Q v Q
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | THE PRESIDENT |
| Judgment Date | 21 May 2014 |
| Neutral Citation | [2014] EWFC 7 |
| Court | Family Court |
| Docket Number | Case No. WJ10P00530 |
| Date | 21 May 2014 |
[2014] EWFC 7
IN THE FAMILY COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
THE PRESIDENT OF THE FAMILY DIVISION
Case No. WJ10P00530
THE APPLICANT appeared as a Litigant in Person.
Miss J. Spooner appeared on behalf of the Respondent.
These are private law proceedings relating to a boy born in June 2007, who is therefore a little short of seven years old. The proceedings, it is distressing to record, have been going on since as long ago as 27 July 2010. The applications currently before the court are by the father for contact to his son and by the mother for an order under s.91(14) of the Children Act 1989.
The father is a convicted sex offender, having convictions for sexual offences with young male children, the second of which was committed during the currency of these proceedings.
Reports have been commissioned from Ray Wyre Associates dealing with the question of the risk which the father poses to his son. Reports commissioned by the father were provided by DS of Ray Wyre Associates on 28 March 2011 with a more recent addendum report dated 15 January 2014. On joint instructions, reports were commissioned from JD of Ray Wyre Associates, the original report by JD being dated February 2012, with an addendum report dated 27 February 2014. These reports were before Her Honour Judge Boye, who has had the carriage of this case since 31 October 2013, when on 10 March 2014 she made an order directing that the case be adjourned for a final hearing on 6, 7, 9 and 12 May 2014, the first day being a reading day.
The reports both from DS and from JD set out unequivocally, and on the face of it with some force, the proposition that the father's son would not be safe in his presence and indeed that there should be, for reasons explained in the reports, no contact, direct or indirect, between the father and his son unless and until certain work identified by DS has been successfully undertaken by the father. Nonetheless, Judge Boye directed the final hearing and that order has not been challenged.
Perhaps not entirely surprisingly in these seemingly unpromising circumstances, the father's legal aid has been terminated. The consequence of that is twofold. First, it means that there is no available fund to meet the costs of DS attending court as an expert witness or to fund the father's half share of the cost of JD attending court as an expert witness. Secondly, it means that the father is unrepresented.
The father seemingly does not speak much, if any, English and is dependent upon the services of an interpreter. I need say nothing more to indicate the obvious forensic difficulties of a hearing taking place if the father is to challenge the expert reports, as he must if he is to have any realistic prospect of avoiding the orders for which the mother contends.
Miss Spooner on behalf of the mother invites me today, in effect summarily, to determine the matter. She asks for the father's application to be dismissed forthwith, being as she puts it totally without merit and she seeks a s.91(14) order today in substance preventing the father making any application in respect of his son without the leave of the court at least until such time as the father has undertaken the work identified by DS.
I can understand why Miss Spooner makes that submission. On the face of it, the reports are clear and compelling but, quite apart from the fact that Judge Boye was of the view that there required to be a substantial final hearing, the fact is, if one analyses the reports, that a significant part of the analysis is dependent upon the accounts given to each expert by one party or the other. For example, the addendum report of JD addresses in paras. 6 and 7 the father's contention that, despite his convictions in relation to sexual abuse of other children, he poses no risk of sexual harm to his own son. In the course of analysis as to why that view is not accepted, JD founds herself in part upon the account given by the mother of the role played by the father in caring for his son, as also the mother's account of the relationship, including the nature of the sexual relationship, between the mother and the father.
Tempting though it is to think that the father's case is totally lacking in merit, it does seem to me, despite everything Miss Spooner has said, and recognising the constraints which may be imposed on cross-examination by the fact that, in part, challenge on behalf of the father would be to his own expert, I am unpersuaded that there are not matters in these reports which could properly be challenged, probed, by someone representing the father.
For example, a perfectly proper line of cross-examination of JD might be along these lines, "In part at least, your analysis of the risks that the father poses to his son, as opposed to other children, is based upon the account you have had from the mother of what went on in the family home." It would seem, bearing in mind the language of JD's report, that the answer could only be, "Yes." The next question then might be, "Suppose...
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