Re "F" (A Minor)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE BALCOMBE,LORD JUSTICE BELDAM |
| Judgment Date | 25 June 1991 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1991] EWCA Civ J0625-5 |
| Docket Number | 91/0657 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
| Date | 25 June 1991 |
[1991] EWCA Civ J0625-5
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
FAMILY DIVISION
(HIS HONOUR JUDGE HUTCHINSON Q.C., sitting as a Judge of the High Court)
Royal Courts of Justice.
Lord Justice Balcombe
Lord Justice Beldam
91/0657
MRS. LINDY ARMITAGE (instructed by Messrs. Green Williamson & Way of Wakefield) appeared on behalf of the Appellant.
MRS. JILL BLACK (instructed by Messrs. J.W.F. Holt of Wakefield) appeared on behalf of the Respondent.
This is an appeal by the mother of an 11-year old boy, Christopher, against an order of His Honour Judge Hutchinson, sitting as a judge of the High Court on the 3rd June of this year, whereby he ordered that Christopher should remain a ward and that there should be an order under section 7(2) of the Family Law Reform Act 1967 in favour of the plaintiffs (the local authority) that the plaintiffs should have leave to move Christopher to a children's home, thereafter to a new long-term foster placement, to change his school if necessary, and that there should be certain other consequential directions.
The facts, in brief, are these. Christopher was born on 15th May 1980. He has an older sister, who is a full sister. Subsequently the marriage between his parents broke up, and his mother married a man called "B" by whom there was a younger child. Christopher from a very early age had problems, which can be shortly described as enuresis and soiling and also a craving for food. Not attempting to put it in medical language, in lay language that summarises Christopher's problems. Also there undoubtedly were problems with his stepfather when he was living at home, and they may well have contributed to his emotional and behavioural difficulties.
Christopher went into voluntary care on two occasions in 1985 and 1986, but the present position really arose after the separation of the mother and "B" when the mother became ill with a kidney infection. She went into hospital. Christopher, with his sister and younger half-brother, went to live with the maternal grandmother. She could not cope because of the problem with Christopher soiling himself. I think it is necessary to say that the problem was not just that he soiled himself, but that he would smear his faeces on the walls of rooms and so on. It was clearly a great problem, and one can understand the grandmother's difficulty. It was in those circumstances that Christopher was taken into care by the local authority. In January 1988 they started wardship proceedings. Quite soon after that he went to live with foster parents (whom I shall call "Mr. and Mrs. W").
That situation lasted until the main hearing in the wardship which took place before His Honour Judge Hutchinson in December last. The judgment was given on 21st December 1990. At that stage the judge had heard evidence over several days, including expert evidence from a Dr. Ward. The mother, who was represented by counsel, was putting forward the case that Christopher should be rehabilitated to her or that a programme of rehabilitation should be implemented. She said—and the judge accepted this—that her circumstances had improved, that her health was better, that her marriage to "B" had ended and that he was no longer on the scene.
The judge decided that Christopher's situation was such that he needed to know where his future lay as a matter of urgency, and so far as could be seen the right answer was that he should make his home with Mr. and Mrs. W. He summarised his findings at page 10 of his judgment. He referred to the question of urgency and that, if there was to be rehabilitation to the mother, there would have to be a programme which would take possibly six to twelve months in order to give the mother the assistance she would need to cope with Christopher. Then the learned judge said this:
"I accept, and I am very happy for her, that [the mother] is now much better, and stronger, and happier than she has been throughout her married life, but one of the difficulties at this stage, if I am to depend as I do depend on the urgency of the situation, is that Miss Peel"—i.e. the court welfare officer "has not seen the child with the natural mother."
Then he went on to deal with certain matters and he referred to the evidence of Dr. Ward, the child psychiatrist. He said at page 162C of our bundle:
"…the simple fact, I believe, it is again described in [Dr. Ward's] reports and spoken to in her evidence, is that the situation now existing between mother and child, and the circumstances and her observations of the mother suggest to her that the mother would not, with the best will in the world, in all the circumstances, be capable of caring for this difficult child through this very difficult period of his life.
And so I am, therefore, faced it seems to me inevitably, and I suppose one might say that the evidence on which substantially I relied in terms of the giving of the evidence forms only a small part of the three days hearing that we have had. But I have to accept the professional opinion, I believe, of Dr. Ward. First of all - I realise I repeat myself—first of all, there is an urgency about the situation, and secondly that [Dr. Ward] would view any attempt at rehabilitation pessimistically and [in] the circumstances,...
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