January 2008;

(ii) neither had been open and honest about the extent of their relationship, that “it has been more extensive than they said”;

(iii) both had intimidated and made various specific threats towards the maternal grandparents;

(iv) and the Learned Judge ruled the mother out as a long-term carer for Ellie.

  1. On 14 August 2008 the Learned Judge made the Special Guardianship Order to the maternal grandparents and the contact orders for the parents.
  1. The police charged the father with causing grievous bodily harm to Ellie on 15 February 2007 contrary to S.20 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 and with cruelty contrary to S.1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933.
  1. On 24 March 2009 after a 4 week trial at Croydon Crown Court the father was convicted on both counts, and by majority verdict on the charge under S.20 and sentenced to concurrent terms of 18 months and 1 month imprisonment.
  1. Isabella was born on 7 September 2009 while the father was in prison.

 

 

It can easily be seen, that in relation to paragraph 45, those findings made that the parents had not accepted the finding of fact hearings are the only thing they could have done, and to criticise them for it is now evidently unfair.  Given that it was not true, how could they do anything other than continue to deny it?

But of course, the Court was proceeding on what was understood to be right at the time   [and from a legal point of view, what the Court FOUND to have happened at the hearing in January 2008 WAS what happened; although we now know that in reality, it was not what happened at all]

 

  1. The Injuries Ellie received
  1. Ellie collapsed in the father’s home. She suffered brain dysfunction or encephalopathy. She sustained subdural and retinal haemorrhages.
  1. Those three types of injuries are often referred to as The Triad and considered as a significant pointer towards a diagnosis of non-accidental head injury, particularly as in this case where there are no other signs, symptoms or marks of injury on the child. In this respect I am excluding the burns.
  1. It must not be assumed that because it seems ‘The Triad’ is present that it automatically and necessarily leads to a diagnosis of non-accidental head injury.
  1. Before concluding that The Triad exists and that a finding of non-accidental head injury is justified the Court must consider and examine the evidence in respect of each injury, its diagnosis, and its causative event(s) with care. It must also consider the clinical presentation of the child and the evidence of the parents, carer or other relevant witnesses.
  1. The findings in every case must depend on the specific individual facts to that case.
  1. At the end of the day it is always possible for a Judge to rule that the cause of an injury remains unknown. As Mr Justice Hedley said in Re R. 2011 EWHC 1715:

“In my Judgment, a conclusion of unknown aetiology in respect of an infant represents neither professional nor forensic failure. It simply recognises that we still have much to learn and it also recognises that it is dangerous and wrong to infer non-accidental injury merely from the absence of any other understood mechanism.

Maybe it simply represents a general acknowledgement that we are fearfully and wonderfully made.”

 

 

I suspect, that this is a phrase, as it is both resonant and skilfully constructed, that we will see again and again  “We are fearfully and wonderfully made”

 

The Judge analysed the evidence in relation to each element of the ‘triad’  – those classic symptoms which suggest that the child has been the victim of a shaking injury.

 

  1. My Conclusions
  1. The conclusion I draw from the evidence of all three ophthalmologists are:

(a) This is an unusual case;

(b) It is unlikely that the injuries to the eyes were (i) birth related or (ii) caused by the seizures suffered by Ellie in hospital.

(c) The causative event(s) probably occurred shortly before Ellie’s admission to hospital;

(d) Ellie’s rapid and complete recovery was “remarkable” given the apparent severity of the haemorrhages when first seen;

(e) By just looking into the eye it is not possible to identify the cause of haemorrhaging;

(f) The haemorrhages do not have the hallmarks of a shaking injury, but such an injury cannot be excluded. In the event it was a shaking injury the severity of the force would be at the lower end of the spectrum;

(g) An airway obstruction giving rise to a sharp increase in intra cranial pressure could be an explanation for the haemorrhages, and would fit into the scenario resulting in a rapid and complete recovery without any residual damage;

(h) All three were prepared to consider an explanation other than that of shaking. The two experts were also specifically questioned about the possibility of an airway obstruction being the root cause as suggested by Professor Fleming. Both accepted the possibility;

(i) None were prepared to say on the balance of probabilities the injuries seen in Ellie’s eyes were caused by a shaking or inflicted mechanism. Mr Gregson and Professor Taylor were prepared to say they “did not know” or “could not be certain” what caused the injuries and “sat on the fence” when asked whether there was an innocent explanation or non-accidental explanation;

(j) The ophthalmic evidence is only one part of the picture, a piece of the jigsaw which is before the Court

 

 

 

  1. The conclusions I draw from the ENT doctors are as follows:

(i) All the doctors accepted that Ellie had abnormalities: the cyst, the cleft and laryngomalacia. They also accepted that there were indications she suffered from reflux and the cleft could contribute to possible aspiration of the gastric products.

(ii) They accepted that she had intermittent stridor, noisy breathing indicating an airway obstruction, which could have been caused by the cyst, and/or the laryngomalacia and positioning of the head, but that it was mild and there was no evidence that it was a moderate or severe obstruction.

(iii) None were aware of a link between airway obstruction whether severe or not and intracranial haemorrhages either in personal experience or in medical literature.

(iv) Mr Joseph alone indicated that a sudden reflux could cause a spasm and a closure of the airway which would be sudden and silent, but producing a floppy child.

(v) None of the doctors had examined or treated a child with the three physical abnormalities, nor had they read about such a case, even without the additional complication of reflux.

(vi) They agreed she was an unusual child

 

 

 

  1. The conclusions I draw from the radiological/neuroradiological evidence are as follows:-

(i) Any fluid seen in the subdural space is an abnormality and cause for concern. It has a pathological cause.

(ii) There are abnormalities seen on the scans and there was broad agreement as to what is visible. The differences lie in the interpretations; what the abnormalities represented;

(iii) There were darker areas of attenuation over the frontal areas and convexities containing small areas of brighter attenuation:

(a) It is agreed the small bright areas represent acute blood;

(b) The darker areas could either be:

(i) Chronic subdural haemorrhage, possible dating back to Ellie’s delivery; or

(ii) Acute traumatic effusions being cerebro-spinal fluid having leaked through damage to the arachnoid;

(iv) Acute blood is seen as brighter attenuation up to 7 to 10 days after bleeding;

(v) Chronic bleeds are seen as darker attenuation and are recognised between 2 to 3 weeks after the bleed. An upper age limited is not possible to assess from the scans;

(vi) Birth related subdural haemorrhages do occur, particularly after a Ventouse delivery. They are asymmetrical and usually resolve/disappear by 4 weeks: some may remain longer;

(vii) New bleeds creating acute subdural haemorrhages require a force which is beyond that of every day handling. An observer would know it was excessive and inappropriate and likely to cause injury to a child;

(viii) Re-bleeds are possible into chronic subdural haemorrhages either around damaged bridging veins or from membranes within the haemorrhages. Lesser force is required to trigger a re-bleed.

(ix) Subdural haemorrhages in themselves do not cause brain injury: but are markers of injury.

(x) Ellie suffered from encephalopathy, dysfunction of the brain which caused her collapse and presentation to hospital;

(xi) There was no evidence of hypoxic-ischaemic damage in the brain, but that did not exclude such injury being present, but not visible and thus very mild;

(xii) Ellie appears to have made a complete recovery from the neurological point of view;

(xiii) There was no evidence on the scans of scalp swelling, or skull fractures or other visible injury to the head. (I leave aside the injuries to the eyes).

(xiv) Whether there were re-bleeds into chronic subdural haemorrhages or an acute traumatic effusion there needed to be an incident of trauma: the degree of force required for such trauma depended upon whether it was a re-bleed or a bleed de novo;

(xv) The traumatic event would have occurred before her presentation to hospital, and most likely shortly, if not immediately before her collapse;

(xvi) The traumatic event could be one involving a shaking and/or impact, or if only enough to trigger a re-bleed a minor force or even the alleged bumpy buggy ride;

(xvii) In Dr Stoodley’s opinion the trauma sufficient to trigger re-bleed’s would not account for the acute bleeding at the back of the head and in the posterior fossa nor the encephalopathy.

 

 

  1. The conclusions to draw from the evidence of Mr Richards and Mr Jayamohan are:

(i) The two neurosurgeons were in broad agreement with the findings on the scans by the neuroradiologists. Like them Mr Richards and Mr Jayamahon could not agree as to the interpretation of the darker attenuation in the frontal areas. They both agreed there was fresh blood within the darker areas and at the back of the head and in the posterior fossa.

(ii) They agreed that an explanation was required for that fresh blood, and the blood at the back of the head and in the posterior fossa could not be accounted for by a re-bleed or movement between compartments and thus a lesser force. They agreed that the most likely explanation was that of trauma.

(iii) They also agreed that Ellie had suffered some brain dysfunction shortly before her presentation to hospital for which there was no obvious answer: the force required for a re-bleed would not suffice.

(iv) They were of the overall view that the encephalopathy and trauma occurred at about the same time and could have been caused by the same event.

(v) Both were presented with Professor Fleming’s evidence and proposition that Ellie suffered an airway obstruction causing cessation of breathing. In her struggle to breathe there was a sharp rise in intracranial pressure which caused her to collapse. They were both prepared to accept this as a possible cause for the brain dysfunction.

(vi) They were also both prepared to accept that the father unintentionally inflicted injury to Ellie in his panic to help her. Neither could say from the scans that the trauma Ellie sustained was accidental or non-accidental in motive. That was for the Court to decide.

(vii) Both acknowledged that the injuries could have been sustained as a result of an unknown cause.

 

 

 

A significant issue was the detection of a cyst in the child’s throat, with the mechanism being that the cyst had caused breathing difficulties, which in turned caused the child to enter into a fit, which caused the subdural haematoma and the retinal haemorrhaging.  This had potentially been compounded by the child travelling in a car seat, which if the child had (as in this case) weak neck muscles the head can tip forward and block the airway.

 

 

The Court was assisted by the paediatric overview from Dr Fleming

 

  1. Sometimes in cases of alleged abusively injured children a paediatric ‘overview’ adds little to the overall medical evidence. In this case Professor Fleming with his great interest and experience in airway obstruction and near life-threatening events in children was able to look at this case and its history in the light of recent medical thinking and with a very objective eye.
  1. He was cautious, fully aware that there is much to be learnt in medical science particularly with reference to life-threatening events in infants, and the many aspects of their physiology:

“The medical professionals are sometimes arrogant in thinking we know the answers, but our understanding is changing rapidly at present. There are things we know about now that we did not know about 3 or 4 years ago. That is why I am conscious that despite all the investigations we can do in children who have had such life-threatening episodes we don’t actually find an answer as to what’s caused them. Not finding an answer is not to me the same as saying somebody must have done it”.

  1. If I may say, wise comments from a very experienced practitioner and one of which doctors and lawyers alike should take heed.

 

 

 

 

And the Judge then pulled all of this together, and an analysis of the parents evidence.

 

  1. 15 February
  1. I turn now to the 15 February. Should I make the finding sought that the father caused Ellie to suffer a non-accidental head injury by doing something, a shake, a shake with impact or other mechanism in a brief loss of temper or control?
  1. Do I accept the father’s evidence that something silently happened to her before in panic he scooped her out of the car seat?
  1. Do I accept that his actions of scooping her up, putting her onto the bed inadvertently caused her some injury, but only after she had collapsed?
  1. The father’s description of Ellie’s collapse, appearance and floppiness are descriptions of an encephalopathy or brain dysfunction.
  1. Her presentation to hospital and clinical observations are those seen typically in an infant who is suffering from an encephalopathic illness.
  1. It is accepted that the illness could have either an innocent explanation or a non-accidental one.
  1. The investigations undertaken have shown that she was not suffering from any illness or other disorder and unless there was an unknown cause, not impossible, the doctors effectively excluded an illness or disorder.
  1. The CT and MRI scans reveal subdural collections in the frontal area, and at the back of the head and in the posterior fossa. The frontal collections contain acute blood, and there is acute blood at the rear of the head. There is a dispute as between the neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons as to what the frontal collections represent; there is no dispute as to the presence of acute blood in the various areas. There is no dispute that the acute blood was caused by trauma, the exact nature of the mechanism and force required is disputed, subject to the individuals’ interpretations.
  1. The important blood to consider is that at the back of the head and in the posterior fossa and the possible mechanisms and forces required to cause it.
  1. Otherwise the neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons agree that on the scans there was no other evidence of hypoxic-ischaemic damage or injury to brain, and no evidence of an impact to the skull or scalp. The radiology revealed no other injury to Ellie’s body and other than the burns there were no other marks or bruises on Ellie.
  1. There were retinal haemorrhages present which were not typical of a shaking injury and which required explanation.
  1. Ellie was an unusual child with three abnormalities in the laryngeal area. The cyst and the cleft are rare features, the laryngomalacia more common. That combination with the cyst could have caused her intermittent stridor. No doctor appearing before me had ever encountered a child with all three abnormalities present.
  1. She also suffered from reflux.
  1. There was strong evidence from Professor Fleming that Ellie could have suffered from airway obstruction, either as a result of laryngo spasm triggered by reflux, or by her head dropping forward whilst asleep in her car seat. Either way she could have collapsed through an inability to breathe and consequential lack of oxygen. Either would give rise to rapid changes in intra thoracic and intra-cranial pressure which in turn could have caused the retinal haemorrhages.
  1. The experts, the neurosurgeons in particular and the ophthalmologists were able to accept this hypothesis as possible.
  1. Professor Fleming was not so certain about the acute blood at the rear of the head, and I felt the other evidence that indicated a trauma of some form was required to cause it was stronger.
  1. The neurosurgeons accepted that a swift arc like movement from the car seat and a bang onto the bed following a collapse induced by an airway obstruction was a possible explanation for the presence of the acute blood both at the back and in the frontal regions. Even Dr Stoodley who preferred an overall inflicted shaking causation could accept it as a possibility but an unlikely one.
  1. On the medical evidence alone there is no strong pointer that the injuries Ellie sustained were inflicted through a loss of control or temper by a perpetrator shortly before her collapse.
  1. I go further. On the medical evidence alone I think the Local Authority has difficulties. There are too many pointers which question a conclusion of inflicted injury. There is a strong pointer indicating an innocent explanation for the collapse, being the airway obstruction as propounded by Professor Fleming and accepted by the neurosurgeons as possible.
  1. The Local Authority has to prove its case. In my view on the medical evidence alone I do not think that it has established on the balance of probabilities that the injuries Ellie sustained were non-accidental in origin. There is too much strong evidence flowing the other way. I do not make the finding sought by the Local Authority that she was a victim of an abusive head injury.
  1. Where does that leave me? Am I in a position to take the matter further, or merely leave it as a case of no find of fact against the father?
  1. In fairness to all I should try to go further. Ellie and [OTHER CHILD] when they grown up need to know with as much clarity as possible what happened to Ellie in February 2007 and why they were separated from their parents while still infants.
  1. The parents have suffered enormous loss as a result of the findings. If I can exonerate them from wrongdoing in February 2007, the father in particular, I should do so. This family, all three generations, have suffered as a result of the findings made in January 2008. The grandparents’ planned quiet retirement was invaded by their granddaughter. It has been their pleasure and enjoyment to bring her up, but it has been at an enormous physical and emotional cost. Neither is in the first flush of youth or best of health. It could not have been easy for them to change gear and take on a toddler. They have done well. Ellie is thriving in their care. Without them she would have been adopted, but the additional cost is they have lost touch with their own daughter, and she with her siblings. The family circle has been shattered. I hope the damage can be repaired, and if it be possible any work might be assisted by all the adults knowing what I think probably happened to Ellie that February evening.
  1. I therefore ask myself: Do I accept the father’s account of the events of that early evening, that all was peace and calm before Ellie for some reason collapsed; and do I accept his now not clear account of his reaction to seeing his daughter lifeless?
  1. There is corroboration from the parents themselves describing intermittent noisy breathing and episodes of intense paleness. Professor Fleming accepts these could be symptoms of the underlying, and then unknown laryngeal abnormalities.
  1. There is corroboration from Dan the flat mate that all was quiet and he did not know Ellie was there until summoned by the father.
  1. There is corroboration from the 999 tape and transcript that the father was panicking.
  1. The incident took place more than 5 years ago. The father was panicking and frightened for his daughter and I accept it is likely in those circumstances he may not now recall the exact details of what he did after the collapse or what he said on the tape. Even nearer the time given his panicky state of mind he may not have recalled the precise details. Such corroborative evidence as is available supports his account.
  1. It is inherently unlikely that a ‘silent’ something happened which caused the father to silently lose control and silently inflict an injury upon Ellie. He is not someone who reacts silently, even in court when he disagreed with a piece of evidence he was muttering and overheard by others. If there had been an event which had caused him to lose his temper or control he would not have been silent, he would have been heard by Dan. There would have been some form of commotion.
  1. According to the neurosurgeons in particular his account of a collapse followed by a panicked reaction involving a swift arc-like movement onto the bed could have had the same effect in Ellie as if she has been shaken or shaken with an impact onto a soft surface.
  1. On the medical front there is an innocent explanation for all the injuries Ellie sustained having taken into account the father’s own evidence. It is a complex picture that involves two innocent events in quick succession.
  1. Overall, I felt both parents wanted to be open with me. I felt in this context the father was anxious to be truthful. He did not say he remembered it all; he did not try to provide new information. I accept his account. I do not think he inflicted an abusive injury to Ellie. It may well be that inadvertently he injured her, but only in a reactive way after she had collapsed. I wonder how many parents in a panic situation scooping up a lifeless infant from a car seat remember to protect the wobbly head. I am sure many parents would not.
  1. It may be in failing to do so and swinging her round too fast he mimicked a rotational shaking movement; maybe he banged her head too hard onto the bed. He was a new and inexperienced parent reacting to a very difficult and frightening event. He was seeking to revive his baby. He may well have acted in too much haste and with too much force but not intending to harm her in any way.
  1. I do not blame him for causing injury to Ellie, while I accept that he may have done so with all good intention to help her.
  1. I hope everyone will accept that I do not attach any culpability to him, and that in my Judgment he is exonerated from causing her any inflicted injury. If, in fact, he did cause her injury it was purely accidental.

 

 

 

 

There are some final conclusions, which are very important. One is the Judge’s firm views that the involvement of neurosurgeons in a case of this kind is vital, with which I completely agree. Another is that the role of the Guardian, and her representatives in this case was pro-active and assisting the Court in reaching the truth, rather than the passive ‘deckchair brief’ that it often becomes.

 

We have had three judgments this year, McFarlane LJ,  Justice Mostyn and now this one, and this is the strongest of the three.  I would say that this is, because it is a positive decision praising the Guardian and her representatives for being pro-active, that it is now authority for the principle that this is what a Guardian and his or her team should do in fact finding hearings.  Fold up the deck-chair and get stuck into the medical records.

 

If you are representing a Guardian in a fact-finding hearing, or if you are involved in a fact-finding hearing and think the Guardian is being entirely passive, these passages are vitally important.  [My underlining]

 

I could NOT agree more forcefully with these sentiments – it isn’t for the Guardian to prosecute or defend, or to take a side, but to ensure that the possibilities are properly explored and that the Court has the best chance of reaching the truth for the children concerned.

 

  1. And Finally
  1. The medical evidence which I heard is very distant from that heard by HHJ Atkins in January 2008.
  1. To begin with neither he nor the criminal trial, nor indeed the Court of Appeal had sight of the CT scan of 26 February. Its first appearance in Court was before me and before I heard any evidence. Why it was not produced to Judge Atkins I do not know. It is a most valuable document identifying the subdural collections, the acute blood in the subdural space, and the cyst in the larynx.
  1. The Learned Judge heard evidence from Dr Rich, the “treating” Consultant Neuroradiologist, and Dr McConachie, the expert Consultant Neuroradiologist, who declined any further instructions in these proceedings. I did not. He did not have the evidence of Dr Anslow or Dr Stoodley.
  1. He heard from Dr Salem, Dr Dutta, and had reports from Dr Shepherd, all being ‘treating’ doctors. He heard from Dr Lloyd who was jointly instructed, and Dr Harding instructed by the mother. I did not.
  1. He heard from Mr Richards who has never seen the whole medical evidence. He did not hear or see any report from Dr Jayamohan.
  1. He heard from Professor Proops and Mr Joseph, both Consultant Otolaryngologists and ‘expert’ witnesses. He also heard from Mr Daya, the treating Consultant ENT Surgeon. I did not.
  1. He heard from Miss Leitch the ‘treating’ Ophthalmic Surgeon and Mr Gregson and Professor Taylor who were instructed as expert Ophthalmologists. I did not hear Miss Leitch.
  1. He also heard from Dr Cussons, a Consultant in Burns and Plastic surgery. Although I have seen his report and views he was not required, and I preferred the more pragmatic view of Professor Fleming.
  1. The Learned Judge did not hear from Professor Fleming, who was particularly instructed by the parties for this hearing as an expert paediatrician with considerable experience and interest in treating infants with airway and breathing difficulties, and those who have suffered a life-threatening event.
  1. It was very fortunate that he was available. The issue of airway obstruction had been raised long ago, particularly by Dr Salem who called for an expert. Although Dr Harding accepted the proposition her evidence was not so strong. Professor Proops’ evidence discounted airway obstruction as did Dr Lloyd.
  1. I have not read HHJ Atkins’ Judgment of January 2008 or the summing up of HHJ Stow, and deliberately so as to ensure that I dealt with the ‘raw’ medical evidence only and not that as recorded or interpreted by another. I cannot and do not criticise Judge Atkins Judgment, and I make no comment upon Judge Stow’s summing up.
  1. I have come to different conclusions from Judge Atkins on different and more expansive evidence. In my view it is important for me to emphasise this so that the parents, the grandparents and the girls in time can appreciate this. It may also be of some value to the Local Authority.
  1. I wish only to add a few comments and thoughts.
  1. I add also that in many cases involving a fact-finding hearing of alleged abusive injury a Guardian plays little or no part in the proceedings at that stage.
  1. In this case although I gave leave that the Guardian personally need not attend every day she was most ably represented by experienced Queen’s Counsel and experienced Junior, newly drawn from the ranks of solicitors.
  1. The Guardian through them was kept closely informed of the medical evidence. She was able to reflect upon it, and give clear instructions. She came to hear the parents’ own evidence, which in itself is important if a case is to go further.
  1. She gave clear instructions for her written submissions.
  1. I appreciate that it is important to consider costs in such cases, but in this case the Guardian’s involvement and interventions have been of great assistance and significance in the final outcome.
  1. There is no reason why a Guardian should not play an active part in a fact-finding hearing. There are very good reasons why a Guardian should.
  1. A Guardian represents the interests of the child. It is in the interests of that child that the truth is ascertained with as much clarity as possible.
  1. It is the child’s right to know in later life what happened in his/her childhood, and why certain decisions were taken.
  1. In days gone by when I was still practising, and when some children were represented by a Guardian, then the Official Solicitor, the Guardian’s Counsel took an active part in the fact-finding part of the hearing and was expected to do by the Judge and other Counsel ensuring that the relevant and appropriate questions were asked and issues raised for the Judge.
  1. In the appropriate case a Guardian should not only be represented but personally attend parts if not all of a fact-finding hearing, and be prepared to play as full a part as is necessary in that hearing: only then can the child be properly represented.
  1. The instruction and evidence of Professor Fleming only emphasises in cases of alleged inflicted injury and difficult medical issues to resolve the need for all parties and their legal advisors and Courts to consider with care the type of expert required, and the particular expert’s expertise and experience.
  1. It was also important in this case to have the evidence of two experienced Consultant Neurosurgeons. The evidence of a neurosurgeon tends to be broader than that of a neuroradiologist. A consultant neurosurgeon is capable of viewing a scan and interpreting what he sees, he then on operating will see the real thing, and see in fact what he saw as an image on a screen. He also has the advantage of meeting the parents or carer of an injured child, and indeed has to meet with and console grieving adults. Whilst working with the neuroradiologists discussing cases both neurosurgeons said they could read the scans, but deferred to the neuroradiologists for subtleties on the scan.
  1. Again in some cases and with an eye to the costs of cases it may be appropriate to consider instructing an expert neurosurgeon rather than neuroradiologists. In many cases the evidence only of a neuroradiologist is adequate.
  1. It is also important to reflect that in the last 5 years further research has been carried out and papers published on head injuries to infants. There has been much debate on the medical and legal worlds as to how or why some injuries occurred. The debate has emphasised that there is still much that is not fully understood and much to learn. Professor Fleming put it so well, that there was a need to be cautious, not arrogant, and to know that medical science is still learning.
  1. I simply add: “we do not know it all”.
  1. The late Mrs Justice Bracewell once commented to me after a particularly difficult case that it was at the “very edge of medical science”, “she could only do her best in the light of the evidence put to her”.
  1. Mr Justice Hedley is right: “we are fearfully and wonderfully made”.

 

[See, I said we’d be seeing that line again.  It”s from the King James Bible, Psalm 139:14 if you’re interested]

 

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Can a person choose whether to be represented by the Official Solicitor?

Posted on October 12, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

A consideration of the ECHR decision in R.P and Others v The United Kingdom 2012 

You may remember this case from 2008 in the Court of Appeal  – it was an appeal brought on behalf of a woman who had been judged to lack litigation capacity, and who had been represented through the Official Solicitor in care proceedings. The Official Solicitor had eventually not contested the care order at final hearing, and the woman then contacted John Hemming MP, and an appeal was brought on the basis that :-

(a)   The assessment of her litigation capacity was wrong

(b)   The assessment of her litigation capacity was fundamentally flawed as it had been obtained by an expert report funded by all parties, and thus the expert had a financial interest in reaching a particular conclusion (i.e because the LA were paying some of the experts fees, the expert had a financial conflict of interest and delivered a verdict they wanted)

(c)   That the entire principle of a person being unable to fight a Care Order when they wished to do so, purely because they lacked capacity was unfair and discriminatory against the most vulnerable persons in society.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, and it is a judgment worth reading. I know that Mr Hemming disagrees with the conclusions, as he is entitled to, and I put that caveat in so that people know that there is a different perspective to that in the judgment.  [That judgment is at  http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2008/462.html]

The case finally reached the ECHR and their judgment can be found at :-

http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/2012/1796.html

The Claimant was unsuccessful on all counts, but I still think that the case raises some important issues. It does feel uncomfortable that every parent, no matter the quality of their case has the right to be legally represented and challenge the recommendations of the State and to test that evidence UNLESS they lack litigation capacity and the Official Solicitor takes a view that the case should not be contested. 

It does seem to me that a person can lack litigation capacity to know what a care order is, or what a threshold criteria document is, or even to be taken through individual allegations and be able to respond to them, but I think fundamentally it is not difficult to judge whether the view of a parent in a care case is  “I want my child back” or “I don’t want my child to be adopted” and I think that case ought to be put.

What RP didn’t really get massively into was the ability of the Official Solicitor to effectively throw the towel in on behalf of a parent who lacks capacity to instruct a solicitor but still has firm views on that central question of ‘I want my child back’.  If the O/S always approached cases on the basis of ‘if the parent is saying they want the child back, that case must be put, but it will be for the O/S to instruct the solicitor on HOW to put the case’   I would be quite happy. Like John Hemming MP, I do feel uncomfortable when the O/S throws the towel in – even where the evidence is overwhelming. 

[After all, there were probably stages of Alas Al Wray where the evidence looked overwhelming…]

 

 

The ECHR accepted the view of the UK that where a person lacks litigation capacity, the Official Solicitor can be appointed and conduct the litigation and that the O/S has to do what they consider is in the child’s best interests.

 [Now, in my humble and trivial opinion,  sometimes what the parents consider to be the child’s best interest and what the child’s best interest is completely overlaps, sometimes they are diametrically opposed and more often than either, sometimes it takes a Court hearing and a determination of the evidence to see whether those two views overlap or are incompatible – that’s why we have Court hearings]

 

And of course, the need to conduct the ligitation with the child’s best interests at the forefront, rather than the parents wishes, is not a stipulation that applies to those receiving instructions directly from parents.   [With some caveats – a solicitor isn’t allowed to lie to a Court on your instructions,  or conceal child abuse,  but if a parent says ‘I want you to fight the case’ a solicitor isn’t obliged to decide whether fighting the case is good for the child, they let the Judge make that ultimate decision]

 

I think the submissions of the Equality and Human Rights Commission are interesting and worth reading.

  1. 58.                        3.  The submissions of the Third Party intervener

 

  1.   The Equality and Human Rights Commission (“the Commission”) submitted that learning-disabled parents in the United Kingdom were more likely to have their children removed from their care than other parents and frequently did not receive the support which they needed in order to retain custody of their children. Consequently, decisions about the removal of children from learning-disabled parents required very close scrutiny of the support offered to the parents.

 

  1.   The Commission further submitted that Articles 6, 8 or 14 could be breached if limitations were placed on a learning-disabled litigant’s right of access to a court which were not strictly necessary, or if a litigation friend did not take sufficient positive steps to ensure that the specific needs and interests of such a parent were properly taken into account. In particular, it was important that strong procedural safeguards existed to ensure that the parent’s views were properly, fully and fairly advanced before the court. In order for this to be the case, it was essential that decisions about the parent’s litigation capacity should not be taken on the basis of a joint report part-funded by an opposing party in family litigation; that the question of capacity be kept open, with a formal institutional/legal mechanism for it to be challenged by the learning-disabled person and reviewed if any evidence suggested it could be wrong or that the position had changed; and that the case put forward by the Official Solicitor or other litigation friend should be focused solely on the needs of the parent.

The ECHR were satisfied that the UK system has sufficient safeguards for establishing whether a person has litigation capacity and whether they are entitled to challenge such assessment, for the Official Solicitor role to operate properly and for this to be explained to the person, that the system did not discriminate against those with a disability, and that the system of jointly funding experts did not lead to a conflict of interest.

 

[Frankly, as a Local Authority lawyer who knows the financial budgetary problems, I’d have been delighted if the ECHR had decided that the LA could no longer share in the costs of instructing an expert]

Here is the reasoning on this element

  In cases involving those with disabilities the Court has permitted the domestic courts a certain margin of appreciation to enable them to make the relevant procedural arrangements to secure the good administration of justice and protect the health of the person concerned (see, for example, Shtukaturov v. Russia, no. 44009/05, § 68, 27 March 2008). This is in keeping with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which requires States to provide appropriate accommodation to facilitate the role of disabled persons in legal proceedings. However, the Court has held that such measures should not affect the very essence of an applicant’s right to a fair trial as guaranteed by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention. In assessing whether or not a particular measure was necessary, the Court will take into account all relevant factors, including the nature and complexity of the issue before the domestic courts and what was at stake for the applicant (see, for example, Shtukaturov v. Russia, cited above, § 68).

  It is clear that in the present case the proceedings were of the utmost importance to R.P., who stood to lose both custody of and access to her only child. Moreover, while the issue at stake was relatively straightforward – whether or not R.P. had the skills necessary to enable her successfully to parent K.P. – the evidence which would have to be considered before the issue could be addressed was not. In particular, the Court notes the significant quantity of expert reports, including expert medical and psychiatric reports, parenting assessment reports, and reports from contact sessions and observes the obvious difficulty an applicant with a learning disability would have in understanding both the content of these reports and the implications of the experts’ findings.

 

  In light of the above, and bearing in mind the requirement in the UN Convention that State parties provide appropriate accommodation to facilitate disabled persons’ effective role in legal proceedings, the Court considers that it was not only appropriate but also necessary for the United Kingdom to take measures to ensure that R.P.’s best interests were represented in the childcare proceedings. Indeed, in view of its existing case-law the Court considers that a failure to take measures to protect R.P.’s interests might in itself have amounted to a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention (see, mutatis mutandis, T. v. the United Kingdom [GC], no. 24724/94, §§ 79 – 89, 16 December 1999).

 

  It falls to the Court to consider whether the appointment of the Official Solicitor in the present case was proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued or whether it impaired the very essence of R.P.’s right of access to a court. In making this assessment, the Court will bear in mind the margin of appreciation afforded to Contracting States in making the necessary procedural arrangements to protect persons who lack litigation capacity (Shtukaturov v. Russia, cited above, § 68).

  With regard to the appointment of the Official Solicitor, the Court observes that he was only invited to act following the commissioning of an expert report by a consultant clinical psychologist. In assessing R.P., the psychologist applied the test set out in Masterman-Lister v Brutton & Co (Nos 1 and 2) [2002] EWCA Civ 1889; Masterman-Lister v Jewell and another [2003] EWCA Civ 70, namely whether R.P. was capable of understanding, with the assistance of such proper explanation from legal advisers and experts in other disciplines as the case may require, the issues on which her consent or decision was likely to be necessary in the course of the proceedings. She concluded that R.P. would find it very difficult to understand the advice given by her solicitor and would not be able to make informed decisions on the basis of that advice, particularly when it involved anticipating possible outcomes. The psychologist produced two more reports in the course of the proceedings, the second of which contained a further assessment of R.P.’s litigation capacity. In that report she noted that R.P. did not have the capacity to give informed consent to a placement order as she could not really understand the proceedings, except at a very basic level. The Court is satisfied that the decision to appoint the Official Solicitor was not taken lightly. Rather, it was taken only after R.P. had been thoroughly assessed by a consultant clinical psychologist and, while there was no formal review procedure, in practice further assessments were made of R.P.’s litigation capacity in the course of the proceedings.

  The Court considers that in order to safeguard R.P.’s rights under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, it was imperative that a means existed whereby it was possible for her to challenge the Official Solicitor’s appointment or the continuing need for his services. In this regard, the Court observes that the letter and leaflet which the Official Solicitor sent to R.P. informed her that if she was unhappy with the way her case was being conducted, she could speak to either S.C. or to the Official Solicitor, or she could contact a Complaint’s Officer. Moreover, in his statement to the Court of Appeal the Official Solicitor indicated that R.P. could have applied to the court at any time to have him discharged. Alternatively, he indicated that if it had come to his attention that R.P. was asserting capacity, then he would have invited her to undergo further assessment. While the Court observes that these procedures fall short of a formal right of appeal, in view of the finding that R.P. lacked litigation capacity, it considers that they would have afforded her an appropriate and effective means by which to challenge the appointment or the continued need for the appointment of the Official Solicitor.

  The Court does not consider that it would have been appropriate for the domestic courts to have carried out periodic reviews of R.P.’s litigation capacity, as such reviews would have caused unnecessary delay and would therefore have been prejudicial to the welfare of K.P. In any event, as noted above (see paragraph 69), assessments were in fact carried out of R.P.’s litigation capacity in the course of the proceedings. The Court would also reject R.P.’s assertion that she should have been encouraged to seek separate legal advice at this juncture. In view of the fact that she had been found to lack the capacity to instruct a solicitor the Court does not consider that this would have been a necessary or even an effective means by which to protect her interests.

  As stated in paragraph 61 above, the Convention is intended to guarantee not rights that are theoretical or illusory but rights that are practical and effective and this is particularly so of the right of access to a court in view of the prominent place held in a democratic society by the right to a fair trial (Airey v. Ireland, cited above, § 24). Consequently, any means of challenging the appointment of the Official Solicitor, however effective in theory, will only be effective in practice and thus satisfy the requirements of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention if the fact of his appointment, the implications of his appointment, the existence of a means of challenging his appointment and the procedure for exercising it are clearly explained to the protected person in language appropriate to his or her level of understanding.

 

  In this regard, the Court recalls that the letter sent to R.P. indicated that the Official Solicitor would act as her guardian ad litem and would instruct her solicitor for her. It further indicated that S.C. would tell the Official Solicitor how R.P. felt about things and that he would consider her wishes and views before he filed a statement on her behalf. He would do his best to protect her interests but also had to bear in mind what was best for K.P. The leaflet accompanying the letter informed R.P. that the Official Solicitor made decisions about court cases, such as whether to bring, defend or settle a claim. Under the heading “Will the client be consulted” R.P. was informed that “the instructed solicitor will communicate with the client and attend court hearings and will report on the outcome to the case manager”. If she was dissatisfied with the way her case was being conducted, she was informed that she should discuss the matter either with S.C. or the Official Solicitor’s Office. If she remained dissatisfied she could write to the Complaint’s Officer. While the Court accepts that R.P. might not have fully understood, on the basis of this information alone, that the Official Solicitor could consent to the making of a placement order regardless of her own personal wishes, it cannot ignore the fact that she was at all times represented by S.C. and experienced counsel who should have, and by all accounts did, explain to her the exact role of the Official Solicitor and the implications of his appointment.  Indeed, in this regard the Court recalls that S.C.’s conduct of the case was commended by the Court of Appeal which found, in its judgment of 8 May 2008, that R.P. had been fully informed of the involvement of the Official Solicitor and the nature of his role. Nevertheless, she did not seek to complain until ten months after his appointment and two days before the final hearing.

74.                         Consequently, the Court considers that adequate safeguards were in place to ensure that the nature of the proceedings was fully explained to the applicant and, had she sought to challenge the appointment of the Official Solicitor, procedures were in place to enable her to do so (cf. Stanev v. Bulgaria, [GC], no. 36760/06, 17 January 2012, where no direct access to court was open to the applicant to have his status as a partially incapacitated person reviewed by a court).

 

  1. 75.                          With regard to the role of the Official Solicitor in the legal proceedings, the Court recalls that he was to act “for the benefit of the protected party”. The Court has taken note of R.P.’s concerns about his focus in the present case on “what was best for K.P.”. However, the Court accepts that the best interests of K.P. were the touchstone by which the domestic courts would assess the case. Thus, in determining whether a case was arguable or not, it was necessary for the Official Solicitor to consider what was in K.P.’s best interests. Consequently, the Court does not consider that the fact the Official Solicitor “bore in mind” what was best for K.P. in deciding how to act amounted to a violation of R.P.’s rights under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.

 

  1. 76.                          Moreover, the Court does not consider that “acting in R.P.’s best interests” required the Official Solicitor to advance any argument R.P. wished. On the contrary, it would not have been in R.P.’s – or in any party’s – best interests for the Official Solicitor to have delayed proceedings by advancing an unarguable case. Nevertheless, in view of what was at stake for R.P., the Court considers that in order to safeguard her rights under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, it was imperative that her views regarding K.P.’s future be made known to the domestic court. It is clear that this did, in fact, occur as R.P.’s views were referenced both by the Official Solicitor in his statement to the court and by R.P.’s counsel at the hearing itself.

 

  1. 77.                          Moreover, the Court recalls that R.P. was able to appeal to the Court of Appeal. Although she was not legally represented in the appeal proceedings, this was through choice as she refused the assistance of pro bono counsel which the Official Solicitor had secured for her. Nevertheless, the Court notes that in the course of the appeal proceedings she was afforded ample opportunity to put her views before the court, and her arguments were fully addressed in the court’s judgment.

[If you have read the Court of Appeal decision, you will be aware that whether this letter was sent was a matter of great factual dispute, with it being alleged that it had been falsely inserted into the file by the solicitor as a ‘back covering exercise’ after the event  but never actually sent. The Court of Appeal rejected that allegation fairly forcefully, but one can see the critical importance of proper documentation prepared in a way that the client can comprehend being provided in a timely fashion]

 

All of this seems to go away, of course, now that the Practice Direction suggesting that the Official Solicitor may cheerfully refuse to act on behalf of someone lacking litigation capacity and that the solicitor should take instructions from the client’s friends, family, neighbour,  friendly milkman,  local newsagent et al instead.

 

I am adding in the comment made by @thesmallplaces on the UK Human Rights blog post about this, because I think it raises some really important points and in an excellent way – so none of these are my words that follow, but I do agree with an awful lot of it, particularly the fine final paragraph.

I think it’s a real shame that this case has become overshadowed by the antics of John Hemming MP. Although it raised very serious Article 6 issues, every time these issues are raised they get swept aside by a discussion of Hemming’s behaviour. Valid as many of those criticisms are, this misses the point entirely. I’m really pleased to see that serious lawyers like Rosalind English and Richard Stein are talking about these issues.

My feeling is that the ECtHR gave a very superficial analysis of the situation. Prior to RP bringing the case in the Court of Appeal, it wasn’t even clear that a person who had been found to lack capacity to litigate had standing to (see paragraph 36 where Sir Nicholas Wall ‘says no more about it’ as neither the OS nor the LA raised a challenge on these grounds). I suppose the ECtHR ruling has at least made clear that people in RP’s position must have standing to apply to the court to displace their litigation friend. But there are several problems here. How is a person who may have borderline capacity, who is unlikely in the extreme to be familiar with CPR 21 or Court of Protection Rule 147, supposed to do so without being able to instruct a solicitor? These are precisely the circumstances which drive people into the arms of McKenzie friends like Hemming in the first place. Secondly, if they do wish to challenge the appointment of a litigation friend in court – is there public funding for them to do so? How are they supposed to secure and fund any expert reports they might need?

The ECtHR placed great store by the OS’s complaints mechanism. There is very little evidence that the complaints mechanism has ever been used in this way. Certainly none of the OS’s annual reports for the last four years suggests that he has withdrawn from a case on the basis of a complaint. The ECtHR also said that RP should have raised her challenge to his appointment earlier. There is very little discussion as to precisely what RP was told about the OS’s appointment at the outset. The role of a litigation friend seems baffling to most people outside the legal world. To be told that somebody has been appointed who will act in your best interests is very different to being told that somebody has been appointed who might argue a case which conflicts entirely with what you want. Surely that latter point is what must be pressed home to a person in order for them to fully understand the significance of being found to lack litigation capacity. Yet neither the CoA nor the ECtHR report that this is what RP was told.

One of the core principles of the MCA is that people should be offered support to promote their capacity in the relevant respect. If you look at the correspondence between RP and her solicitor quote in the CoA ruling, it’s very hard to see how this is geared towards supporting a young mother with learning disabilities who is extremely distressed. For somebody in RP’s position, the first stage should be to provide support for her to understand and make the requisite decisions herself. For people with learning disabilities, it may require skills which mainstream solicitors don’t have – yet there is very little provision of advocacy services or similar which could help people with litigation matters.

There is a wider question about whether it is even appropriate for a person’s ‘objective’ – as opposed to ‘subjective’ – best interests to be represented in court. There are cases where there is a danger that a person might run up excessive costs or settle for trifling amounts without the intervention of litigation friends – they often have a very valuable role in such cases. Likewise in cases where a person’s wishes and preferences cannot be discerned. But in cases like this, or cases in the Court of Protection, where the courts are already bound to give effect to the best interests of the child or the person themselves, what is the danger in pressing as hard as possible for what the person actually wants? To do otherwise distorts the case that is presented before the court so that a person’s rights to self-determination are never fully adversarially tested. What is tested instead, is other people’s views of what they should want.”

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Ultra Orthodox or Orthodox – which is best? Only one way to find out…

Posted on October 10, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

 

The case of Re G (Children) 2012 has attracted quite a bit of press attention, and it touches on some interesting issues; particularly on the role of the Courts in determining religious disputes and how deeply the Court will roll up its sleeves and plunge arms into those murky waters.

 

The case can be found here

 

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2012/1233.html

 

 

The thrust of the case is fairly simple – the parents separated. The mother diverted from her previous religious beliefs, which were ‘ultra-orthodox’ Jewish specifically Chareidi  and now described herself as ‘orthodox’. The father remained of the ‘ultra-orthodox’ Chareidi faith.

 

They could not resolve between themselves which school their children would be attending  (the youngest child was 3, so for him it was an issue for the future).     The father wanted the children to attend a Chareidi school, and the mother a Modern Orthodox school.

 

The Court was therefore faced with a Specific Issue Order application, arising within an application for a Residence order.   It was very clear from the evidence that it was not a simple narrow ‘which school is better’ approach, but that the selection of the school would effectively be a determination of whether the children would have an ‘orthodox’ or ‘ultra orthodox’ way of life.  It was central to the children’s lives in a way that it would not necessarily be where the religious principles were so intertwined with educational provision.

 

[Given that orthodox means ‘true belief’ or ‘having the right opinion’  loosely, being orthodox is good, and perhaps etymologically speaking being  ‘ultra orthodox’ is either better, or a tautology]

 

The judgment in the Court of Appeal would be a very good start for distilling the essential principles of how the Court is to approach matters of religious difference.

 

It is not the place of the Court to weigh one religion against the other, not to comment or criticise religious practices (although they are entitled to look at the impact of those practices on the child), and all religions are entitled to equal respect as long as they are legally and socially acceptable.  The Court would have a view on religious practices such as forced marriage or female circumcision on that basis.

 

  1. Religion – whatever the particular believer’s faith – is not the business of government or of the secular courts, though the courts will, of course, pay every respect to the individual’s or family’s religious principles. Article 9 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, after all, demands no less. The starting point of the common law is thus respect for an individual’s religious principles, coupled with an essentially neutral view of religious beliefs and a benevolent tolerance of cultural and religious diversity.
  1. It is not for a judge to weigh one religion against another. The court recognises no religious distinctions and generally speaking passes no judgment on religious beliefs or on the tenets, doctrines or rules of any particular section of society. All are entitled to equal respect, so long as they are “legally and socially acceptable” (Purchas LJ in Re R (A Minor) (Residence: Religion) [1993] 2 FLR 163, 171) and not “immoral or socially obnoxious” (Scarman LJ in Re T (Minors) (Custody: Religious Upbringing) (1981) 2 FLR 239, 244) or “pernicious” (Latey J in Re B and G (Minors) (Custody) [1985] FLR 134, 157, referring to scientology).
  1. The Strasbourg jurisprudence is to the same effect. Article 9 of the European Convention provides as follows:

“1 Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

2 Freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.”

The protection of Article 9 is qualified in two ways. In the first place, the Convention protects only religions and philosophies which are “worthy of respect in a ‘democratic society’ and are not incompatible with human dignity”: see Campbell and Cosans v United Kingdom (No 2) (1982) 4 EHRR 293, [36]. I mention the point only for completeness; it plainly does not arise in this case, because the parents’ beliefs are in each case clearly worthy of respect. Secondly, whilst religious belief and thought are (subject to that overriding qualification) given absolute protection by Article 9(1), the “manifestation” of one’s religion in “worship, teaching, practice and observance” is subject to the qualifications referred to in Article 9(2).

  1. The important point for present purposes is that the Convention forbids the State to determine the validity of religious beliefs and in that respect imposes on the State a duty of what the Strasbourg court has called neutrality and impartiality: see, for example, Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army v Russia(2007) 44 EHRR 46, [58], where the court said that:

“The State’s duty of neutrality and impartiality … is incompatible with any power on the State’s part to assess the legitimacy of religious beliefs.”

  1. Within limits the law – our family law – will tolerate things which society as a whole may find undesirable. A child’s best interests have to be assessed by reference to general community standards, making due allowance for the entitlement of people, within the limits of what is permissible in accordance with those standards, to entertain very divergent views about the religious, moral, social and secular objectives they wish to pursue for themselves and for their children. We have moreover to have regard to the realities of the human condition, described by Hedley J in Re L (Care: Threshold Criteria) [2007] 1 FLR 2050, [50]:

“… society must be willing to tolerate very diverse standards of parenting, including the eccentric, the barely adequate and the inconsistent. It follows too that children will inevitably have both very different experiences of parenting and very unequal consequences flowing from it. It means that some children will experience disadvantage and harm, while others flourish in atmospheres of loving security and emotional stability. These are the consequences of our fallible humanity and it is not the provenance of the state to spare children all the consequences of defective parenting. In any event, it simply could not be done.”

  1. Where precisely the limits are to be drawn is often a matter of controversy. There is no ‘bright-line’ test that the law can set. The infinite variety of the human condition precludes arbitrary definition.
  1. Some things are nevertheless beyond the pale: forced marriages (always to be distinguished of course from arranged marriages to which the parties consent), female genital mutilation and so-called, if grotesquely misnamed, ‘honour-based’ domestic violence. Plainly, as I wish to emphasise, we are not here in that territory.
  1. Some aspects of even mainstream religious belief may fall foul of public policy. A recent striking example is Westminster City Council v C and others [2008] EWCA Civ 198, [2009] Fam 11, where this court held on grounds of public policy that a ‘marriage’ valid under both Sharia law and the lex loci celebrationis, despite the manifest incapacity of one of the parties, was not entitled to recognition in English law. Again, I emphasise, we are not here in that territory.
  1. Some manifestations of religious practice may be regulated if contrary to a child’s welfare. Although a parent’s views and wishes as to the child’s religious upbringing are of great importance, and will always be seriously regarded by the court, just as the court will always pay great attention to the wishes of a child old enough to be able to express sensible views on the subject of religion, even if not old enough to take a mature decision, they will be given effect to by the court only if and so far as and in such manner as is in accordance with the child’s best interests. In matters of religion, as in all other aspects of a child’s upbringing, the interests of the child are the paramount consideration.
  1. There are many examples of the working out of these principles in the family courts. Sometimes, as in the cases involving blood transfusions for the children of Jehovah’s Witnesses, the issue is literally one of life or death (using those words in the secular sense). The tenets and faith of Jehovah’s Witnesses will not prevent the court ordering a child to receive a blood transfusion, even though both the parents and the child vehemently object: see, for example, Re E (A Minor) (Wardship: Medical Treatment) [1993] 1 FLR 386.
  1. But the clash between a parent’s religious beliefs and a loved child’s welfare may arise in many other contexts. Consider, for example, the wrenchingly sad case of Re S; Newcastle City Council v Z [2005] EWHC 1490 (Fam), [2007] 1 FLR 861, where the question was whether, within the meaning of section 16(2)(b) of the Adoption Act 1976, a mother was unreasonably withholding her consent to the adoption of her son on the basis of religious beliefs that were reasonable and genuinely held. I adjudged that she was. As I said [56]:

“Religious belief is no more determinative of whether a parent is acting reasonably than it is of whether something is in a child’s best interests. Whilst the court will no doubt be slow to conclude that a parent faithfully striving to follow the teachings of one of the great religions of the world is acting unreasonably, there is nothing to prevent the court coming to that conclusion in an appropriate case. Everything must depend upon the facts and the context. In this, as in so many other areas of family law, context is everything.”

  1. Often issues of this kind arise, as in the present case, following the breakdown of the parental relationship in a situation where the parents have different religious beliefs or follow different religious observances. Examples to which we were referred are Re J (Specific Issue Orders: Muslim Upbringing and Circumcision) [1999] 2 FLR 678, affirmed Re J (Specific Issue Orders: Child’s Religious Upbringing and Circumcision) [2000] 1 FLR 571, where there was a dispute between a Muslim father and a Christian mother as to the circumcision of their 5-year old son, and Re S (Specific Issue Order: Religion: Circumcision) [2004] EWHC 1282 (Fam), [2005] 1 FLR 236, where a similar dispute arose between a Muslim mother and a Hindu (Jain) father. We were also taken, and appropriately in some detail, to Re T (Minors) (Custody: Religious Upbringing) (1981) 2 FLR 239, where custody was in dispute between a father who was a member of the Church of England and a mother who was a Jehovah’s Witness, and to Re R (A Minor) (Residence: Religion) [1993] 2 FLR 163, where residence and contact were in issue because the father was a member of the Exclusive Brethren.
  1. None of this is at all controversial but it requires to be clearly understood because it is the essential legal landscape against which the issue in the present case falls to be determined.
  1. In the present context I can do no better than to set out what Scarman LJ (as he then was) said in Re T (Minors) (Custody: Religious Upbringing) (1981) 2 FLR 239, 244-245, in a passage understandably much relied upon by Miss Platt. It is a long passage but it demands citation in full as a powerful and compelling statement of principle by one of the greatest and most socially sensitive judges of his generation. He was speaking in 1975, although for some reason the case was not reported until 1981, but his words remain as true today as then:

“We live in a tolerant society. There is no reason at all why the mother should not espouse the beliefs and practice of Jehovah’s Witnesses. It is conceded that there is nothing immoral or socially obnoxious in the beliefs and practice of this sect. Indeed, I would echo the words of Stamp LJ in T v T (1974) 4 Fam Law 190 in which he said this of the Jehovah’s Witnesses – and what he said is, indeed, borne out by such evidence as we have in this case:

“Many families bring up their children as Jehovah’s Witnesses and the children are good members of the community, although perhaps a little isolated from other children in certain respects. They are different but the same thing could be said of Presbyterians, Catholics and indeed any other religious faith.”

It is as reasonable on the part of the mother that she should wish to teach her children the beliefs and practice of the Jehovah’s Witnesses as it is reasonable on the part of the father that they should not be taught those practices and beliefs.

It is not for this court, in society as at present constituted, to pass any judgment on the beliefs of the mother or on the beliefs of the father. It is sufficient for this court that it should recognize that each is entitled to his or her own beliefs and way of life, and that the two opposing ways of life considered in this case are both socially acceptable and certainly consistent with a decent and respectable life. What follows from that? It follows, in my judgment, that there is a great risk, merely because we are dealing with an unpopular minority sect, in overplaying the dangers to the welfare of these children inherent in the possibility that they may follow their mother and become Jehovah’s Witnesses. Of course, most of us like to play games on Saturdays, to go out to children’s parties and to have a quiet Sunday – some of us will go to church, and some of us will not. This appears to be the normal and happy, even though somewhat materialistic, way of life, accepted by the majority of people in our society. It does not follow, however, that it is wrong, or contrary to the welfare of children, that life should be in a narrower sphere, subject to a stricter religious discipline, and without the parties on birthdays and Christmas that seem so important to the rest of us. These are factors that must be considered, but I think it is essential in a case of this sort to appreciate that the mother’s teaching, once it is accepted as reasonable, is teaching that has got to be considered against the whole background of the case and not as in itself so full of danger for the children that it alone could justify making an order which otherwise the court would not make.”

  1. How then is the court to decide in such a case? I quote again from Scarman LJ (at 248):

“… when one has, as we have here, two good parents, indeed, two unimpeachable parents, each of them following very different ways of life, which have led to the matrimonial breakdown, it does not follow that, because one parent’s way of life is more acceptable to most of us, it is contrary to the welfare of the children that they should adopt the way of life of the other parent that is acceptable only to a minority, and a tiny minority at that.”

 

 

 

 

So, in essence, both of the religious practices espoused by the parents were legal and legitimate and the Court had no basis for determining that one was in any way inferior or less proper than the other.  Equally, it was not right to consider that one was more socially common than the other, and to prefer the one which seemed to our eyes more usual.  Or even that one seemed more normal than the other to secular eyes.

 

How then, were the Court to resolve a problem between two parents, each with Parental Responsibility, and each with a valid and legitimate viewpoint and desire?

 

Lord Justice Munby goes on a digression here which was fascinating to a law geek like me; and explains exactly why the historical starting point in English law that it was for the father to decide what happens with his children is no longer how the Courts settle things.  [And an interesting side note for those who consider that mothers have the upper hand  in family courts – there’s 1925 statute law, still in force, to say otherwise. Whether that is followed, or indeed known, much I could not say]

 

  1. Time was when the solution to a case such as this would have been simple. The court would have declined to become involved and deferred to parental authority, that authority being of course exclusively the father’s. According to Sir William Balliol Brett MR, the court could not interfere with “the sacred right of a father over his own children.” A father had a legal right to control and direct the education and bringing up of his children, and the court would not interfere with him in the exercise of his paternal authority, unless by his gross moral turpitude he forfeited his rights or had by his conduct abdicated his paternal authority: In re Agar-Ellis, Agar-Ellis v Lascelles (1883) 24 ChD 317. That was, to quote the words of Lord Upjohn in J v C [1970] AC 668, 721, the dreadful case where the Court of Appeal permitted a monstrously unreasonable father to impose upon his daughter of 17 much unnecessary hardship in the name of his religious faith.
  1. The retreat from that high water mark of judicial abstention is traced in the speeches of the Law Lords in J v C and subsequently in Gillick v West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority [1986] AC 112. The speech of Lord Scarman in the latter case demands particular attention. For present purposes there are two centrally important developments to be noted.
  1. The first was the eventual realisation that the child’s welfare as judicially determined is paramount. In 1924 Lord Cave LC could treat this as established principle: Ward v Laverty [1925] AC 101, 108. The principle was put on a statutory basis in section 1 of the Guardianship of Infants Act 1925. It has been part of our statute law ever since, now enshrined in section 1(a) of the Children Act 1989 which provides that:

“When a court determines any question with respect to … the upbringing of a child… the child’s welfare shall be the court’s paramount consideration.”

  1. The other equally important development was the dethroning of the father from his privileged position vis-à-vis the mother. The Guardianship of Infants Act 1886 marked an important step in that direction, but the 1925 Act put the matter beyond all argument. The preamble to the 1925 Act read as follows:

“Whereas Parliament by the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act, 1919, and various other enactments, has sought to establish equality in law between the sexes, and it is expedient that this principle should obtain with respect to the guardianship of infants and the rights and responsibilities conferred thereby:”

The second limb of section 1 was in the following terms:

“the court … shall not take into consideration whether from any other point of view the claim of the father, or any right at common law possessed by the father, … is superior to that of the mother, or the claim of the mother is superior to that of the father.”

  1. Ever since then, men and women, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers have come before the family courts, as they come today, on an exactly equal footing. The voice of the father carries no more weight because he is the father, nor does the mother’s because she is the mother. The weight to be attached to their views, if opposed, is to be determined on the basis of the merits or otherwise of the views being expressed, not on the basis of the gender of the person propounding them. The second limb of section 1 of the 1925 Act finds no place in section 1 of the 1989 Act, though it still appeared in section 1 of the Guardianship of Minors Act 1971, no doubt because by the late 1980s Parliament thought that it went without saying. And no doubt for that reason the true significance and importance of section 1 of the 1925 Act is sometimes forgotten. But it was, and remains, fundamental.

 

 

 

So, it was for the Court to determine what was in the children’s best interests (given that the parents could not agree and had asked the Court to resolve it – Munby LJ was at pains to make clear that this was not the State interfering uninvited with the parents religious arrangements and preferences, but that the Court had been asked to determine the dispute and could not decline to do so).   That’s quite a long route to decide that it is a welfare checklist issue, but it was necessary to take the route in this case, to clear out what was important and relevant and what perhaps only appeared to be.

 

The trial judge had heard evidence about the two schools and the two ways of life, and the impact on the children of following either educational course. In the end, he made the determination that the children would have better opportunities in life by attending the ‘Orthodox’ school as mother desired, rather than the ‘ultra-Orthodox’ school that father wished.

 

There was then an issue about whether that was too narrow a construction and whether the trial judge had placed far too much emphasis on the ‘pure’ educational component and not enough weight on the ‘entire way of life’ component.

 

 

The Court of Appeal dismissed the father’s appeal and did not feel that the Judge had been plainly wrong  (indeed, they indicate that they would have been likely to reach the same decision, had they heard the case in its entireity)

 

  1. In the first place, he had to take into account the present reality that, following the parental separation in October 2010, the children had not been following an exclusively Chareidi way of life. When with their mother they were inevitably exposed to her significantly less strict form of observance. So already, and in significant part, what the father would have wanted for his children, was simply not possible. But the father’s case was, of course, and correctly, that one must not overstate the significance of what had happened. If the children continued within the Chareidi educational system they would have less – very much less – exposure to the non-Chareidi way of life than if they were educated in the way the mother wanted. Judge Copley, as we have seen, was acutely aware of this reality.
  1. At this point a fundamental issue has to be grappled with. What in our society today, looking to the approach of parents generally in 2012, is the task of the ordinary reasonable parent? What is the task of a judge, acting as a ‘judicial reasonable parent’ and approaching things by reference to the views of reasonable parents on the proper treatment and methods of bringing up children? What are their aims and objectives? These are questions which, in the forensic forum, do not often need to be asked or answered. But in a case such as this they are perhaps unavoidable.
  1. In the conditions of current society there are, as it seems to me, three answers to this question. First, we must recognise that equality of opportunity is a fundamental value of our society: equality as between different communities, social groupings and creeds, and equality as between men and women, boys and girls. Second, we foster, encourage and facilitate aspiration: both aspiration as a virtue in itself and, to the extent that it is practical and reasonable, the child’s own aspirations. Far too many lives in our community are blighted, even today, by lack of aspiration. Third, our objective must be to bring the child to adulthood in such a way that the child is best equipped both to decide what kind of life they want to lead – what kind of person they want to be – and to give effect so far as practicable to their aspirations. Put shortly, our objective must be to maximise the child’s opportunities in every sphere of life as they enter adulthood. And the corollary of this, where the decision has been devolved to a ‘judicial parent’, is that the judge must be cautious about approving a regime which may have the effect of foreclosing or unduly limiting the child’s ability to make such decisions in future.
  1. The point arises in its most obvious and extreme form where the issue before the court is whether to require a teenager to submit against their wishes to life-saving medical treatment. There, as Nolan LJ once observed (In Re W. (A Minor) (Medical Treatment: Court’s Jurisdiction) [1993] Fam 64, 94), the duty of the court is to ensure so far as it can that children survive to attain the age of 18 at which an individual is free to do with his life what he wishes. A poignant example is provided by the aftermath of Re E (A Minor) (Wardship: Medical Treatment) [1993] 1 FLR 386, where Ward J (as he then was) had required a 15¾ year old Jehovah’s Witness to have a blood transfusion despite his, and his parents’, vehemently expressed religious objections. A few years later, not long after he had attained his majority, E’s leukaemia returned. He refused a blood transfusion, going bravely to his death steadfast in his religious faith.
  1. But the point arises equally, if in less extreme form, in the kind of case with which we are here concerned. So, in my judgment, Judge Copley was entitled to proceed as he did, just as he was entitled to accept Miss Adams’ analysis. To repeat:

“Whilst it is evident that either decision regarding schooling will result in losses, I have viewed this dilemma as one where I have tried to assess in which situation the children will have the most choices about relationship with both parents in the future, and the most choice about how they wish to live in the future.”

  1. Applying that approach to the particular facts of the present case, and bearing in mind his acceptance of Mrs Adams’ analysis, it seems to me that there were four key strands in Judge Copley’s reasoning.
  1. The first focused on educational opportunity. Here the evidence was clear and the choice stark. Whatever may be the practice in relation to education down to the point when children takes GCSEs, it is clear that, even for boys, the educational options narrow drastically thereafter in the Chareidi system and that tertiary education as generally understood hardly features at all. Career opportunities for boys in professions such as medicine and the law are very limited indeed, for girls virtually non-existent. The contrast with the wider community could hardly be greater. It is hard to imagine how either law or medicine could operate today without the women who at every level and in such large numbers enjoy careers which they find fulfilling and from which society as a whole derives so much benefit. Take the law: when I was called to the Bar in 1971 there were 2,714 barristers in practice at the independent bar of whom only 167 (some 6%) were women; by 2011 there were 12,673 of whom 4,106 (some 32%) were women. That is a measure of just how far society has moved in the last 40 years. And that, in my judgment, is the kind of societal reality to which a family judge must have regard in a case such as this. It is, after all, the reality which is daily on display in our family courts. The present case, as it happens, is typical of many: all three counsel who appeared before us were women, so too were the two solicitors, and so too was the CAFCASS officer. Judge Copley, in my judgment, was plainly entitled to conclude, as he did, that:

“the schools to which she wishes to send them will provide infinitely superior opportunities for these children to gain a much fuller and wider education, not only at secondary level but also at tertiary level should they choose that – the father’s own evidence and that of his witnesses bears this out – and thereafter they will have much greater job opportunities”,

just as he was entitled to accept Mrs Adams’ view that it was:

“more likely that the children will achieve greater economic success if they are given aspirations in relation to careers that exist outside the Jewish community.”

  1. The second strand in Judge Copley’s reasoning was his acceptance of Mrs Adams’ analysis of the emotional impacts on the children:

“If the children were to go to the schools of [father’s] choosing, I think there is a high risk that their relationship with their mother would become problematic … Conversely, if the children go to a school of [mother’s] choosing, there will be considerable losses also … I also think that there is some merit in the observation that a more accepting community composed of children from a variety of backgrounds will make it easier for the children to adjust to being children of a separated family … I think it will be easier for them to make the transition at a younger age, when children are often more adaptable in terms of peer groups.”

In relation to this Mrs Adams made a particularly powerful point:

“It would cause emotional confusion for them to depend upon their mother for love and care, yet have her choices presented as undesirable, and maybe feel that they should not listen to her.”

In my judgment, Judge Copley was plainly entitled to proceed on this basis.

  1. The third strand in Judge Copley’s reasoning was his acceptance of a very important point made by Mrs Adams:

“I am concerned that the children would have difficulty making a decision to embrace their mother’s lifestyle when they are older as they would be fearful of leaving behind everything they had grown up with … On the other hand, within the sort of community their mother proposes, they would be able to return to their religious roots when older.”

Again, in my judgment, Judge Copley was plainly entitled to proceed on this basis.

  1. The fourth and final strand in Judge Copley’s reasoning was his view, shared with Mrs Adams, that on balance the children’s interests were best served by what the mother was proposing. He was, in my judgment, plainly entitled to come to that conclusion.
  1. It follows that the father’s appeal must in my judgment be dismissed. This court can interfere only if it can be shown that Judge Copley was plainly wrong. He was not. I would, however, go further. Far from being plainly wrong Judge Copley was, as it seems to me, in all probability right in the decision to which he came. I suspect that, had I been in his position, having heard all the evidence he heard, I would have come to precisely the same conclusion.

 

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and said ‘oh oh, smother me mother’

Posted on October 3, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

Tasteless title, for which I apologise, but it is a Smiths song.  (the passing of time, and all of its sickening crimes, is making me sad again)

A consideration of AA (A Child) 2012 EWHC 2647 (Fam)  – especially for John Bolch, as I am now taking requests  (other than of the ‘why don’t you just eff off’ variety)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2012/2647.html

Firstly, either Justice Baker has had the most difficult caseload of all time, or (more likely) he’s had a pile of published judgments in his in-tray waiting to be signed off for a while and has done about six in a week, because this is him again.

Secondly, its another in the developing body of High Court caselaw where Judges who might have been accepting of medical evidence (particularly if it stood up to cross-examination) are now setting it in a broader judicial context of the totality of the evidence to be assessed, and recognition that today’s medical dogma might well be tomorrow’s “well, we USED to think”  – I have been told today of a very interesting judgment forthcoming on this topic where the conclusion is that an earlier fact finding on very serious injuries resulted in a miscarriage of justice.

But anyway, onto RE AA.

Here is the opening background, and one can tell immediately that the mother is going to be under pressure in the finding of fact hearing

    1. This is a tragic and extremely difficult case. On 6th January 2011, a little boy, whom I shall refer to as J, died while in the sole care of his mother. Twelve weeks later, on 1st April 2011, his older brother, whom I shall refer to as B, then aged four, was found in a state of acute collapse, also whilst in the sole care of his mother, and died three days later in hospital.

 

  1. Police began an extensive investigation, which is still ongoing, into the causes of those deaths. The local authority started care proceedings in respect of the surviving younger sister of the boys, whom I shall refer to as A, now aged two. The local authority contends that the threshold under section 31 of the Children Act for the making of care orders is crossed in this case and seeks findings, first, that the mother neglected her children and, secondly and more seriously, that she was responsible for the deaths of the two boys by asphyxiation. The proceedings were transferred to the High Court and listed before me for a fact-finding hearing held in Portsmouth. This judgment is delivered at the conclusion of that hearing.

Regardless of how things play out, it is plain to see that professionals are going to have high levels of anxiety about this case.  Particularly given the existence of a third child.

And here’s a warning that idle remarks, made without any malice, can take on horrible significance when looked at through the cold microscope of forensic analysis

On another occasion in November, the mother became drunk when caring for the children, who were taken round to DA’s house. There is evidence that on occasions the mother expressed frustration about the demands for caring for the children. She was a regular user of text-messaging and the internet MSN message service and, when chatting to friends by these means, she would on occasions grumble about the children. One example, on the evening prior to J’s death, contains the statement that she could have “fucking killed” B, because he had made J cry and been disobedient, and added an additional remark: “I wish I didn’t have fucking kids.”

The case sets out the detailed medical history, which I won’t go into – I couldn’t summarise it better than the Judge has already done, and if you want to read it, I would go to the source.

The Judge sets out the legal position on reliance on medical experts, with the Cannings case unsurprisingly looming large in that regard.

The approach to expert evidence

    1. It is particularly important to bear in mind the point just made above where, as is invariably the case in cases of suspected physical abuse, the evidence adduced includes the opinion of the medical experts. As Ryder J observed in A County Council v A Mother and others [2005] EWHC Fam. 31,

 

“A factual decision must be based on all available materials, i.e. be judged in context and not just upon medical or scientific materials, no matter how cogent they may in isolation seem to be.”

    1. Whilst appropriate attention must be paid to the opinion of the medical experts, their opinions need to be considered in the context of all the circumstances. In A County Council v K D & L [2005] EWHC 144 (Fam) at paragraphs 39 and 44, Charles J observed,

 

“It is important to remember (1) that the roles of the court and the expert are distinct and (2) it is the court that is in the position to weigh up the expert evidence against its findings on the other evidence. The judge must always remember that he or she is the person who makes the final decision.”

Later in the same judgment, Charles J added at paragraph 49,

“In a case where the medical evidence is to the effect that the likely cause is non-accidental and thus  human agency, a court can reach a finding on the totality of the evidence either (a) that on the balance of probability an injury has a natural cause, or is not a non-accidental injury, or (b) that a local authority has not established the existence of the threshold to the civil standard of proof … The other side of the coin is that in a case where the medical evidence is that there is nothing diagnostic of a non-accidental injury or human agency and the clinical observations of the child, although consistent with non-accidental injury or human agency, are the type asserted is more usually associated with accidental injury or infection, a court can reach a finding on the totality of the evidence that, on the balance of probability there has been a non-accidental injury or human agency as asserted and the threshold is established.”

    1. In assessing the expert evidence, I bear in mind that cases involving an allegation of smothering involve a multi-disciplinary analysis of the medical information conducted by a group of specialists, each bringing their own expertise to bear on the problem. The court must be careful to ensure that each expert keeps within the bounds of their own expertise and defers where appropriate to the expertise of others (see the observations of Mrs Justice Eleanor King in Re S [2009] EWHC 2115 (Fam).

 

    1. On behalf of the mother, Miss Judd and Miss Pine-Coffin invite me to bear in mind the decision of the Court of Appeal in the criminal case of R v Cannings [2004] EWCA 1 Crim. In that case a mother had been convicted of the murder of her two children who had simply stopped breathing. The mother’s two other children had experienced apparent life-threatening events taking a similar form. The Court of Appeal Criminal Division quashed the convictions. There was no evidence other than repeated incidents of breathing having ceased. There was serious disagreement between experts as to the cause of death. There was fresh evidence as to hereditary factors pointing to a possible genetic cause. In those circumstances, the Court of Appeal held that it could not be said that a natural cause could be excluded as a reasonable possible explanation.

 

    1. The impact of the Cannings decision on care proceedings was considered by the Court of Appeal in Re U, Re B, supra. Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss P identified the following considerations arising from the Cannings decision as being of direct application in care proceedings:

 

“(1) The cause of an injury or an episode that cannot be explained scientifically remains equivocal.

(2) Recurrence is not in itself prohibitive.

(3) Particular caution is necessary in any case where the medical experts disagree, one opinion declined to exclude a reasonable possibility of natural cause.

(4) The court must always be on the guard against the over-dogmatic expert, the expert whose reputation is at stake or the expert who has developed a scientific prejudice.

(5) The judge in care proceedings must never forget that today’s medical certainty may be discarded by the next generation of experts or that scientific research would throw a light into corners that are at present dark.”

    1. Usually, it is unnecessary for the Family Court to go further into the analysis by the Court of Appeal in Cannings, but in this case Miss Judd invites the court to have regard to the whole of that decision. I remind myself that it was a criminal case involving the deaths of infants under the age of six months, whereas these are family proceedings involving the deaths of two children aged two and four. Nevertheless, I find the analysis by the Court of Appeal of what Judge LJ, as he then was, described as two critical problems, as relevant to the current case.

 

    1. First, I note the paragraphs specifically cited by Miss Judd, in particular paragraphs 10 to 13 of the judgment in Cannings, which amplify point 2 in Butler-Sloss P’s summary in Re U, Re B cited above.

 

“(10) It would probably be helpful at the outset to encapsulate different possible approaches to cases where three infant deaths have occurred in the same family, each apparently unexplained and for each of which there is no evidence extraneous to the expert evidence that harm was or must have been inflicted, for example, indications of or admissions of violence or a pattern of ill-treatment. Nowadays such events in the same family are rare, very rare. One approach is to examine each death to see whether it is possible to identify one or other of the known natural causes of infant death. If this cannot be done, the rarity of such incidents in the same family is thought to raise a very powerful inference that the deaths must have resulted from deliberate harm. The alternative approach is to start with the same fact, that three unexplained deaths in the same family are indeed rare, but thereafter to proceed on the basis that if there is nothing to explain them, in our current state of knowledge at any rate, they remain unexplained and still, despite the known fact that some parents do smother their infant children, possible natural deaths.

(11) It would immediately be apparent that much depends on the starting point which is adopted. The first approach is, putting it colloquially, that lightning does not strike three times in the same place. If so, the route to a finding of guilt is wide open. Almost any other piece of evidence can reasonably be interpreted to fit this conclusion. For example, if a mother who has lost three babies behaved or responded oddly or strangely or not in accordance with some theoretically “normal” way of behaving when faced with such a disaster, her behaviour might be thought to confirm the conclusion that lightning could not indeed have struck three times. If, however, the deaths were natural, virtually everything done by the mother on discovering such shattering and repeated disasters would be readily understandable as personal manifestations of profound natural shock and grief.”

Later at (13):

“Reverting to the two possible approaches to the problems posed in a case like this, in a criminal prosecution we have no doubt that what we have described as the second approach is correct. Whether there are one, two or even three deaths, the exclusion of currently known natural causes of infant death does not establish that the death or deaths resulted from the deliberate infliction of harm. That represents not only the legal principle, which must be applied in any event, but, in addition, as we shall see, at the very least, it appears to us to coincide with the views of a reputable body of expert medical opinion.”

    1. Secondly, in considering the Cannings judgment, I note the observations of Judge LJ at paragraph 22, which amplifies point 5 in Butler-Sloss P’s summary in Re U, Re B cited above.

 

“We have read bundles of reports from numerous experts of great distinction in this field, together with transcripts of their evidence. If we have derived an overwhelming and abiding impression from studying this material, it is that a great deal about death in infancy, and its causes, remains as yet unknown and undiscovered. That impression is confirmed by counsel on both sides. Much work by dedicated men and women is devoted to this problem. No doubt one urgent objective is to reduce to an irreducible minimum the tragic waste of life and consequent life-scarring grief suffered by parents. In the process however much will also be learned about those deaths which are not natural, and are indeed the consequence of harmful parental activity. We cannot avoid the thought that some of the honest views expressed with reasonable confidence in the present case (on both sides of the argument) will have to be revised in years to come, when the fruits of continuing medical research, both here and internationally, become available. What may be unexplained today may be perfectly well understood tomorrow. Until then, any tendency to dogmatise should be met with an answering challenge.”

    1. With regard to this latter point, recent case law has emphasised the importance of taking into account, to the extent that it is appropriate in any case, the possibility of the unknown cause. The possibility was articulated by Moses LJ in R v Henderson-Butler and Oyediran [2010] EWCA Crim. 126 at paragraph 1:

 

“Where the prosecution is able, by advancing an array of experts, to identify a non-accidental injury and the defence can identify no alternative cause, it is tempting to conclude that the prosecution has proved its case. Such a temptation must be resisted. In this, as in so many fields of medicine, the evidence may be insufficient to exclude, beyond reasonable doubt, an unknown cause. As Cannings teaches, even where, on examination of all the evidence, every possible known cause has been excluded, the cause may still remain unknown.”

    1. In Re R, Care Proceedings Causation [2011] EWHC 1715 (Fam), Hedley J, who had been part of the constitution of the Court of Appeal in the Henderson case, developed this point further. At paragraph 10, he observed,

 

“A temptation there described is ever present in Family proceedings too and, in my judgment, should be as firmly resisted there as the courts are required to resist it in criminal law. In other words, there has to be factored into every case which concerns a discrete aetiology giving rise to significant harm, a consideration as to whether the cause is unknown. That affects neither the burden nor the standard of proof. It is simply a factor to be taken into account in deciding whether the causation advanced by the one shouldering the burden

of proof is established on the balance of probabilities.”

    1. Later in the judgment, at paragraph 19, Hedley J added this observation:

 

“In my judgment a conclusion of unknown aetiology in respect of an infant represents neither professional nor forensic failure. It simply recognises that we still have much to learn and it also recognises that it is dangerous and wrong to infer non-accidental injury, merely from the absence of any other understood mechanism. Maybe it simply represents a general acknowledgment that we are fearfully and wonderfully made.”

Long term readers of this blog will know that I am a huge admirer of Hedley J, and this observation is very well made. I think on shaking cases we are getting very close, judicially speaking, to a conclusion that we simply cannot be sure until all of the evidence is tested forensically whether a child is likely to have been shaken or not, and as a result, I suspect that we may relatively soon get an appeal on an interlocutory decision to place in foster care,  a child suspected of having been shaken.

The Local Authority had run their threshold in parallel – on neglect, and on the far more serious allegations that the mother had smothered and killed two children. The Judge found that they had proved the neglect allegations.

    1. The local authority alleges that the mother is culpable of serious and repeated acts of neglect of her children and has set out this allegation in the schedule of findings filed in these proceedings. In their response on behalf of their client, the mother’s representatives have very substantially accepted the allegations. Some issues, however, remained and they have formed part of the hearing before me.

 

    1. Having considered the evidence, written and oral, I make the following findings on this aspect of the case:

 

(1) There is evidence that the mother struggled to cope with all of the children. In the early days after B was born, she was unable to cope with his care and often left him in the care of other people, including DA. On one occasion, feeling unable to manage, she left him at the social project where she was receiving support. Later she found it difficult to care for J and A together. As a result she did not always provide adequate attention, stimulation or boundaries for the children.

(2) The mother failed to prioritise her children’s physical and emotional needs, on occasions putting her own needs and interests first. She spent significant periods of time on the internet, including extensive periods communicating with friends via internet chat rooms. The children were expected to fit around the mother’s own wishes and needs. This was a particular concern for the experienced health visitor who gave evidence before me.

(3)On occasions the mother was emotionally neglectful towards the children. On one occasion she announced that she was placing the children in care and packed their bags before being talked out of this by support and social workers.

(4)The home conditions in which the children lived were frequently poor. The mother struggled to keep her home clean and tidy, despite repeated reminders from others, including DA. The home was often left cluttered with rubbish.

(5)On a number of occasions the mother failed to protect and supervise the children so that their safety was at risk. In September 2009, B covered himself in bleach. In October 2009, he was found sitting in bleach. In October 2009, J was taking to hospital having ingested Sudocrem. Stair-gates were fitted but on occasions left open. On other occasions dangerous items were left within the reach of the children, cans of spray, loose wall sockets, paracetamol, scissors, cleaning fluid and medication. On one occasion, J was observed by a health visitor to be in a position to turn a fire on and off. The mother failed on occasion to supervise the children in the street, on one occasion allowing J to walk so far ahead that he was able to cross a road by himself.

(6)The mother struggled to manage the care of the children so as to ensure that they were kept clean and had their nappies changed with sufficient regularity. J was noted on occasions to have a very dirty nappy and to be dressed in dirty, wet and sometimes inadequate clothing. As a result on occasions J and A had very sore bottoms and nappy rashes.

(7)The mother struggled to provide the children with appropriate food. She delayed starting B on solid food. She would give the children inappropriate food on occasions and rely excessively on junk food. J would be fed chocolate biscuits for breakfast. The mother struggled to manage A’s feeding regime as a baby and did not always follow advice on this topic. She told the health visitor that she could on occasions put J straight to bed without giving him any meal if they were late arriving home.

(8)The mother found it difficult to manage the children’s behaviour. She resorted on occasions to harsh chastisement of the children that was both inappropriate for their age and generally excessive. She would smack the children, perceiving their behaviour as “naughty,” not realising that it was often simple normal conduct to be expected of a lively, inquisitive toddler. She would shout at B when he was a baby in a vain effort to keep him quiet. She would resort to corporal punishment to an inappropriate and excessive extent. In October 2010 she was observed to slap B on the legs. She would threaten to smack the children by raising her hand. On occasions she put J in his room for excessive periods and sent him to bed at inappropriate times. On one occasion, as I find, she slapped B on the back of the head after he had run off.

(9)In November 2010 the mother was found drunk in charge of J and A. There is no evidence that this was anything other than an isolated incident; nonetheless it is a matter for considerable concern and jeopardised the safety of the children.

(10)The mother was provided with considerable support throughout the intervention of Social Services. Whilst there is some reason to question the level of support provided, the mother was not always as cooperative with the support workers who asked to assist her. The health visitor felt that her failure to take her advice was wilful. I bear in mind, however, that this mother suffers from a learning disability and I am unsure about the extent to which this was taken into account by the professionals who were trying to help her.

    1. There is a further allegation which concerns the father of the two younger children, GM. The mother reported that she had seen him poke J’s genitals with his finger. Despite her concern about this alleged behaviour, the mother continued to allow GM contact with the children. She states that she found it difficult to say no to him and still had feelings for him. The father has played no part in these proceedings. There has been no oral evidence about this matter and I am not in a position to make a finding about whether he did behave in a sexually inappropriate way towards J. I find however that the mother, knowing of the allegation that the father had behaved in that way, failed to protect J from further contact with him.

 

  1. Taken together, these findings about the mother’s treatment amount to serious and chronic neglect at a time when she was receiving considerable support through Social Services, as well as from her own mother, DA, and from friends and neighbours. Miss Davis and Miss Dewhurst, on behalf of the local authority, have rightly taken the view that it would be disproportionate to conduct an enquiry into each and every allegation about which there is documentary evidence that the mother was unable to cope, but I have heard enough to reach a clear conclusion. I conclude that this mother was simply unable to cope with the demands for caring for her children.

But on the major allegations, that the two children had been smothered (even in the context of those findings that the mother was unable to cope), the Judge did not agree that this was proven.

There were several clinical features which the experts explored . This is the passage of the judgment specifically on the expert evidence as to whether there was evidence of smothering (as opposed to any other possible cause of death)

Evidence of smothering

    1. So far as B is concerned, Dr Cartlidge found no evidence of any general health problems, nor any developmental problems. B was a previously healthy child who died suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of four and a half. Dr Cartlidge described this as “very unusual.” J died suddenly and unexpectedly, aged 28 months. Dr Cartlidge described this also as “very unusual.”

 

    1. Dr. Cartlidge considered that the evidence of a possible intentional airway obstruction in B’s case included: the fact that B was a healthy child; the fact that he had been well no more than half an hour before his collapse; the fact that he had collapsed suddenly without explanation; and the fact that his brother, J, had also collapsed and died suddenly without explanation. On the basis (which I have rejected above), that the petechiae were present on B on arrival at hospital, Dr Cartlidge concluded that they were consistent with, rather than diagnostic of asphyxiation, but stressed that his conclusion did not turn on the presence of the petechiae. Dr Cartlidge concluded that it is most likely that B died unnaturally and “smothering is probable.” He added, however, that “the medical evidence for smothering is not specific and relies quite heavily on the exclusion of other causes and an assessment of the case as a whole.”

 

    1. So far as J is concerned, again Dr Cartlidge found no evidence of any general health problems, nor any developmental problems. Like his brother, J was a previously healthy child who died suddenly and unexpectedly, in his case at the age of 28 months. Once again Dr Cartlidge described this as “very unusual.”

 

    1. Dr Cartlidge considered J’s earlier hospital admissions on two occasions to be significant. On 1st January, J had been well when he went to bed, but two hours later found unresponsive and jerky, with blue hands, feet and face. On admission to hospital some 50 minutes later, he was fully conscious and afebrile, but with petechiae over his chest and upper neck. In Dr Cartlidge’s opinion, this episode considered in isolation would support a diagnosis of a fit, although he noted that the evidence of a fever was weak and the temperature taken in hospital over 37.9 degrees Celsius was not usually sufficient to trigger a febrile fit. So far as J’s second admission to hospital was concerned on 3rd January, Dr Cartlidge noted that once again J had been well or reasonably well at the time he went to bed. Several hours later, he was found pale with staring eyes and possibly twitching of his hands. On admission to hospital, J was found to be suffering from chicken pox, but was very energetic and afebrile. In those circumstances, Dr Cartlidge ruled out the possibility that he had suffered from chicken pox encephalitis on this occasion. Once again Dr Cartlidge considered that this episode, taken in isolation, would not be of significance. However, when considered in the light of the later events, he considers that the admissions to hospital on 1st and 3rd January were concerning. The events that are said to have taken place on those occasions were similar to later events in J’s and B’s lives that resulted in their deaths. However, J’s clinical features on both 1st and 3rd January were not typical of a cardiac arrhythmia. Dr Cartlidge thought that smothering could have caused the clinical features in J on both 1st and 3rd January, as well as those described in both children immediately prior to their deaths. He therefore concluded that smothering was a plausible explanation for J’s death, but added again that medical evidence of smothering “is not specific and relies quite heavily on the exclusion of other causes and the assessment of the case as a whole.”

 

    1. In his oral evidence, Dr Cartlidge said that in his clinical practice he had only come across two cases of children of this age dying without any known cause. He had no experience of two children from the same family dying in such circumstances and he was unaware of any epidemiological study of childhood deaths involving this age group. He was asked to consider a paper produced by counsel for the mother entitled, “Smothering children older than one year of age, diagnostic significance of morphological findings,” by Banaschak and Others (2003) published by Forensic Science International. This paper led Dr Cartlidge to reflect on how B, at the age of four and a half, would have been expected to struggle quite vigorously if an attempt was made to smother him. Cross-examined by Miss Judd, he acknowledged that it was more surprising that there were no marks on the four-year-old child.

 

    1. In his oral evidence, Dr White said that the presence of physical signs of smothering would depend on the size and strength of the victim, the size and strength of the assailant and the method by which smothering was inflicted. In the case of child victims, the older the child, the more likely he or she was to struggle and the greater the likelihood of physical signs. Dr White considered that it was possible that B would have scratched himself in an attempt to prevent suffocation, but the fact that there were no scratch marks observed on B did not rule out suffocation as an explanation.

 

    1. In passing, I remind myself that Dr White noted two small marks, bruises, on the top of B’s head during his post-mortem examination. He did not, however, suggest that they were indicative of a physical assault. The local authority did not ask the mother about these bruises, nor did they feature at all in the local authority’s case.

 

    1. The striking picture provided by the consultant in emergency care, Dr Beardsall, was that B looked like he was sleeping, rather than suffering a life-threatening event.

 

  1. Having found, as explained above, that the petechiae on B’s face were not present when he was admitted to hospital, I conclude that there is no clinical evidence of asphyxiation other than the fact that two children died suddenly with cardiac failure, for which no cause had been identified.

So, the Judge concluded that although the deaths had unusual features, there was not clinical evidence to show that they had been asphyxiated, other than that the deaths had no identified cause.  He reminded himself of the other evidence, the number of genetic factors that were particular to this family and the mother’s evidence (particularly that her emphatic denials were convincing) and that whilst he had found her culpable of neglect such that the threshold was made out, there was still a marked difference between that neglect and deliberate murder of two children.

    1. Miss Judd rightly points out that, whilst the various experts have pointed to the lack of evidence of any disease or condition that could have caused the death of either J or B, there is equally no evidence of smothering. She submits that it is no more likely that this mother smothered each child without leaving any signs, than that the child died of an unknown, probably as yet unrecognised, cardiac cause.

 

    1. This mother has a variety of conditions which are likely to be genetic in origin. Dr Newbury-Ecob accepted that the new variant found in the KCNH2 gene, whilst not a cause of LQTS, might lead to a susceptibility or risk of arrhythmia in the presence of other factors, either genetic or environmental and might be associated with his death in some unknown way. Dr Martin noted that “there are quite possibly a whole host of genetic conditions we know nothing about.” The clear impression from his evidence is that the genetic understanding of cardiac disorders is still evolving.

 

    1. I recall again the observations of Judge LJ in Canningsquoted above, in particular that “where there are one, two or even three deaths, the exclusion of currently known natural causes of infant death does not establish that the death or deaths resulted from the deliberate infliction of harm” and that “a great deal about death in infancy and its causes remain as yet unknown and undiscovered.” I also have in mind the observation of Butler-Sloss P in Re U, Re B cited above: “The cause of an injury or episode that cannot be scientifically explained remains equivocal. Recurrence in itself is not prohibitive. The judge in care proceedings must never forget that today’s medical certainty may be discarded by the next generation of experts or that scientific research would throw light into corners that are at present dark.” Finally, I remember the wise words of Hedley J in Re R, also quoted above: “there has to be factored into every case which concerns a discrete aetiology giving rise to significant harm, a consideration as to whether the cause is unknown …. a conclusion of unknown aetiology in respect of an infant represents neither professional nor forensic failure. It simply recognises that we still have much to learn and it also recognises that it is dangerous and wrong to infer non-accidental injury, merely from the absence of any other understood mechanism.”

 

    1. I have given extremely careful attention to the opinions of all the experts and Dr Cartlidge in particular. I acknowledge that there is a significant possibility that this mother was responsible for the deaths of the boys and my mind has fluctuated during the course of this hearing and in my subsequent deliberations. There may be in due course other evidence that bears upon this issue. Having considered all the evidence put before me, however, I find that the local authority has not proved on a balance of probabilities that this mother smothered either J or B.

 

  1. The consequence of my finding is that, for the purposes of these proceedings, the court and the parties will proceed on the basis that the mother did not smother the boys. For the reasons explained above, however, I have found that the mother was responsible for significant acts of neglect of all the children and on that basis the threshold conditions under Section 31 of the Children Act are satisfied.

This body of caselaw may very well be a watershed moment in care proceedings, where the Courts began taking a stance that the presentation of the parents in evidence can be as pivotal as the seemingly damning medical evidence laid against them, and that mere lack of an alternative plausible explanation than non-accidental injury does not necessarily equate to NAI.  It is liable to lead to the job of Local Authorities in such complex medical cases to be more akin to marshalling and testing the evidence rather than the quasi-prosecutor role that traditionally accompanies trying to prove threshold at a finding of fact hearing.  It is also liable to make senior figures in Local Authorities very nervous about fact finding hearings where the outcomes are now so hard to predict, and the costs so vast.

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Be my, be my baby

Posted on October 1, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

A discussion of the law on surrogacy, and the case of D and L (Surrogacy) 2012 EWHC 2631 Fam

A lot of new caselaw this week, and this one is a little off the beaten track. It involves the issue of surrogacy, which is something at the moment I’m interested in, as there’s a pending case of public interest  (reporting restrictions, upcoming criminal trial, can’t say anything more, sorry)

The case can be found here:-

http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed101209

The facts of the case are relatively straightforward  – a couple decided that they wanted to have a child and being a same-sex couple the traditional route wasn’t open to them. They entered into dialogue with an agency the Kiran clinic from Hydrabad, who found them a woman who was prepared to become a surrogate. That woman was from India.  A contract was signed. Twin babies were born and the couple were provided with those babies and returned to the UK with them.

In order to then obtain parental orders in the UK, they sought the mother’s consent to the making of such orders.

Because the UK provisions are that a consent given less than six weeks after the child is born is not valid  (in order to give a mother who has hormonal feelings of bonding and attachment or hormonal surges post-birth generally time to settle on her true feelings), the contract was not sufficient to demonstrate the mother’s consent.

The couple asked the agency to assist with this, and found them to be somewhat lacking in their willingness to assist.

11. At that stage, they had still to receive any signed consent from the surrogate mother. They made further requests to the director of the clinic, to no avail. On 13 September, the first Applicant emailed a long letter to the director, setting a deadline for the production of the signed consent, and warning that if the documents were not supplied, they would make formal complaints to the authorities in India and the British High Commission. On 16th September, the Applicants received a DHL package, purportedly from the director of the clinic, containing a single sheet of paper on which was printed an obscene gesture.

Yes, you did read that correctly.  I really hope that the single sheet of paper found its way into the court bundle.  (And I can’t help speculating what it was – my gut feeling is a v-sign, or the bird , but was it a sketch or a photograph?)

The couple had not wanted to contact the birth mother directly, wanting to respect her privacy, but had to instruct an enquiry agent, whose search was fruitless.

“I am sorry to inform you that I could not locate Miss B. The address provided by the clinic where Miss B should be residing…is not the place where she lives. Property is currently empty but is former residence of [the caretaker/arranger]. His old clinic is on ground floor. Nobody there had any knowledge of Miss B or where she is living now. I have shown neighbours [identity] card of Miss B and they did not recognise her. I could not find out where she lives now and so could not get her to sign the forms.”

It seemed very likely that the address that the couple had been provided with by the agency was not accurate (although one has no way of knowing whether this was of the agency’s making, or whether they themselves had been misinformed)

[By the way, ‘misinformed’  takes me on a tangent to one of my favourite exchanges in cinema, from Casablanca.

Rick: My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.

Captain Renault: The waters? What waters? We’re in the desert.

Rick: I was misinformed     ]

As is often the way in the High Court, you get a nice pithy summary of the law, which is always a great starting point if you need to research the issue.

17. Before turning to the detailed provisions of section 54 of the 2008 Act, I remind myself of the important change to the law affected by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Parental Orders) Regulations 2010. Regulation 2 provides:

“The provisions of the 2002 Act [that is to say, the Adoption and Children Act 2002] set out in column 1 of Schedule 1 have effect in relation to parental orders made in England and Wales and applications for such orders as they have effect in relation to adoption orders and applications for such orders, subject to the modifications set out in column 2 of that Schedule.”

The effect of this provision is, inter alia, that section 1 of the 2002 Act applies to the making of parental orders in the following terms:

“(1) This section applies whenever a court is coming to a decision relating to the making of a parental order in relation to a child.
(2) The paramount consideration of the court must be the child’s welfare, throughout his life.
(3) The court must at all times bear in mind that, in general, any delay in coming to the decision is likely to prejudice the child’s welfare.

(6)   The Court must always consider the whole range of powers available to it in the child’s case (whether under section 54 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008, the Adoption and Children Act 2002 as applied by regulation 2 of and Schedule 1.2 The Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Parental Orders) Regulations 2010 or the Children Act 1989) and the Court must not make an order under that section or under the 2002 Act so applied unless it considers that making the order would be better for the child than not doing so.

(7)  In this section, ‘coming to a decision relating to the making of a parental order in relation to a child’ the relation to a court includes

a)  coming to a decision in any proceedings where the orders that might be made by the court include a parental order (or the revocation of such an order) and 

b)  coming to a decision about granting leave in respect of any action (other than the initiation of proceedings in any court) which may be taken by an individual under this Act but does not include coming to a decision about granting leaving in any other circumstances.

(8)  For the purposes of this section, 

a)  references to relationships are not confined to legal relationships,
b)  references to a relative, in relation to a child, include the child’s mother and father.”

19.  Those principles, in particular the paramountcy principle set out in subsection (2) and the checklist set out in subsection (4,) guide the court in exercising its powers to make parental orders under section 54 of the 2008 Act, which reads as follows:

“(1) On an application made by two people (‘the Applicants’) the court may make an order providing for a child to be treated in law as the child of the Applicants if

a) the child has been carried by a woman who is not one of the Applicants, as a result of the placing in her of an embryo or sperm and eggs or her artificial insemination,

b) the gametes of at least one of the Applicants were used to bring about the creation of the embryo, and

c) the conditions in subsection (2) (8) are satisfied.

(2) The Applicants must be

a) husband and wife,
b) civil partners of each other, or
c) two persons who are living as partners in an enduring family relationship and are not within prohibited degrees of relationship in relation to each other.

(3) Except in a case falling within subsection (11), the Applicants must apply for the order during the period of six months beginning with the day in which the child is born.

(4) At the time of the application and the making of the order

a) the child’s home must be with the Applicants and
b) either or both of the Applicants must be domiciled in the United Kingdom or in the Channel Islands or in the Isle of Man. 

(5) At the time of the making of the order both the Applicants must have attained the age of 18.

(6)  The court must be satisfied that both

a) the woman who carried the child and
b) any other person who is a parent of the child but is not one of the Applicants (including any man who is the father by virtue of section 35 or 36 or any woman who is a parent by virtue of section 42 or 43)

have freely, and with full understanding of what is involved, agreed unconditionally to the making of the order.

(7) Subsection (6) does not require the agreement of a person who cannot be found or who is incapable of giving agreement; and the agreement of the woman who carried the child is ineffective for the purpose of that subsection if given by her less than six weeks after the child’s birth.

(8) The court must be satisfied that no money or other benefit (other than for the expenses reasonably incurred) have been given or received by either of the Applicants for or in consideration of

a) the making of the order,
b) any agreement required by subsection (6)
c) the handing over of the child to the Applicants or
d) the making of arrangements for the view to the making of the order unless authorised by the court. 

  …
(10) Subsection (1) (a) applies whether the woman was in the United Kingdom or elsewhere at the time of the placing in her of the embryo or the sperm and eggs or her  artificial insemination.
…”

So, very broadly, before making the parental order, the Court must be satisfied that the child was the subject of a surrogacy arrangement and be the product of a use of gametes from one of the applicants, and that the other party consented (in a meaningful and informed way) to the pregnancy and to the making of a parental order; although s19(7) gives a way out where the mother cannot be found, or would be incapable of giving agreement.

[That feels a bit weird to me, since it suggests that the whole s19(6) issue of the mother having to have freely, and with full understanding of what is involved, agreed unconditionally to the making of the order could be sidestepped by finding a surrogate who doesn’t really have capacity to agree it, but I’m sure that must be covered elsewhere and prohibited.  Okay, relatively sure.  Okay, dimly hopeful]

In considering whether the mother’s consent could be dispensed with because she could not be found, the Court made this determination

  1. 28.     First, when it is said that the woman who gave birth to the child cannot be found, the court must carefully scrutinise the evidence as to the efforts which have been taken to find her. It is only when all reasonable steps have been taken to locate her without success that a court is likely to dispense with the need for valid consent. Half-hearted or token attempts to find the surrogate will not be enough. Furthermore, it will normally be prudent for the Applicants to lay the ground for satisfying these requirements at an early stage. Even where, as in this case, the Applicants do not meet the surrogate, they should establish clear lines of communication with her, preferably not simply through one person or agency, and should ensure that the surrogate is made aware during the pregnancy that she will be required to give consent six weeks after the birth.29.  Secondly, although a consent given before the expiry of six weeks after birth is not valid for the purposes of section 54, the court is entitled to take into account evidence that the woman did give consent at earlier times to giving up the baby. The weight attached to such earlier consent is, however, likely to be limited. The courts must be careful not to use such evidence to undermine the legal requirement that a consent is only valid if given after six weeks.30.  Thirdly, in the light of the changes affected by the 2010 regulations, the child’s welfare is now the paramount consideration when the court is ‘coming to a decision’ in relation to the making of a parental order. Mr Ford submits, and I accept, that this includes decisions about whether to make an order without the consent of the woman who gave birth in circumstances in which she cannot be found or is incapable of giving consent. It would, however, be wrong to utilise this provision as a means of avoiding the need to take all reasonable steps to attain the woman’s consent.31.  Applying these principles to this case, I accept that these Applicants have taken all reasonable steps to obtain the woman’s consent.

    32.  Through no fault of their own, they have been given a false address. If it is correct that she is living in the state of Andhra Pradesh, then she is one of many millions of women living in that state and there is in my judgment no realistic hope of finding her. I accept that it is not the Applicants’ fault that they found themselves in this position. I am satisfied that they reasonable believed that the clinic and its staff would behave responsibly. It seems that they and the twins have been badly let down.

    33.  I note that Miss B appears to have given her consent to the making of the parental orders at an earlier stage, although in the circumstances I treat all documents and information provided by the clinic with caution. The fact that Miss B appears to have given informal consent earlier is a factor to be taken into account but for the reasons set out above, it carries little weight in my decision. I do, however, take into account the fact that as a matter of law the children’s welfare is my paramount consideration, and I further take into account that any further delay in reaching a decision is likely to be prejudicial to their welfare. I also take into account as required by the welfare checklist to be applied by virtue of the 2010 regulations, that there is realistically no likelihood that the twins would have any relationship with the surrogate, gestational mother, or any member of her family.

    34.  In the circumstances of this case, therefore, I conclude that the agreement of the surrogate mother Miss B is not required on the grounds that she cannot be found.

 

 

 

The payments made were also retrospectively approved – the payments amounted to £17,000.

36.  As set out above, section 54 (8) provides a condition of making a parental order that no money or other benefit (other than for expenses reasonable incurred) has been given or received by either of the applicant for or in consideration of the making of the order, any agreement required by the Act, the handing over of the child to the Applicants or the making of arrangements with the view to the making of the order, unless authorised by the court. The Applicants accept they have paid twenty seven thousand US dollars (which is approximately seventeen thousand pounds at current exchange rates) to the clinic for the surrogacy programme, on the basis that the clinic would then pay ‘reasonable expenses’ to Miss B in the sum of three hundred and fifty thousand rupees, approximately four thousand pounds at current exchange rates. The Applicants accept that the sums paid exceed a level that could be described as ‘reasonable expenses’. They therefore invite the court to give retrospective authorisation for the payments made.

37.  Unlike the question of consent, the issue of payments for surrogacy, and the basis upon which retrospective authorisation may be given, has been considered by the courts at first instance on several occasions in recent years, notably by Hedley J, who has played a lead role in the development of the law surrounding surrogacy, in four cases- Re X and Y (Foreign Surrogacy) [2008] EWHC 3030 (Fam), Re S (Parental Order) [2009] EWHC 2977 (Fam), Re L (Commercial Surrogacy) [2010] EWHC 3146 (Fam) and Re IJ (Foreign Surrogacy Agreement Parental Order) [2011] EWHC 921 (Fam) – and, the most recently, the President Sir Nicholas Wall inRe X and Y (Parental Order: Retrospective Authorisation of Payments) [2011] EWHC 3147 (Fam). From these authorities the following principles emerge.

(1) The question whether a payment exceeds the level of ‘reasonable expenses’ is a matter of fact in each case. There is no conventionally- recognised quantum of expenses or capital sum: Re L, supra.

(2) The principles underpinning section 54 (8), which must be respected by the court, is that it is contrary to public policy to sanction excessive payments that effectively amount to buying children from overseas: Re S, supra.

(3) On the other hand, as a result of the changes brought about by the 2010 Regulations, the decision whether to authorise payments retrospectively is a decision relating to a parental order and in making that decision, the court must regard the children’s welfare as the paramount consideration: Re L, supra, and Re X and Y (2011), supra, per the President.

(4) It is almost impossible to imagine a set of circumstances in which, by the time an application for a parental order comes to court, the welfare of any child, particularly a foreign child, would not be gravely compromised by a refusal to make the order: per Hedley J in Re X and Y (2008), approved by the President in Re X and Y (2011) at paragraph 40. It follows that : ‘it will only be in the clearest case of the abuse of public policy that the court will be able to withhold an order if otherwise welfare considerations support its making’, per Hedley J in Re L at paragraph 10.

(5) Where the Applicants for a parental order are acting in good faith, with no attempt to defraud the authorities, and the payments are not so disproportionate that the granting of parental orders would be an affront to public policy, it will ordinarily be appropriate to give retrospective authorisation, having regard to the paramountcy of the children’s welfare.

38.  In this case, the twin’s welfare unquestionably will be enhanced by the making of parental orders. I am satisfied that these Applicants acted in good faith and have been entirely candid in all of their dealings with the Court and the other authorities. As I have set out above, the total sum paid equivalent to about £17,000. Although I remind myself that each case should be scrutinised on its own facts, I note that the total paid was somewhat less than that paid by the Applicants in the President’s case Re X and Y (2011), which also involved a surrogacy arranged by an Indian clinic. In that case the President ruled that the sum paid was not so disproportionate that the granting of a parental order  would be an affront to public policy.

39. I am therefore prepared to give retrospective authorisation for the payments made by the Applicants in respect of the surrogacy arranged in this case.

The Court suggested that it would essential in future cases to ensure that where a surrogacy arrangement was entered into that the applicants ensured that they had opened a line of communication with the birth mother so that her written consent could be obtained six weeks or later after the birth.

 

 

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Designation’s what you need (or how to duck your responsibilities)

Posted on October 1, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

A discussion of Derbyshire County Council v HM 2011, and why it is important for Local Authority lawyers.

http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed101199

It is a sad case – a mother of two children went into a coma. Southwark, who were the responsible authority at the time, tried to find family members to look after the children. They were looking at some relatives in America, but as a holding position, the children went to stay with a great-aunt Ms A in Derbyshire.

For one reason or another, the placement in America didn’t pan out, and Ms A kept the children, and subsequently sought a residence order. The mother, by this stage, had sadly passed on.

A section 37 report was directed, and then Southwark and Derbyshire had the time-honoured and traditional bust up about who was responsible.

21. There is no dispute as to the law which I must apply.   Pursuant to section 31(1) of the Children Act 1989, a care order (or an interim care order) must be made in favour of a “designated local authority”.   Section 31(8) deals with the principles to be applied.  The designated authority must be (a) the authority within whose area the child is ordinarily resident; or (b) where the child does not reside in the area of a local authority, the authority within whose area any circumstances arose in consequence of which the order is being made. 

22. Following the decision of the Court of Appeal in Northamptonshire CC v Islington LBC [1999] 3 FCR 385, the test under s31(8) is a two stage test.  I must first seek to identify if the children are ordinarily resident in any local authority area and, if so, designate that authority.  If, and only if, I am satisfied that the children are not resident in any local authority area, I must then consider the s31(8)(b) test. 

On that basis, the children hadn’t lived in Southwark for two years, and had lived in Derbyshire for that time. They had ordinary residence in Derbyshire.

But then, the ‘stop the clock provisions’ come into play. If the ordinary residence in Derbyshire came about because Southwark were looking after the children and placed them in Derbyshire, then Southwark would retain responsibility, even though the children were physically in Derbyshire.

And if you’re scratching your head and saying “eh?” that may explain why there’s so much law on this issue.  There are two methods by which the placement with Ms A could have come about.  (a) Southwark were looking after the children under 23 (2) and placed with Ms A, who would be a foster carer  (note, Southwark don’t have to mean to do this, it can come about by them inadvertently doing it)  or (b) Southwark used their duties and powers under s23(6) to find family members who could care for the children and thus avoid them being looked after.

25. The local authority had to discharge its duties in accordance with section 23.  At the time, there were two sections that were relevant.  Section 23(2) provided that “a local authority shall provide accommodation and maintenance for any child they are looking after by (a) placing him…with (i) a family; (ii) a relative of his; or (iii) any suitable person, on such terms as to payment and otherwise as the authority may determine…(f) making such other arrangements as (i) seem appropriate to them; and (ii) comply with any regulations made by the Secretary of State.”  Section 23(6), however, provided that “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 – …. (b) a relative, friend or other person connected with him, unless that would not be reasonably practicable or consistent with his welfare.”  

26. It is accepted that the court is bound by a line of authorities culminating in the Court of Appeal decision in R (SA; a child by SH as litigation friend) v Kent County Council [2011] EWCA Civ 1303; The Times 6th November 2011.  Section 23(2) and section 23(6) are two distinct routes by which the local authority can discharge its duties under section 20(1).  The court must determine whether the local authority was exercising its statutory powers under s23(2) or facilitating the making of private arrangements under s23(6).  If Southwark was acting pursuant to s23(6), the children ceased to be looked after children and s105(6) ceased to apply.  If, however, the placement was under s23(2), the children remained looked after by Southwark.

27. The decision is a factual question on the basis of the evidence before the court.  Smith LJ did, however, say in D v LB of Southwark [2007] EWCA Civ 182 at Paragraph 52 that, where a local authority seeks to divest itself of its obligation and requires someone else to do so (by placement under s23(6) rather than under s23(2)), it would need to be very clear that this was its intention

Or in short, the Court looks at whether something that might be a s23(2) or s23(6) placement to see if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck (a s23(2) foster placement),  and if they are not to conclude that it is a duck, there must be reasons why not and the LA must be really clear and upfront with everyone involed that this WAS NOT A DUCK.

In this case, the Court concluded that Southwark had done enough to show that it had placed under s23(6) and was thus not responsible for the children; even though a lot of the evidence was self-serving  (i.e that it was Southwark saying loudly and often “This isn’t a duck, this isn’t a duck”)  and this is why the case is important – it shows a route map to protect yourself in a Southwark situation

28. Having considered the evidence in this case carefully, I am quite satisfied that Southwark was indeed facilitating the making of private arrangements under s23(6) rather than looking after the children pursuant to s23(2).  I have come to this conclusion for numerous reasons but it is clear to me that any reasonable bystander would undoubtedly have concluded that Southwark was shedding its legal responsibility (Paragraph 59 of D v Southwark).  Other than the original agreement, there is no respect in which it could be said that these were looked after children.  In particular:-

(a) After the placement with the As, Southwark played no role whatsoever in supervising the As or “looking after” the children;

(b) In a handwritten letter, the father authorised Mr and Mrs A to “take decisions relating to (the children’s) urgent medical and health needs and give consent to medical procedures…”;

(c) Southwark paid absolutely nothing to Mr and Mrs A (not even a “kinship allowance”);

(d) When the father approached Southwark on 1st March 2010 and 4th June 2010, Southwark said the children were not an open case;

(e) Southwark’s letter to the father’s solicitor on 31st March 2010, stated that this was a private family arrangement and Southwark had not been providing on-going services/intervention to the family;

(f)  On 26th August 2010, Southwark wrote to Derbyshire legal services stating that “this was a family placement between the respective maternal and paternal families”; although Southwark agreed to undertake an assessment of the father because he was living in its area, the letter is clear that as the children were in Derbyshire’s area, Derbyshire had a duty towards them as children in need;

(g) In Southwark’s letter to the As dated 25th October 2010, Southwark repeats that this was a family arrangement and a private family matter.

29. I accept that the original agreement dated 28th August 2009 imposed obligations on the As but I consider that the factors that I outline in Paragraph 28 above make clear the real nature of the arrangement.  The terms of the agreement reached constituted the arrangements to enable the children to be cared for by the As pursuant to s23(6) rather than for the children to be placed by the Local Authority in accordance with s23(2). 

30. I recognise entirely that some of the evidence relied on by Southwark in support of this conclusion is self-serving.  It could be said that it is not particularly attractive for Southwark to rely on matters such as its own failure to pay allowances.  Nevertheless, this is the factual background and I find it impossible to say that s105(6) is engaged.

So, if you’re in a Southwark situation, you need to shout from the rooftops that this is a s23(6) placement and not a looked after child. Say it loud, say it proud.

If you’re in a Derbyshire position, you’d better shout just as loud that this is a looked after child, so that there’s something to weigh on the other side, and explore with the family exactly what they were told at the time.

Comments Off on Designation’s what you need (or how to duck your responsibilities)

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Is there truly such a thing as an ‘anonymous’ referral?

Posted on September 24, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

 

 A discussion of Re J (A Child:Disclosure) 2012

The case can be found here :-

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2012/1204.html

 

 

This was an appeal arising from private law proceedings, but the principles are likely to apply (if not be even more apposite) to public law proceedings.

 

Effectively, within the time that private law proceedings were going on, an allegation of sexual misconduct was raised against the father.  The allegations were made to the Local Authority, who then alerted the mother that allegations of a serious kind, that they had some confidence in, had been made.

 

The referrer had requested anonymity.

 

(We go back here to D v NSPCC 1978 AC 171  which established that a principle called  Public Interest Immunity applied to information provided to a child protection agency – like NSPCC or Social Services,  and that there was a broad public interest in individuals being able to know that they could make those referrals in confidence.    In particular that they wouldn’t face threats, violence or harassment as a result of having made that referral.

 

There’s a larger public debate here, which can easily be understood if you switch the word ‘referral’ with ‘allegation’   – it’s appropriate for someone to be able to make a referral in confidence, but if you put yourself in the place of a parent who is the subject of an anonymous allegation, you would feel entirely differently)

 

 

As the father, understandably, was disputing that he had behaved in a sexually inappropriate way, and the issue was going to the heart of whether he was a risky person to have contact with his children, or a safe person, the Court had to have a finding of fact hearing to determine the allegations.

 

Given that the referrer, who wished to remain anonymous, had become known to the mother, the issue then became twofold :-

 

  1. Should her identity be formally revealed and the detail of the referral be made known by disclosing the documents
  2. At the finding of fact hearing, should the referrer attend Court and be available to be cross-examined?

 

 

The Judge at first instance, who was Mr Justice Peter Jackson  analysed the issue in this way :-

 

  1. a. The father denied sexually abusing anybody. He had not been informed of X’s identity and knew nothing of the substance of her allegations. He asserted that the mother had colluded with X to generate these allegations for the purpose of obstructing contact with his daughter. He argued that for the court not to insist on testing the allegations would be fundamentally unjust and the situation would effectively encourage mothers to make outrageous allegations as a means of alienating fathers and children from each other. The interests of A must come first and there must be a trial attended by X.

b. The mother described herself being torn between the need to protect A and the reluctance to add to the pressure on X. She supported disclosure if it is the only means by which A can be protected, but is concerned about the consequences for X if disclosure takes place.

c. X strongly resisted disclosure of her identity and of the substance of her allegations. She would oppose any attempt to summons her as a witness and would not be able to speak about her allegations if she were brought to court. She was acutely distressed by the effect of the proceedings on her already fragile state of health.

d. A’s guardian asserted that she was unable to represent A’s interests in the proceedings without knowing the detail of the allegations and forming an assessment of them. She submitted that the issue of disclosure was a discrete issue and should be determined separately from any question of X being compelled to attend court to give evidence.

e. The local authority took a neutral stance, but assisted the court by presenting arguments for and against disclosure.

  1. In analysing the competing factors, the judge referred to the following articles of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms 1950 (‘ECHR’) as being relevant:

ARTICLE 3

No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

ARTICLE 6

1. In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law.

ARTICLE 8

1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.

2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

  1. Having considered the decision of this court in A Local Authority v A [2009] EWCA Civ 1057; [2010] 2 FLR 1757, the judge concluded that the fundamental objective of the balancing exercise is to strike a fair balance between the various rights and interests within the context of achieving a fair trial. In this context he held (at paragraph 29) the following ECHR articles were engaged so far as the court and the local authority as public bodies are concerned:
    • Article 6, entitling A and her parents to a fair hearing of X’s allegations;
    • Article 8, guaranteeing respect for the family life of A and her parents;
    • Article 8, guaranteeing respect for the private life of X; and
    • Article 3, prohibiting inhuman or degrading treatment of A and of X.
  1. Peter Jackson J concluded (paragraph 34) that X’s wish not to speak further about her alleged experience of sexual abuse and the risks to her mental and physical health were each aspects of her ‘private life’ within Article 8.
  1. Within the Article 3 considerations fell not only the protection of vulnerable individuals such as A and X, in particular from sexual abuse, but also the protection of X from inhuman treatment by forcing her to give evidence about these matters in the context of her precarious state of health.

 

The Judge at first instance decided that balancing those competing interests meant that it was right, in the circumstances of this particular case, not to compel X to give evidence, or to disclose the information  (he approached it in that order, which becomes relevant later)

 

48. I have nevertheless concluded that in this highly unusual situation it is not possible for information about X’s identity and allegations to be disclosed to the parties. My reasons are these:

1) I accept the medical evidence about the potentially serious effect of disclosure on X’s health.

2) The information once disclosed, cannot be controlled. X could not be assured that her identity as an alleged victim of sexual abuse would remain confidential within the proceedings.

3) X’s identity and her allegations are inextricably intertwined.

4) For the court to order disclosure when it is not prepared to order X to give evidence would risk harming X without achieving anything valuable for A and her parents. The nature and extent of X’s allegations mean that they could not readily be proved or disproved by reference to third parties or independent sources. It is therefore unlikely that any outcome achieved in X’s absence would clear the air between the parties or provide a solid foundation for future arrangements for A.

5) The court must have regard to the nature of the interests being balanced, namely contact on one hand and physical and mental health on the other.

 

49. I realise that the existence of this unresolved allegation creates real difficulties in relation to future contact between A and her father. Once the parties have considered this judgment, there will be a short hearing to identify the issues that now arise. For the present, I will only repeat the observation that I made during the Guardian’s submissions, namely that this outcome will not automatically lead to the court making an order for unsupervised contact. That question must be resolved taking account of all factors bearing on A’s welfare

The father’s case, again understandably was, that without having the opportunity to properly test the very grave allegations that had been made against him  (and not even knowing who it was he was alleged to have abused)  would make it impossible to conduct a finding of fact hearing, and even if the allegations were effectively set to one side with a decision that they couldn’t be proved, they would hang over him and inevitably colour any later decision about his contact.  

 

(The Judge seemed to be saying that X’s allegations wouldn’t be the subject of a finding of fact hearing, but that on its own did not mean that father’s contact would automatically revert to pre-allegation position. And a strand that emerged was that without the allegations being determined one way or another, was it reasonable for mother – who believed them – to be opposed to direct contact?)

 

The Court of Appeal considered the issue of the trial judge having seen the source material which was not disclosed to the parties , with the long and the short of it being that a Judge who saw such pertinent evidence and decided it was not to be disclosed was really in a position where he had to recuse himself from determining the matter, no matter how hard he would strive to put it out of his mind, ‘justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done’ :-

 

 

  1. Having now had the benefit of looking at these potentially ambiguous passages with the assistance of counsel’s submissions, I am fully satisfied that the judge has no intention of relying directly upon the undisclosed material to support some form of finding on the issue of sexual abuse. His latter comment about the outcome not automatically leading to unsupervised contact would seem simply to be a sensible and proper judicial indication that all substantive welfare options remain open and that all he has dealt with thus far is the application for disclosure.
  1. Despite accepting that the judge’s indication is, within its own context, unremarkable, there is a need to step back to consider how a fair final hearing can be seen to take place if it is conducted by a judge who has read the detail of X’s undisclosed allegations. This is not a topic that is addressed expressly in the judgment, yet to my mind it justifies careful consideration. From the perspective of an insider within the family justice system, I have no difficulty in accepting that any judge of the High Court Family Division would have the necessary intellectual and professional rigour to conduct the final hearing by putting the undisclosed material out of his or her contemplation when considering A’s welfare. That, however, is not the test, or, at least, not the complete test. Justice not only has to be done, but it must be manifestly and undoubtedly seen to be done. How is the final hearing to be viewed by the father if his contact to A is reduced from its pre-2010 level or terminated, when he knows that the judge who has determined the case has read details of serious, but untried and untested allegations against him? The father has already referred to ‘a kangaroo court’ and such a characterisation could only gain prominence in his mind were the case to proceed in the manner contemplated by the current orders.
  1. Often when Public Interest Immunity (‘PII’) is raised the matter to which the PII relates may not be directly relevant to the primary issue in the case and there can be a fair trial of the central issue notwithstanding the fact that material known to the judge remains undisclosed to some or all of the parties. Here the undisclosed information is at the core of the case and represents the entirety of the material relating to the only issue that has generated the mother’s application to vary the contact regime. The father, or an impartial bystander, is entitled to question how there could be a fair trial of the contact issue when the judge is privy to this core material yet the father and those representing A are not. I stress again that I readily accept that if Peter Jackson J were the trial judge he would have approached the matters before him with intellectual and judicial rigour; my concern relates to how matters are, or may be, perceived by the parties and others.
  1. Drawing these observations together, in my view an outcome on the facts of this case whereby the key material has been read in full by the judge but is not to be disclosed to the parties, yet the same judge is going on to preside over the welfare determination is an untenable one in terms of justice being seen to be done. In failing both to consider this aspect of the case and in arriving at that outcome the judge was plainly wrong

 

 

There is, as always with Lord Justice MacFarlane’s judgments, a helpful drawing together of the history of decisions on both Public Interest Immunity and balancing of competing Human Rights, and it would be a good starting point for any research on these issues.

 

 

The Court of Appeal then determined whether the Court at first instance had gone awry in balancing those matters, and specifically whether in determining that X was not going to give evidence and thus disclosure was of no purpose, that decision had been made the wrong way around (i.e that disclosure was a separate issue to X giving live evidence)

 

  1. Moving from legal principle to the circumstances of this case, whilst the judge’s characterisation of the probative value of X’s allegations as being unlikely to lead to a resolution of the issue that they raise may be correct on our present state of knowledge, that state of knowledge is based entirely on what X is reported to have said. Because of X’s stipulation that no person is to be told of her allegations, the local authority has not undertaken any investigation of them whatsoever. In so far as X may give a factual context which places X and the father together and within which the alleged abusive behaviour took place, it has not been possible to ask any of the adults who were then responsible for X’s care whether or not that factual context has validity. A’s mother knows only of the label attached to the alleged behaviour, she too may readily be able to validate or challenge what is said about the factual context and the father’s opportunity to interact abusively with X as X alleges. Plainly the father too will be able to give his own account of matters if disclosure takes place. I do not therefore accept Peter Jackson J’s assertion that ‘the nature and extent of X’s allegations mean that they could not readily be proved or disproved by reference to third parties or independent sources’; the position is that, unless or until the relevant adults are told of the allegations, it is simply too early to come to a conclusion on that issue. There is merit in the disclosure of this core material, so that it may properly be evaluated by A’s mother, A’s father and A’s professional representatives, that merit is freestanding and has value irrespective of whether or not in due course X could be called to give oral evidence.
  1. For the reasons I have given, I conclude that the judge was in error in conflating the issues of disclosure and X being required to give oral evidence in due course. In turning to the latter issue first, and concluding that compelling X to give evidence would be oppressive and wrong, the judge unfortunately allowed that conclusion to dominate his consideration of the disclosure question in a manner which is unsupported by authority. The judge was further in error in failing to identify the freestanding value of disclosure which would enable the key adults to understand and give their own factual account of the circumstances within which X alleges that the abusive behaviour took place

And then moved on to make the decision about disclosure :-

 

  1. In answer to the questions posed within structure established by Lord Mustill in Re D:

a) there is a real possibility that disclosure will cause significant harm to X’s mental and physical health;

b) the interests of X would benefit from non-disclosure, but the interests of A favour disclosure. It is in A’s interests that the material is known to her parents and is properly tested. There is a balance to be struck between the adverse impact on X’s interest and the benefit to be gained by A;

c) If that balance favoured non-disclosure, I would in any event evaluate the importance of the undisclosed material as being central to the whole issue of contact and the life-long structure of the relationships within A’s family. In fact, X’s allegations represent the entirety of the ‘issue’ in the family proceedings. There is therefore a high priority to be put upon both parents having the opportunity to see and respond to this material.

  1. For the reasons that I have given, and approaching the matter in way that I have described, I am clear that the balance of rights comes down in favour of the disclosure of X’s identity and of the records of the substance of her sexual abuse allegations to the mother, the father and A’s children’s guardian.

 

 

The Court of Appeal did make it plain during the judgment, that they were considering this on the basis of the individual case and the individual judgment, rather than attempting to pull out some general principles for all cases, and say so explicitly here:-

 

40         I repeat and stress that this conclusion is specific to the facts of this case where the PII material relates entirely to the core issue in the case. It is not my intention to lay down a blanket approach to all cases, which will fall to be determined by the application of general principles to the individual facts that are in play.

 

And of course, the key issue in this case is that the referrer X, was not someone who was saying  “I have seen father do such and such to a child” or “I believe father has done such and such to a child”  but that “when I was a child, this man did such and such to me”     (i.e that the referrer was not claiming to have witnessed abuse, but to have been a victim of it)

 

But the principle remains – in the light of this authority, and the ones cited within the judgment  (notably Re D (Minors) (Adoption Reports: Confidentiality) [1996] AC 593)  )   http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKHL/1995/17.html  

 

Can someone who makes a referral or allegation to a Local Authority, who wishes to remain anonymous, have confidence that they would remain so?

 

The reality is, that if the referral or allegation is relied upon – i.e that a party to the case seeks to convert that allegation into proven fact (as opposed to ‘it is true that an anonymous referrer said this, but the Court is not asked to determine that what was alleged is true’)   then it is hard to see a Court being persuaded that the parents article 6 rights to see the allegation and challenge it are outweighed by the interests of confidentiality to the anonymous referrer.

 

The deck was stacked pretty heavily in favour of the referrer here  –  she had been a ‘child victim’, there was psychological evidence about the consequences of disclosure being very detrimental to her, and still the material was disclosed.

 

There’s the possibility, perhaps long-distant, of a referrer who was told by the Local Authority when they rang up and asked if they could remain anonymous that they could, bringing a claim against the LA when their details were disclosed. 

 

It might well be the case that the only true way to make an anonymous referral is the obvious one – don’t give your name to anyone.  If you tell the person on the other end of the phone your real name, they might well have to cough it up at some point in the future.

 

[If it hasn’t been clear in the discussion above, I am very sympathetic to both sides of the debate – I think it is important that people are able to genuinely alert the right authorities to suspected child abuse without having to have fear of reprisals, but I can also see that where there is suspicion and doubt that such referrals are genuine and might instead be false malicious allegations, there’s a serious interest in the victim of such allegations being able to properly contest them.  

 

It is one of those difficult areas where the overarching public interest in cases generally might well be anonymity, but in any particular case the right thing is more likely to be transparency]

 

 

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Liberace, losing and Lou Gehrig

Posted on September 20, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

Some thoughts arising from the Evidence in Child Abuse Cases  #ECAC course I attended today.

 

Firstly, it was an excellent course, and had a lot of fresh and useful material.  It was a genuine pleasure to hear Jo Delahunty QC  (who is like the most charming intelligent surgical scalpel you will ever meet) speak on the Al Alas Wray case  (which I’ve blogged about before – here : –   https://suesspiciousminds.com/2012/04/24/subdural-haematomas-fractures-and-rickets/                as she was leading counsel for one of the parents, and so had a wealth of useful insights and tactics to put forward.

 

Secondly, there was a paediatric neuroradiologist sitting in front of me who is DEFINITELY going to get instructed next time I need one. Likewise the paediatric neurosurgeon. And no, I’m not sharing names, because I want them to be available when I call them.

 

One slightly awkward moment when an entirely different barrister responded, during the Panel session, to a barbed question from a doctor about whether Court is the best place to resolve complex medical issues with the R-bomb  (With the greatest possible respect).  Kudos to the questioner, for not responding, as I might have with “you know what, I’ll see your ‘crusader for justice’ and raise you ‘I save children’s lives for a living’ , so keep your Respect to yourself”  and instead just said “with all due respect”  which was even better)

 

Anyway, Liberace.  You may not know, if you are younger, who Liberace is. So he was a flamboyant singer, who looked like this :-

 

 

In 1956, the Daily Mirror printed a story saying that he was gay.  It was the Fifties, perhaps people needed to be told the bleeding obvious back then, and perhaps for some reason it was any of a newspaper’s business what a celebrities sex life was like  (thank goodness times have changed)

 

Liberace sued them for libel. (he couldn’t, presumably, sue them for being homophobic jerks, because this was the Fifties).

 

He won his case,won about £15,000  (which in those days was at least several houses) and coined his expression “I cried all the way to the bank”.

Now, as you probably know, truth is a defence to libel. So, someone, representing the Mirror, went to Court, and tried to persuade the Court that it was true that Liberace was gay. And failed.

 

Feel free to look back at the photograph, which would have been my exhibit one.

 

I suspect whoever had that brief for the Mirror put on a tie with a smile on his face, and walked to Court with a spring in his step that day. They didn’t know much about basketball in those days, so the phrase “slam dunk” was meaningless to them, but if there was ever a slam dunk, that was it.

 

So I occasionally like to ponder the mixed feelings of the two counsel on that case – one with a mountain to climb who did so, and one with what looked like a molehill to step over, who fell over it.

 

The Al Alas Wray case is of course, not in that same league. For one thing (and I am sorry if this crushes any illusions) , Liberace really was gay, so shouldn’t have won; and the odds weren’t quite so slanted, but still, one is expected to think as counsel seeking the findings with the great and the good of Britain’s medicine lined up behind you, that you will see off these fancy American experts with their crazy theories, but it was not to be.

 

But the reason it was not to be, and this really came home today, listening to Jo Delahunty QC, is that people involved put in huge amounts of work. Medical reports weren’t just obtained and copied, or read through, they were digested and tough questions formulated arising out of them. The truth came out, but it wasn’t like finding a doorkey under a doormat – just a quick bit of lifting and there it is – this was truth obtained by painstaking forensic analysis.

 

And what was clear to everyone in the course was that Al Alas Wray might well represent the high watermark of when English family justice meant just that, that a person wrongly accused has the weight and resources of the law behind them and has the chance at a fair trial.  A similar case in two years time, is not going to get the experts that are needed, the time that each expert needs to read the source material, the ability to call and test that evidence  (it seems pretty clear that cross-examining experts will be a rarity even when you do get to instruct one) and certainly isn’t going to have the period of time it takes to do a case like that properly.

 

There was some interesting discussion about head injuries, and the medical research on lucidity.  A key piece of research, which offsets the previous position of Chadwick 1997 that “If a history purports a lucid interval that history is likely false and the injury is likely inflicted”   was Denton and Mileusnic 2003 where the child suffered a witnessed fall backwards 3 feet onto vinyl floor, was fine and tragically died 3 days later.

 

It’s a telling example of how even though any particular case might have to make medical history for the explanation given to be correct, medical history can be made by a single case.   (And the one of those that leapt to my mind was Lou Gehrig, the baseball player, who died of Lou Gehrig’s disease. Plus, it started with an L, so it fitted.  And was referenced by Bill-Hicks-rip-off-merchant Dennis Leary  with the tasteless aside  “How’d he not see that coming?”.    )

 

Frankly, Phineas Gage is a better example particularly as we’re talking head injuries, and his story is fascinating if you haven’t already read it.  He was a railway worker, who suffered a serious head injury, destroying his left frontal lobe  which changed his entire personality, and is pretty much the beginnings of neuroscience, and moved us from reading bumps on people’s heads to finding out which bits of the brain do what.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phineas_Gage

 

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I’ve got (section) thirty seven problems, but a ***** ain’t one

Posted on August 31, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

 A discussion about section 37 of the Children Act 1989 and the pending appeal on  Re K (Children) [2012] EWCA Civ 1169

 

 

The case is discussed over at Family Lore, here

 

http://www.familylore.co.uk/2012/08/re-k-children-how-not-to-conduct.html

 

 

and Family Lore’s focus is on how the parents nearly messed up their very valid argument by the manner in which they presented the case.  That is a very good analysis and discussion, and I recommend checking it out.

 

I come at this from a slightly different tack, which is the novel and interesting point of law that Mr and Mrs B included in their grounds for appeal, namely that a series of ICOs were made, without an application for such being made by the Local Authority, the Court effectively making them of their own motion by using the powers under s37 and s38(1)(b) to make ICOs of the Court’s own motion.

 

 

The judgment granting permission to appeal can be found here

 

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2012/1169.html

 

 

The bare facts are these.  Mrs B is the mother of two children, who the Court named “Tok” and “Tun”   (which are the most unusual pseudonyms for children I have seen in a judgment).  Tok was 15, Tun 12 ½.    The father of the child is Dr K, mum and dad are estranged. Mum remarried, and Mr B is the stepfather.

 

There have been extensive private law proceedings over about six years and at the time in question, the children had been living with Mr and Mrs B.

 

On 10th December 2010, the Court made a section 37 direction, inviting the Local Authority to prepare a report on the circumstances of the case and specifically to report as to whether it would be appropriate to initiate care proceedings (and if not, to say why not). Alongside that, the Court made an Interim Care Order.

 

This is the only situation in which a Court can make an Interim Care Order without a formal application and arises from

 

Section 38 (1) of the Children Act 1989 

 

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 purpose of that power is to enable a Court faced with private law proceedings where it appears that the child is suffering or at risk of suffering significant harm if an ICO or ISO is not made, to make one, which would be for a period of 8 weeks, which coincidentally or by design, is the timescale for the Local Authority to supply their section 37 report.

 

Mr and Mrs B refused to work with the Local Authority, and as a result, five days after the making of the ICO, the children were removed from their care.

 

Now, remember, that in making the ICO, there was no formal application before the Court, and therefore the Local Authority had not laid out to the parents the threshold criteria  (or the facts that led to concerns about significant harm)  and nor had the Court held a hearing to determine whether the legal test for removal of the children under an ICO was made out.  (It being settled law now that sanctioning separation at interim stage is more than just deciding that an Interim Care Order is the right order)

 

By 28th January 2011, the LA had determined that matters had cooled and that the children could be returned to Mr and Mrs B, and did not make any formal application for a Care or Supervision Order.

 

The Judge considered otherwise, and made another section 37 direction for the LA to report, making alongside it a further Interim Care Order, pursuant to section 38 (1) (b).  He also said that alongside that ICO, he did not sanction the children being returned to Mr and Mrs B whilst it was in force.

 

Now, this will be the nub of the appeal decision for me. I am aware that there are two schools of thought on the powers of s38(1) (b).   One (my own) is that it goes far enough to allow a Court to make an ICO or ISO whilst awaiting the Local Authority’s report and decision as to whether to issue proceedings, “to hold the ring” as it were. The other  (and one that I have seen in various County Court case and a couple of High Court cases) is that faced with a Local Authority who don’t share the Judge’s view that a section 31 application for a Care Order should be made, the Court can simply make a second and subsequent directions for further reports and further ICOs until either matters resolve or the LA see sense and issue.

 

The LA, in this particular case, changed their view to reflect the Judge’s strong views, and subsequently made an application for an ICO. But the children remained out of their care for at least some period, on the basis of a second ICO having been made, without an application, using a second s38(1) (b) order, rather than the traditional s38(1) (a) ICO on application.

 

 

 

 

The precise wording of the Act, as set out earlier, says that the Court can make an ICO alongside a direction for a section 37 report, and does not say that this can only be once, or can only be done if the LA have not reported.

 

But the obvious risk here is that rather than the application for a Care Order being prosecuted by the Local Authority, opposed by the parents, and determined by the Court, the Court is actually driving the application that it is in the position of determining.

 

It seems to me that whilst the first ICO is justifiable  (although I think it would be worth remembering that s38(2) is clear that the order can’t be made unless there are reasonable grounds to believe the threshold criteria is made out, and the Court ought to, if making an order, give a judgment as to why that is the case and why in the circumstances of the welfare checklist making an ICO is better for the child than making no order)   making subsequent ones put the Court in a dual position of seeking an ICO whilst also being the arbiter of whether one should be made.

 

I also suspect that at the appeal hearing, the Court of Appeal may be troubled by the judicial indication that when making the second ICO (that was, remember, not sought by the Local Authority) the Judge informed the Local Authority that he did not sanction them returning the children to Mr and Mrs B during that order.  That seems to me, to be a step too far.  A Court might indicate that the risks before the Court were high and that the current circumstances suggested that managing the risks with the children with Mr and Mrs B would be very difficult to achieve, but the Court has fettered here the Local Authority power to do what their stated intention was, which was to rehabilitate the children to Mr and Mrs B.

 

 

This is the basis on which the Court of Appeal granted permission for the appeal to be heard in full, although the time for appealing the ICOs was clearly long gone  (as usual, my own underlining):-

 

  1. Without expressing any concluded view as to the ultimate merit or otherwise of these matters, the points that particularly justify a full hearing are as follows:

a) Given the importance of the decision made on 10th December 2010 to make an interim care order in private law proceedings, where the local authority had on at least two previous occasions, one less than a month prior to the hearing, indicated that there were no grounds for seeking a public law order, the judgment given on that day is extremely brief and amounts to little more than an assertion that there is “really no doubt at all” that the interim threshold criteria in s 38 are met on the basis of emotional abuse, principally arising from Mr B’s bullying and intimidating behaviour. The contrary stance of the local authority indicates ground for questioning if the s 38 threshold criteria were actually met.

b) The judge’s stated justification for making an interim care order in December 2010 was to gain Mr and Mrs B’s co-operation with the local authority assessment process. Once that had been achieved in January 2011 and in the light of the local authority’s sustained assertion that there were no grounds for a further interim care order, the judge’s decision to make two subsequent fresh s 37 directions, thereby maintaining the court’s jurisdiction to make interim care orders, must be open to question.

c) In his judgment of 12th April 2011, HHJ Tyzack give a detailed account of the history to date. It is of note that, at paragraph 9, the judge summarises the social work evidence as follows:

“…up until quite recently professionals from Leicestershire County Council have been able to work with Mr and Mrs B so far as the care of Tun is concerned. Indeed Ms S’s first two statements, which are comprehensive and thorough, attest to that fact, that, despite the difficulties that Leicester have had with Mr and Mrs B in achieving their co-operation, they have been able, up until recently, to work with them so far as Tun is concerned.”

The judge then goes on to record that “all that has fallen away” following the withdrawal of co-operation pursuant to the order of 4th March. Given the judge’s conclusion that the previous social work reports were favourable to Mr and Mrs B and were “comprehensive and thorough”, the court’s grounds for nevertheless making s 37 directions at earlier hearings, in part on the basis that the social work assessment was incomplete, falls to be questioned.

d) Insofar as the threshold criteria are concerned, the 12th April 2011 judgment, in like manner to that of December 2010, does not refer to the evidence prior to those dates which would establish a factual basis for holding that there are reasonable grounds for believing that Tun is suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm. At paragraph 18 the judge simply says “I should say that I find the threshold criteria met, so far as this application is concerned, on a s 38 basis….”

 

 

In the permission hearing, the Court of Appeal didn’t make comment as to the other two issues I have touched on here – that the making of the first ICO allowed the children to be removed without the Court ever having determined that the risks involved were proportionate to the children being removed from home at an interlocutory stage, and whether when making the second ICO the Judge went further than he was entitled to by telling the Local Authority that the Court did not sanction the children being returned by the LA to Mr and Mrs B during the course of that order.

 

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Adult safeguarding investigation

Posted on August 30, 2012 by suesspiciousminds

 

A discussion of Davis & Anor v West Sussex County Council 2012

 

I’m always mindful that I do much less blogging on adult social care than I would like. Child protection work is my day to day bread and butter, so that’s invariably my focus, but I do like to discuss adult social care when I can, and I’ve neglected it recently.

 

So, given a combination of insomnia and this interesting case, the opportunity arises.

 

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/QB/2012/2152.html#para26

 

This was a judicial review brought by owners of an adult care home against the Local Authority’s decisions at a safeguarding case conference that 15 allegations made against staff were substantiated and 10 allegations made against staff were “inconclusive” and that the staff should be referred to the Independent Safeguarding Authority and the Nursing and Midwifery Council for possible disciplinary action. To cut to the chase, the claimants won the jr, and the decisions of that case conference were quashed.

 

So what went wrong, and how can that be avoided in the future?

The Claimants main objections to the process, all vigorously challenged by the Defendant, are that;

 

(a) They were not given adequate notice of the allegations made against them so as to allow them a fair opportunity to present their case at the Case Conference. They were only provided with a copy of the very substantial Investigation Report – which set out the allegations for the first time, albeit in unclear form – one working day before the Case Conference.(b) They were not shown the evidence against them.

(c) The Case Conference was not shown relevant evidence generated by the investigation, both for and against them.

(d) They were not permitted, or given an adequate opportunity, to produce relevant evidence to the Case Conference, whether through witnesses or otherwise.

 

and we can already see, by paragraph 3 of the judgment, that this is probably not going to end well for the Local Authority. If those objections are made out, the LA are going to lose, on the article 6 point if nothing else, but almost certainly it would be unreasonable to make determinations that affect the individual livelihoods and career of staff and the financial viability of the organisation as a whole without them having proper opportunity to defend themselves.  (I hasten to add that these claims were vigorously challenged by the Local Authority)

 

The case very helpfully sets out the statutory and binding guidance framework for conducting safeguarding investigations, and would be a useful starting point if one wanted to get to grips with what the duties and requirements are. (The joy of case law is that it often sets out all of the background knowledge in one neat place, saving you hours of leafing through separate sources or even locating what those sources might be)

 

What is interesting about this case is that of course there was a contract between the LA and the claimant for the provision of these services. The claimant ran their case largely on public law grounds  (i.e that this was an administrative decision of a public body which must be taken in a Wednesbury reasonable manner) and the LA largely on contractual grounds (i.e that the issue of investigations, cooperation with them, being bound by recommendations, dispute resolution etc were all contained in the contract, and this was a contract dispute  – and ultimately that the decision was about whether to renew the contract that existed between the Claimant and the LA)

This is interesting, at paragraph 26  (and was the part on @celticknottweet ‘s tweet that led me to dig a little deeper)

It is not the function of this court to decide whether or not abuse took place. The court is concerned with the process by which allegations were investigated. There is some disagreement about the long and complex dealings between the parties over a lengthy period and Mr McGuire QC for West Sussex places emphasis on what he describes as ‘the true factual context’.

 

So, it would not matter if the allegations had merit or substance, the JR court would not be looking at that – they would be looking at whether the process of investigation and opportunity to defend and decision-making process was fair, not whether or not the abuse alleged had taken place. The Court was not conducting a judicial determination of the allegations, merely the process.

 

On that very issue, here is the nub of the judgment  –  the case against the Claimants and their staff was produced in a 22 page report at 7pm on 8th December, for the conference on 10th December. The Claimants request for the conference to be adjourned to allow them time to consider the report and respond in writing was refused.  Two members of staff were refused admission to the conference (the Court accepted that there were legitimate reasons for this) but that decision made on the day, allowed there to be nobody present at the Conference who could speak to the day to day running of the home.  The meeting lasted for 8 hours, and there were “ten on one side and one on the other”  – the Claimant handed a solicitors letter to the Chair who declined to show it to anyone else.

    1. By the middle of 8 December nothing further had been heard from West Sussex about the conference set for 10 December and Mrs Hillary-Warnett sent a reminder to the Council which responded at 4pm confirming that the conference would proceed at 9.30 on 10 December and that a copy of the report would be hand delivered. This was received at 7pm on 8 December. It was 22 pages long alleging abuse against thirteen residents of Nyton House (five of whom had since died).

 

    1. The Claimants submit that the report is incoherent and unclear about what is being alleged against whom. The report referred to the investigations as having been ‘extensive and complex’ and it had taken seven and a half months to produce. However for much of that time the police had been the lead investigator and it had been difficult for West Sussex to carry out the necessary and important work. Of the thirteen residents identified in the report only one had been placed at Nyton House under the Contract. Every relative of a resident at Nyton House that had been questioned was positive about the quality of care provided.

 

    1. Mrs Davis’s evidence, unsurprisingly, is that she was quite unable to deal with the report in the very short time available. On 9 December the Claimants’ solicitors wrote to Mr Yong pointing out the difficulties of holding a Case Conference within the proposed timescale and proposing an adjournment for something over ten days so that Mrs Davis could consider the report and provide a written response within seven to ten days. The solicitors suggested as an alternative that ‘no expectation or pressure’ be put upon Mrs Davis at the next day’s Case Conference to respond and that she should be given the opportunity to provide a detailed written response within seven to ten days. The solicitor could not themselves have attended at such short notice.

 

    1. Mr Yong rejected both options by fax at about 6pm on 9 December.

 

    1. So Mrs Davis attended the Case Conference but took with her for support Mrs Hillary-Warnett, Ms Hillary who was the acting manager and, apparently, a Mr Fieldhouse the son of one of the residents. Mr Fieldhouse apparently soon left. Mrs Hillary-Warnett was refused admission on the basis that she was an alleged perpetrator, a decision understandable in the circumstances. Ms Hillary was also refused admission for similar reasons. So no one remained who was able to speak to day to day management issues at the home. Mrs Davis then attended the meeting alone. She was 77 years old and faced ten members of the safeguarding authorities, eight of whom were employees of West Sussex. Mrs Davis handed up her solicitors’ letter of 9 December but Ms Attwood, the chair declined to consider it or to show it to the others present.

 

    1. The meeting lasted more than 8 hours. It is unclear what documents were available to the panel. Mr McGuire emphasises the extent of the discussion at Mrs Hillary-Warnett’s interview with the police, at which all matters complained of were apparently covered. However there is nothing to suggest that the record of the interview was disclosed or discussed with the panel despite the fact that it must have been one of the factors leading the police to decide to take no action. It does not appear from the record that notes of other interviews were available to the panel either. West Sussex, surprisingly, relies on the fact that Mrs Davis did not herself at the conference ask to have the matter adjourned. But it was or should have been obvious that she wanted it adjourned because her solicitors had written to say so and Mrs Davis had reminded the meeting of the letter. Ms Attwood points to the fact that Mrs Davis started by making it clear that she was going to follow her solicitors’ advice to make no comment but then chose to go on and comment on a number of occasions. There was no indication that West Sussex saw anything amiss in relying on what this elderly lady went on to say, despite knowing of her solicitors’ advice. During the lunch break which according to Ms Attwood was ‘relaxed’ Mrs Davis made a remark to her informally. Ms Attwood “suggested … that she share these comments with other attendees when the meeting reconvened and she agreed and … repeated this statement towards the end of the meeting”. This was unfair.

 

    1. West Sussex was aware of Mrs Davis’s limited role as owner not manager of Nyton House. The chair refused an adjournment, gave Mrs Davis no proper opportunity to prepare for the meeting, refused even to consider her solicitors’ letter, continued for eight hours knowing that she was an elderly lady, where the meeting was ten on one side and one on the other and where even the informality of a brief lunch break was abused. Nevertheless conclusions were drawn about Mrs Davis’s credibility and her fitness to own a care home. These were in part based on detailed matters relating to individual carers and patients (see paragraph 18 of Ms Attwood’s statement) which West Sussex knew or should have known were outside Mrs Davis’s knowledge given the impossibility of looking into all these allegations in such an absurdly short time and its decision (for reasons which were of themselves legitimate ) to exclude from the meeting those who would have had the answers . West Sussex, as Mr McGuire put it, considered that Mrs Davis had ‘made a long series of admissions’.

 

    1. I again remind myself that the prime object of the investigation was to protect vulnerable adults and to prevent abuse not to give particular consideration to Mrs Davis. But her treatment at and around the meeting was deplorable.

 

    1. The Case Conference concluded that fourteen allegations of abuse were substantiated and ten were ‘inconclusive’. An allegation of ‘institutional abuse’ was found to substantiated based amongst other things on an ‘incestuous management and ownership structure’, an odd description of a family business. The conference imposed 45 ‘actions’ mainly on Nyton House. They also, referred, with potentially devastating professional and personal consequences, Ms Hillary, Ms Bidwell and Ms Hillary-Warnett to the ISA and NMC.

 

    1. The policy required minutes of the Case Conference and its outcomes to be sent to the Claimants within five days but these were not received within that time but delivered to the Claimants thirteen days later on 23 December with a request to respond within seven days (which would have been 31 December) shorter than the ten days permitted by the policy.

 

  1. It is not necessary for my decision for me to evaluate the quality of the decisions taken at the Case Conference but, having looked at the relevant material it seems to me that the submissions that there were serious flaws in the Defendants’ approach, for the reasons set out in paragraph 89 of Mr Purchase’s written argument, are well-founded. The object of the Case Conference was primarily to investigate allegations in the interests of protecting vulnerable adults, not to make determinations about Mrs Davis or the Case Conference and so it is understandable to a degree that West Sussex did not see the vulnerability of Mrs Davies as a concern.

 

and then this

 

52. West Sussex had started to investigate the allegations in April 2010 and, partly as a result of the police intervention, had not reached or communicated its conclusion orally until 10 December. It had not communicated its conclusions in writing until 22 December. It is hard to see how a responsible council genuinely seeking the views of the Claimants could have expected them to respond within a ludicrously short timescale set to expire on 31 December in the middle of what, for so many, is the Christmas and New Year break. In the event the council extended the deadline to 21 January 2011 and on 24 January the Claimants’ solicitors submitted a response running to 45 pages with a further eleven pages of attachments.

 

[This is the bit in the judgment, where if you’re for the Local Authority, you know beyond any doubt that you have lost on the public law case, your only hope is that the Judge agrees with your primary case that this is a contractual dispute, not a public law dispute. You are probably not optimistic about the prospects of that, at this point]

 

    1. Mr Purchase contends that the decisions of the Case Conference were made in the exercise of a public function. It was attended and conducted by members of public bodies carrying out their various statutory functions and to protect residents of care homes from abuse. Those functions are controlled by governmental guidance and published local policy and do not derive from contract. The point is starkly illustrated by the fact that only one of the residents who are alleged to have been abused was placed at Nyton House by the local authority under the Contract. He submits that while there is a contractual dispute following on from the allegations of abuse and the action taken by West Sussex following the decisions at the Case Conference there is no challenge to the Defendant’s exercise of its contractual rights in stark contrast with the facts in Caerphilly (a case in which Weaver was not cited and, which Mr Purchase argues, is wrong).

 

    1. I follow the guidance given by the Court of Appeal in Supportways and Weaver. In Supportways the question was whether a review which led to the decision not to renew a contract was a public law matter. As I read the judgments an applicant for a judicial review who has a contract with the body sued must establish a relevant and sufficient nexus between the matters complained of and the alleged unlawful exercise of public law powers. The caution about permitting a public law remedy does not apply to the same extent if the issue is not, as Neuburger LJ put it, ‘fundamentally contractual in nature’. The issues here are not fundamentally contractual or, to borrow the words of Elias LJ, ‘in the nature of a private act’.

 

    1. West Sussex responded to allegations by starting an investigation under its regulatory powers which was to lead to findings of abuse of thirteen residents at Nyton House only one of whom was there under a contract with West Sussex. The original complaint led swiftly to the exercise of the contractual power of suspension about which the Claimants’ solicitors corresponded. At different points in the investigation notices were given under the Contract. The Claimants’ solicitors’ letters referred to contractual rights, as well as to those under public law but there are also letters from West Sussex indicating that the two are seen as separate matters. When the decisions now challenged were taken at the Case Conference in December 2010 Default Notices under the Contract were soon given and one of the West Sussex employees present at the conference Mr Ian McCarthney attended because his responsibilities were for management of contractual matters. But it is plain that the investigation would have been carried out whether or not a contract had been in place between the parties as would the process of conference and decision-although the actions to be taken as a result would have differed. West Sussex issued Default Notices under the contract following the case conference but this was one of a series of steps consequent upon the decisions. It seems to me that West Sussex was rightly and primarily concerned with investigating allegations of abuse under its legal powers.

 

    1. The contractual issues were ancillary. There is no direct challenge to the contract in this case. The Claimants originally sought to quash the Default Notice, a grievance for which a private law remedy was available. Their other complaints are some distance from the contract. The contractual remedies would have been inadequate because these are essentially public law claims. The decisions were not about whether or not to continue a contract or to change its terms, they were about whether or not abuse had been established and if so what the consequences would be in a number of areas, only one of which was the contract. The Claimants are trying to clear their names from what they see as unfair findings of abuse by West Sussex (but not by the other public agencies concerned) and protect their staff from what they see as unfair referrals to professional bodies. In essence these are public law not contractual concerns.

 

  1. When taken together the factors cumulatively establish sufficient public flavour, as it was put in Weaver, to make the process of investigation and decision a public function distinct from the contractual relationship. So this defence fails.

 

These investigations are hard for a Local Authority. They have a duty of care to the people placed in these homes, and once the police conclude their investigation, there is obviously a time pressure to take appropriate safeguarding action. But in a case such as this, where the police were investigating from April to December, having a meeting with only one working day for the organisation under investigation to respond to the report was always going to be problematic.  I suspect in retrospect  (a place where wisdom comes easily) there is regret in not having accepted the request to adjourn for 10 days.

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