Tag Archives: adults and inherent jurisdiction

 

This case, involving an 18 year old woman who had lived in England until she was nearly 17 and then went to live with her father in Saudi Arabia, attracted a lot of press attention – the headline of this piece is how it was portrayed in a lot of the Press coverage. The story was that this woman was locked up by her father, to keep her away from men, and was locked up in a cage – the High Court made orders that she be released (although with an acknowledgment that there was nothing the English Court could do if the father didn’t comply)

 

The case is now reported, so we can see the facts.  Al Jeffery v Al Jeffery (Vulnerable Adult : British Citizen) 2016

 

 

 

(Let’s be honest, when the other members of Rainbow zipped up Zippy’s mouth, it is hard not to see that as a deprivation of Zippy’s liberty)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2016/2151.html

 

In a similar way to the “woman who sparkled” case, once again, the Press don’t come out of it too well – they had access to this information, and of course used it to doorstep the woman’s relatives. Stay classy, San Diego.

 

I am aware that this has led to considerable publicity in print and online, much of it under a headline “Woman kept in a cage” or words to that effect, the accuracy of which I will later address. I was told (and if it is true, I regret it) that this led in turn to press harassing members of the family in Wales

 

The ‘cage’ element is obviously the major motif of the story,  but there is perhaps more to that than one might think from the Press coverage

 

 

The “cage”

 

• I refer under a discrete heading to the issue of a “cage” because I am aware that this has given rise to some rather sensational headlines in the media. Further, in two national newspapers last Saturday (it may have been in more) I myself saw large colour pictures of the photograph now at bundle p.C84. It is the case that Amina herself has referred to her being kept “in a cage” or “in a massive cage”. This may have led headline writers and/or their readers to visualise that she was being kept actually in a cuboid cage of the type that an animal might be kept in with some form of bars all around and on top of it. That is not what happened; and the purpose of this section of this judgment is to create some objectivity and proportionality, and to describe as best I can what appears actually to have happened. I stress, however, that I have not heard any oral evidence and I have only seen the two photographs at pp.C84 and 85.
• Within the father’s flat there were two vertical barred panels. One, now seen at p.84, is yellow. It is a large metal framework of bars upon which is affixed, probably by welding, a metal diamond shaped lattice grille. Each diamond shape in the lattice is smaller than an adult hand. It is the sort of security structure that could be fixed over windows or doors to prevent entry, or could be used as a security partition in, for instance, a store room. It is a form of caging, but not itself a cage. The other, now seen at p.C85, is, in the photograph, a mid-brown colour. It is roughly the size and shape of a full height vertical door. It consists of a hinged metal frame with metal vertical bars through which an adult could not squeeze. It is the sort of security structure that is occasionally seen as an added security door or gate outside a front door, or could be used as a security door or gate in a corridor. It, too, is caging, but not itself a cage.
• The father admits that both these structures were affixed within his flat. He says through Mr. Scott-Manderson that the yellow lattice grille is simply affixed over external windows to prevent Amina from shouting out to the street below, the flat being on the fourth floor. From the appearance in the photograph at p.84 I am sceptical about this. Amina herself is in the foreground, with the grille beyond her, so the windows could not be in the foreground but off the photograph. Beyond the grille there does, indeed, appear to be a wooden framework which appears to contain glass panes, but they do not have the appearance of external windows. They do have the appearance of an internal glazed screen or partition, like a “room divider”. I say that, because it appears from the photograph that in part of the area beyond the grille there is a hanging cupboard or something similar, and above that the appearance of artificial electric light shining through from beyond. The father says that the glass panes are, indeed, external windows and that the light is merely a reflection from a light within the room. The father says that the purpose of the brown barred door or gate seen at p.C85 was, indeed, to restrict Amina’s access to parts of the flat, including the front door, but that it was removed several months ago. He describes it as a “barrier partition”.
• On the father’s own account, the purpose of both these structures was to restrict Amina, whether from access to parts of the flat and the front door, or from simply looking or calling out of the window. Further, the father does admit that when he himself leaves the flat to go to his part time work he does lock her in. I conclude that Amina was not literally in a cage, but that her freedom of movement was, and is, admittedly constrained in a way that I would regard as severe, having regard to her age and full capacity. She was, and, so far as I am aware, still is, deprived of her liberty and could be described as “caged”, although not “in a cage”.

 

 

It reads more as being in a room that had a barred window and that she was not permitted to leave the home and had very restricted access to the outside world – as Holman J says, she was deprived of her liberty and could be described as being caged, but she was not ‘in a cage’

 

[Google image has let me down here – I really wanted a picture of Andromeda from Clash of the Titans (1981) in her gilded cage that Calibos was keeping her in.  With a vulture jailer, no less, who would pick up the cage in his beak and carry her off… But no joy. Bah. Anyway, here’s a picture of her as she is awaiting for Poseidon to “UNLEASH THE KRAKEN”  and her liberty is definitely being deprived]

 

 

The Judge had made as part of his order that the father must allow his daughter to speak to her solicitor in confidence to provide instructions. That did not happen

 

 

• Notwithstanding the father’s position as recited in the order and summarised above, the order made three orders, each qualified as being “without prejudice to the issue of jurisdiction”: [i] continuing forced marriage protection orders; [ii] for the immediate return of Amina to England and Wales; and [iii] directing the father to make Amina available for an interview at the British Consulate prior to the fact finding hearing. By the time of the next directions hearing on 5 July 2016, Amina and the father were represented respectively by Mr. Henry Setright QC and Mr. Marcus Scott-Manderson QC who represent them again at this hearing. The order recited that the court had determined that “arrangements must be made for [Amina] to give instructions without fetter or any perception of fetter to her solicitors privately and confidentially” at the British Consulate in Jeddah. Paragraph 15 of the order itself ordered the father to facilitate the attendance of Amina at the consulate “… in order to enable her to speak privately and confidentially to her solicitors from those premises, for the purpose of giving instructions for, and approving, the statement” which another part of the same order ordered Amina to file and serve. I will for convenience refer to that particular provision of the order with regard to attendance at the consulate as “the paragraph 15 order”. Overarchingly, the order of 5 July repeated by reference the order to cause the immediate return of Amina to England and Wales.
• The father has not returned Amina to England and Wales and has not complied with the paragraph 15 order. As a result, Miss Hutchinson has not been able to speak privately and confidentially and without fetter or any perception of fetter to Amina, and she has not in fact been able to communicate at all with Amina since June 2016. As to the father’s non-compliance, Mr. Scott-Manderson said at the hearing that:

 

“The father consciously decided in breach of paragraph 15 not to take her to, or make her available at, the consulate, although he knew all the detailed arrangements which had been made and no excuse or explanation (e.g. ill health, car breakdown etc.) is put forward. There is an impasse.”

The result was that the fact finding element of the hearing which had been fixed for last week was completely ineffective. Mr. Setright and Miss Hutchinson have no recent instructions from their client. They have no “proof of evidence” from her. They have been unable to take her through, or seek her instructions upon, the several statements and exhibits filed by or on behalf of the father. And, of course, they have been unable to prepare any statement from her. The father did, as required by another paragraph of the order of 5 July 2016, take Amina to the Hilton Hotel in Jeddah last Monday at the start of the hearing, from which evidence was to be given by each of them by video link (or, as I was told on the day, by Skype) to the Royal Courts of Justice. However, Mr. Setright was, in my view quite rightly, unwilling to embark on any consideration of oral evidence in those circumstances. It is elementary that a client is not, as it were, put into the witness box blind. It is elementary that an advocate does not cross-examine without having his own client’s instructions as to what the case is. There were in any event no safeguards of any kind as to the circumstances of Amina in the hotel or what pressures, influence or “fetter” she might be under. For these reasons, too, I myself would in any event have been quite unwilling to embark upon the projected “fact finding” exercise.

 

• I wish, therefore, to make crystal clear that the reason I did not, and could not, embark upon the “fact finding” that had been scheduled for this hearing was, and is, entirely because of the conscious decision of the father not to comply with the paragraph 15 order. It is his responsibility, not mine, that I am impelled to decide the outcome of this hearing on a consideration of the documents, untested and un-supplemented by any oral evidence. Precisely because that evidence is lacking, I do not by this judgment make any considered judicial finding as to any of the disputed facts. I merely record them, although I must comment upon them.
• Although the father consciously did not comply with the paragraph 15 order, with its more rigorous terms and safeguards and the express purpose of enabling unfettered communication with Miss Hutchinson, he had complied with the earlier order of 12 May to the extent of permitting Amina to have a meeting at the Hilton Hotel in Jeddah with a British consular representative, Amna Ghulam. The father personally was not in the room. However, he insisted on a lady being present who has been described during the hearing as “the father’s representative”. That lady made a note, which has since been typed up in English and is now at bundle p.C165, and she has made a statement that her note is accurate. In view of para.6(b) of the order of 5 July 2016, I will omit parts which make or include allegations against individuals other than the father who is now the sole respondent to these proceedings, but the note requires to be read in full by any court subsequently engaged in this case.

 

“Note: Amina appears dishevelled, strangely unlike her sister covered with a niqab. She appears to have written ‘kill’ or ‘killing’ on her right wrist with blue ink and red or pink ink.

When asked what were her (Amina’s) future plans, if she wanted to stay in Saudi Arabia or if she wanted to leave the country, Amina responded that she would like to leave the country but her family are not allowing her to leave.

Amina stated that she has been locked up in her room for over a year.

Amina stated whilst the British court case is continuing in the UK her family have informed her that she will only get her freedom (study and work) only after the case in the UK closes.

… Since [she dropped the last case] Amina stated she was abused and locked up, which is why she would like to return to the UK.

When asked why is her older sister allowed to have a phone and she is dressed well and not covered, Amina responded that two years ago she kissed a guy (in KAUST [a university in Saudi Arabia]) who proposed to her twice but her family refused him.

Amina stated her family manipulated her younger sister even before she came to Saudi Arabia that Amina is an evil girl and that she should not speak to Amina. Amina continued to say that when her younger sister came to Saudi she already had a bad image of [Amina] but when she came to Saudi Arabia she found a locked up girl with a shaved head.

…

… [Her father] is the one who locks me up. And the reason for that is because she had kissed a guy two years ago.

Amina was asked if she is still locked up. She responded that the metal bars are no longer in her room but she is still locked up in the house and she is not allowed to use the phone or internet.

…

… Amina confirmed that the reason why she ran away and build a case … is because she wants to study, work and get married.

When asked if she wants to get married by her way or her family way, Amina responded that she does not care who she marries, she wants to get out in any way possible …

When asked why she chose to come back and live with her family after running away and not choose the shelter, Amina responded that she did not have the choice, the police threatened her with jail if she did not return to her father. She continued to say that her father has the choice to take her to prison and that he always threatens her with it, she also added that the Saudi police advised her father to take her to prison after hearing what she did.

Amina stated that she would like to inform the judge that she is put in a difficult situation because she will get in trouble with her family if the case does not end. But at the same time she does not trust her family.

When asked to clarify what she wanted, Amina responded that her family wants her to say that she lied about her accusations. She stated that it is not true. And that the judge should know that she is not lying. Amina is afraid that if the case continues her father will continue to hit her.

When asked if her father still hits her Amina responded yes. She stated that her father recently threatened her that if she decides to leave he would take action against her.

Amina continued to say that her father pretends to be cooperative with the Saudi authorities, she stated that he once informed a Saudi judge that if she wanted to complain about him he would take her to the police himself. Amina stated that she had asked her father to take her to the police station after he hit her and strangled her, but he refused.

When asked again if her father hits her, Amina responded yes …

Amina is afraid for her safety if she cannot leave Saudi Arabia. She asked that the court would allow the British Embassy to check up on her every month … She also stated that [she was] prevented from going to the bathroom for one month, she was forced to urinate in a cup. She stated that she would get punished when she used her room as a toilet.

Amina requested to speak with her lawyer.

…

By the end of the meeting Amina had a phone conversation with her lawyer in the UK.

A note was passed under the table to the British representative.”

 

• The conversation with the lawyer in the UK was not with Miss Hutchinson but with her assistant, Mrs. Wendy Ramus. I do not know what was said, being privileged, but in any event it was not the private, confidential and lengthy opportunity to take instructions without fetter which the later paragraph 15 order required. The consular representative, Amna Ghulam, with whom the meeting took place, has supplied to Miss Hutchinson by email her own account of the meeting. The existence of the email has been disclosed to the court and to the father’s lawyers but the contents are stated by Mr. Setright to be privileged, as the intended purpose of the meeting (thwarted by the presence of the father’s representative) had been to provide a conduit for information and instructions from Amina to her solicitor, and her lawyers here (who cannot obtain her instructions) do not consider that they can, or should, waive the privilege. As the father’s representative’s note was, of course, prepared in the first instance for the father, I do not know what else may have been said which the father’s representative decided not to record. Mr. Setright indicated in veiled terms, but in open court, that Amina’s team consider that Amina could be at heightened risk if her father saw the consular representative’s own email. The note of the father’s representative refers at the end to “a note was passed under the table to the British representative”. As I understand it, that note has not itself been transmitted here to London. Photo shots of it made by a mobile phone have been. They are apparently hard to decipher, but in any event Mr. Setright asserts that similar considerations apply to it as to the consular representative’s own email record and they claim privilege. I have not seen it and I do not know what it says.

 

 

Far from what was needed, which was the chance for this woman to talk in private with her lawyers, to be able to speak freely and to obtain advice.

 

It was a very difficult scenario. On the one hand, the Court was looking at someone who was an adult living in another country – a country where rules and law and customs are not exactly the same as ours and the potential of interfering with that sovereign state, and on the other there was a British citizen crying out for help and no prospect of it arriving if the English Courts did not intervene.

 

Discretion

 

• The question now is whether, in my judicial discretion, I should actually exercise jurisdiction and make an order and, if so, what order. I have, indeed, approached this case with very great caution and circumspection. I have had firmly in mind from first to last the risk of exorbitance. Caution and circumspection obviously do not depend on the length of hearing alone, but I did hear this case over four long days, during which I heard sustained argument from very experienced leading counsel. I have had very considerable “thinking time”, both during the hearing and since, while preparing this judgment. I have in fact moved during the course of the hearing from a starting position in which I openly expressed extreme doubt and reservation whether I should actually exercise a discretion to make an order, to the position (which, anticipating the outcome, I now disclose) that I should do so. In my view, the admitted or core facts of this case all point to Amina being under a constraint from her father which, having regard to her age, is severe. Her father admits to locking her in the flat for several hours when he goes out. He admits that until recently the barred door in the photograph at p.C85 was in position, restricting her access to parts of the flat, including the kitchen. He admits that the yellow grille at p.C84 is still in place, and although he says that its purpose is only to prevent her from shouting out of the window, that in itself is a constraint upon her means of communication with the outside world. As I explained at para.33 above, I am sceptical that that grille is not in fact restricting her movement within the flat as well.
• I agree with Mr. Setright that the terms of the document of the Saudi Arabian court dated 12 April 2016 at bundle p.D12 themselves indicate a person under severe constraint. Although now aged 21, she undertakes not to challenge her father’s authority over all her affairs and not to leave the house without his permission. The father’s own evidence in para.15 of his statement dated 16 June 2016 is that if she were to run away, the police, far from offering her protection from her father, would put her in prison. The very recent events in this case, and the father’s refusal to comply with para.15 and to allow Amina even to have unrestricted confidential and secure access to her consul and her own solicitor, vividly illustrate and underline the degree of continuing control and constraint being exercised. Overarchingly, she is under constraint if, at the age of 21, she wishes to leave Saudi Arabia, whether to travel to Britain or anywhere else, and is being prevented by her father from doing so.
• In all these ways, Amina is disabled from functioning as an independent adult, not merely just out of childhood at the age of 18, but already aged 21. Amina is a citizen of Saudi Arabia. These constraints may be acceptable and even the norm under the law and culture of Saudi Arabia. But she is also a British citizen, and under the law and culture of Britain they are not. They are, indeed, totally unacceptable, and do represent in the words of Munby J in Re SA “… some significant curtailment of the freedom to do those things which in this country free men and women are entitled to do”. If Amina chooses voluntarily to remain in Saudi Arabia, of which she is a citizen, she must, of course, respect and adhere to the law and culture of that society. But the current constraint is denying to her the right to choose to be British and to live in Britain and to respect, adhere to and be regulated by the law and culture of British society. It is true that she is currently present and habitually resident in Saudi Arabia, but that results from her obedience to the will of her father in 2012. It is accepted that she did not travel there voluntarily and of her own free will.
• In my view, the current circumstances are such that this British person does require protection, in the language of Lady Hale and Lord Toulson in Re B at para.60; and she is currently in a peril from which she requires to be “rescued”, in the language of Lord Sumption in that case at para.87. Nevertheless, I must exercise great caution and not be exorbitant. There are other factors which weigh in favour of exercising jurisdiction. They include that not only is she British, but she was born and brought up and educated in Britain until the age of almost 17. This is a very significant factor. I would take a very different view of this case if Amina had been born and lived her whole life in Saudi Arabia but happened to be British by descent. Her mother and several of her siblings currently still live in Britain and, although she may be estranged from them, their presence here still indicates the continuing connections between this family and Britain.
• However, there are also powerful factors which militate against exercising jurisdiction. Her father is Saudi and Saudi alone. She herself has dual nationality. The Hague Convention on Certain Questions Relating to the Conflict of Nationality Laws done at the Hague on 12 April 1930 provides at Article 4 that “a State may not afford diplomatic protection to one of its nationals against a State whose nationality such person also possesses”. Britain is a signatory to that Convention, although Saudi Arabia is not. The view of the British Government, expressed in para.3.2 of its Home Office Nationality Instructions, is that:

 

“Commonly known as the ‘Master Nationality Rule’, the practical effect of this Article [viz Article 4] is that where a person is a national of, for example, two States (A and B), and is in the territory of State A, then State B has no right to claim that person as its national or to intervene on that person’s behalf …”

This may in part explain the position taken by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in their letter of 14 December 2015 that “Amina is a dual national … there is little that we can do to assist her”. But I am being asked to make an order against the father personally. I am not being asked to “afford diplomatic protection” or in any way to act “against” the State of Saudi Arabia in the language of Article 4, and there is no question of my doing so. In any event, in Re A the child concerned had dual British and Pakistani nationality and that was not suggested by the judgment of Baroness Hale to represent an obstacle to the exercise of jurisdiction, save to the extent that dual nationality was one of the considerations which had been raised by Mr. Setright and referred to in para.64.

 

• The fact that Amina is present and habitually resident in Saudi Arabia undoubtedly militates against the exercise of jurisdiction, but is tempered in this case by the circumstances in which she came to be there: her father’s insistence and command, from which she has since been unable to escape. In Re B at para.59 Lady Hale and Lord Toulson identified “three main reasons” for caution when deciding whether to exercise jurisdiction. First, that to do so may conflict with the jurisdictional scheme applicable between the countries in question. There is no jurisdictional scheme between Britain, or Wales and England and Saudi Arabia. Second, that it may result in conflicting decisions in the two countries. In view of the proceedings in Saudi Arabia in April 2016, this is, of course, a weighty consideration in the present case. As I understand it, however, the “decision” in the Saudi court in April was not so much a decision imposed by the court in the exercise of its own judgment; rather, it was that court expressing its approval of that which the parties themselves had agreed. Whilst Mr. Scott-Manderson argues that Amina’s more appropriate remedy is to make some application of her own to that court, her ability freely to gain access to that court may itself be limited by the constraints, and she certainly has no means with which to fund a lawyer. Further, I regret that I lack confidence that that court would permit and enforce against the father that she is able to return to Britain, since Saudi Arabia does not recognise dual nationality. The court might not, therefore, recognise what might be the fundamental basis of her application, namely her British nationality.
• The third reason identified by Lady Hale and Lord Toulson is that it may result in unenforceable orders. In relation to that reason, they said on the facts of that case that “it is possible that there are steps which an English court could take to persuade the respondent to obey the order”, although, so far as I am aware, those steps were not further identified. Enforcement is undoubtedly a significant issue in the present case. Generally, courts do not make orders which they cannot effectively enforce, although almost daily judges of the Family Division do just that in relation to children who have been abducted to countries which are not parties to the Hague Convention on the civil aspects of international child abduction. I accept that there is little or nothing that this court could do to enforce against the father in Saudi Arabia any order which it may make if he was determined not to obey or comply with it. There are no conventions in operation between Wales and England, or Britain and Saudi Arabia. There is no reciprocity. The courts of Saudi Arabia would not even recognise the basis upon which I claim and assert jurisdiction, namely the British nationality of Amina, since the State of Saudi Arabia does not recognise dual nationality and, therefore, her British nationality.
• The father has no assets here of which I am aware, unlike in the case of Re B (see para.21 of the judgment of Parker J at [2013] EWHC 3298 (Fam) at the remitted hearing), but that does not preclude the persuasive force of an order, particularly one made after a very full and thorough hearing in which, although not personally present, the father engaged and fully participated and was fully heard throughout. The situation that will pertain after this judgment is very different from the situation that pertained under the earlier orders, many of which were expressed to be “without prejudice to the issue of jurisdiction”. By this judgment the issue of jurisdiction has been resolved. Further, the father himself voluntarily chose to live for many years in Wales; to educate and to bring his children up here; and to subject himself to both the protection of, and the constraints of, the laws of Wales and England and the legal system of Wales and England. His wife, from whom he is not estranged, and several of his children continue to live here. He may later, if not sooner, wish or have reason to visit Wales or England again, but he could not safely do so if he remained in breach of a significant order of this court, for he would be liable to be punished (if still in breach) for his continuing contempt of court.
• For all these reasons, I consider that, although the father may ultimately decide to defy any order I make, this court does have considerable moral and also practical “hold” over him. There is no reason why I should assume or suppose that he will not obey any proportionate order which I may make; and I consider that I should proceed on the assumption that he will obey it.
• There is one further factor to which I should refer. In Re A at para.65(vi) Baroness Hale referred to the absence of any enquiry being made about how the children in that case were. In Re B at para.86 Lord Sumption referred, rather similarly, to an independent assessment of the situation of the child abroad and said “unless the facts were already clear, that would be the least that a court should do before it could be satisfied that she should be compulsorily returned to this country”. This led Mr. Scott-Manderson to submit that, before making any stronger order, this court should first direct or request some similar assessment of Amina by some appropriate authority in Saudi Arabia. There is, however, the significant difference that Re B concerned a child aged seven by the time of the hearing in the Supreme Court who could not speak for herself. The present case concerns an adult aged 21 who (subject to the constraints) can and does.
• Balancing all these considerations, I have come slowly and cautiously, but ultimately very firmly, to the conclusion that I should exercise the jurisdiction and should make such orders as I can to protect Amina. If citizenship means anything at all, it does include the right to seek help and protection and, weighing all those factors, I should not deny help and protection to Amina. To do nothing at all would, in my view, amount to a dereliction towards Amina and in effect just giving up on her.

 

What order?

 

• The next and final question is what order I should actually make. There was much discussion during the hearing about my simply repeating an order in the terms of para.15, hoping that now that a full hearing has occurred the father would permit a private meeting to take place at the consulate. He has, however, persisted in his position that he will not do so unless the Foreign and Commonwealth Office give a prior written assurance that if Amina were to seek diplomatic protection or “sanctuary” in the consulate, the consulate would not give it to her, but would hand her over to the Saudi authorities of the Ministry of the Interior. I see little point or purpose in repeating a para.15 order. Its main purpose when made on 4 July was to enable instructions to be taken from Amina so that a detailed up to date statement could be prepared for her, and an effective fact finding hearing could take place. That having been thwarted by the father, I am not now willing to set up another projected fact finding hearing in inevitably several months’ time. There has been far too much delay already in proceedings which ultimately concern liberty and which were commenced now almost eight months ago last December.
• There has also, incidentally, been far too much expense. I was told by Mr. Setright that the costs and disbursements of Amina, all funded by English legal aid, are already of the order of £50,000. The litigation has not yet cost the father personally anything, since his costs and disbursements are apparently all being funded by or through the Saudi Arabian Embassy, although he may be required later to repay them.
• In my view, I should, rather, move directly now to an order against the father personally that he must permit and facilitate the return of Amina, if she so wishes, to Wales or England and pay the air fare. He must at once make freely available to her both her British and her Saudi Arabian passports. She needs the former to enable her freely to enter Britain. She needs the latter to enable her freely to re-enter Saudi Arabia if later she wishes to return there for any purpose. I will specify the date by which Amina must be enabled to return as Sunday 11 September 2016. That allows about five and a half weeks for the father to reflect on this judgment and to make orderly arrangements. I myself will be sitting again here at the Royal Courts of Justice from Monday 12 September 2016, and very shortly after that date this case must be listed again before me. If Amina is, indeed, here, she must attend and I will decide what further orders, if any, should be made. If she is not here, I will similarly decide what further orders should be made or action taken.
• As I require Amina personally to attend, that hearing will, in the first instance, be listed in private so she is not initially burdened by the presence of the media. However, at or before the conclusion of the hearing I will in some way (by judgment or by a statement) inform the public and any interested representatives of the media the gist of what has occurred between now and then. I wish to make crystal clear that, apart from requiring her attendance before me at that hearing, if she has indeed voluntarily returned to Wales and England, I do not make any order whatsoever against Amina herself. The purpose is not to order her to do anything at all. Rather, it is to create conditions in which she, as an adult of full capacity, can exercise and implement her own independent free will and freedom of choice. To that end, I will give further consideration with counsel after this judgment to what mechanism can now be established to enable her freely to state, if that be her own free decision and choice, that she does not now wish to avail herself of the opportunity provided by my decision and this order to return to Wales or England.
• I conclude this judgment by expressing my sincere thanks to Mr. Setright QC and his junior counsel Mr. Michael Gration, and to Mr. Scott-Manderson QC for their sustained and distinguished written and oral arguments in this case; and to the solicitors on both sides who instruct them.