Re R (Care: Disclosure: Nature of Proceedings)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | MR. JUSTICE CHARLES |
| Judgment Date | 13 November 2001 |
| Neutral Citation | [2001] EWHC 4 (Fam) |
| Docket Number | Case No.RC00C02117 |
| Court | Family Division |
| Date | 13 November 2001 |
[2001] EWHC 4 (Fam)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
FAMILY DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice Tuesday,
Mr. Justice Charles (In Public)
Case No.RC00C02117
MR. J. BAKER Q.C. (instructed by the Legal Department, Slough Borough Council) appeared on behalf of the Local Authority.
Messrs. Fairbrother & Darlow, Bracknell) appeared on behalf of the 1st Respondent/Mother.
MR. S. BELLAMY Q.C. and MS. M. CUDBY (instructed by IBB, Uxbridge) appeared on behalf of the 2nd Respondent/Father.
MR. C. HOWARD Q.C. and MR. N. MOSS (instructed by Messrs. Fairbrother & Darlow, Bracknell) appeared on behalf of the 3rd Respondent.
MISS J. HALL (instructed by Messrs. Griffiths Robertson, Reading) appeared on behalf of the 4th Defendant.
MR. J. SWIFT (instructed by Messrs. Kidd Rapinet, Reading) appeared on behalf of the Guardian ad Litem.
Introduction.
This case concerns five children and, in it, the local authority seek public law orders. The proceedings took place in private, but I am delivering this part of the judgment in public. For that reason, I shall refer to the children by initials and to their parents as "the mother" and "the father". If I slip up and refer to the name of a person within the family, that name and indeed anything else identifying the family from this judgment is not to be reported.
All five children are the children of the marriage of the mother and the father. They were married in 1984 when the mother was 18 and the father was 33. The mother and father are now respectively 36 and 50. The children are C, bom on 27 May 1985, who is 16; TR, born on 10 November 1986, who is 15; T, born on 22 May 1989, who is 12; JL, born on 3 June 1994, who is seven; S, the only girl, born on 23 November 1999, who is nearly two.
Other relevant members of the family are the maternal grandparents, a brother of the maternal grandmother. Uncle B; and a maternal aunt, Mrs. W, who came into the picture very late in the proceedings in that during the course of the proceedings she and her husband made an offer that the mother and all or any of the children could come and live with them; the mother's siblings, namely a sister and her brother. Uncle W. The father's parents are still alive; they live in Gloucester and have played no part in the proceedings and only a minor part in the history. The maternal grandmother died on 16 November 2000. The family of the maternal grandparents, Uncle B and Uncle W, all lived in the same town. Mrs. W and her husband lived and live in a town about 15 miles away, but have had little contact with the mother and her family.
The Parties.
The applicant is the local authority; the first and second respondents are the mother and the father; C is the third respondent, and he was separately represented by solicitors and leading and junior counsel; TR is the fourth respondent and he was also separately represented by solicitors and junior counsel; the fifth, sixth and seventh respondents are the remaining children, and they were represented by their Guardian ad Litem, solicitor and counsel.
The mother and the father were represented by separate solicitors, leading and junior counsel; the local authority was represented by leading counsel.
Notwithstanding the considerable array of talent representing the parties, who are all clearly generally very competent, in my view (which of course has the considerable benefit of hindsight), there was a lack of full and proper preparation in this case. I shall return to this, but at this initial stage record that the criticisms I make in this judgment of the way in which the case was prepared and conducted are not directed to individuals: in my view, most of the matters upon which those criticisms are based arise from a combination of a number of circumstances. In the main, those criticisms relate to the allegations of sexual abuse that were advanced by the local authority as a basis for establishing the existence of the threshold criteria and as matters which were relevant at the disposal stage of these proceedings.
In opening, leading counsel for the local authority (for understandable reasons) submitted that those allegations were very serious and wide. However, on the thirteenth day of the hearing, in circumstances which I will describe later, they were not pursued. A great part of the preceding twelve days was, understandably, taken up with evidence relating to the allegations of sexual abuse.
In broad terms, the local authority decided not to pursue the allegations of sexual abuse in these proceedings because of further material that came to light during the course of the hearing.
In my judgment, having regard to that material, it would not have been possible for the local authority or any of the representatives of the three youngest boys (who had made the allegations of sexual abuse upon which the local authority based their case) to invite the court to make findings in respect of those allegations without an adjournment and, thus, considerable delay. This was effectively common ground between the parties.
It was, however, also common ground between the parties that the remaining allegations advanced by the local authority to establish the threshold criteria and as to the second (or welfare or disposal) stage could be pursued fairly.
I add that, in my view, in the circumstances that arose, the decision of the local authority to proceed only on the basis of those allegations, which can broadly be described as allegations of neglect and emotional harm, was the correct one. Indeed, if the local authority had not reached that decision, I would have been likely to have urged them to take that course.
The consequence of the decision not to pursue further at this stage the allegations of sexual abuse is, naturally, that a considerable amount of time and public money has been wasted.
The reason for my return later in this judgment to the approach to the preparation of this case in connection with the allegations of sexual abuse and the errors which, in my view, were made is in large measure to make what I hope are some constructive suggestions for the future.
In this context, I heard helpful submissions from all counsel, who all recognised that with the benefit of hindsight some mistakes had been made.
A Brief Overview.
The local authority seek care orders in respect of each of the children. Interim care orders have been in place for some time in respect of the four youngest children. It was only following a professionals' meeting held shortly before the hearing before me that the local authority decided to seek a care order in respect of C.
In their case summary which formed part of their opening, the local authority made the following allegation:
"The local authority alleges that the threshold criteria for making orders under Section 31 of the Children Act 1989 are satisfied by reason of the long history of neglect and emotional abuse which the children have suffered whilst in the care of their parents and by the history of sexual abuse within the family. The parents deny that any neglect or abuse has taken place."
At the time that case summary was prepared, that record of denial was I think accurate, but matters moved on and I shall return to that.
The denial of the sexual abuse, however, has been consistent. Admissions were made in respect of allegations of neglect.
The proceedings were commenced on 18 September 2000. On 26 September 2000, the first interim care orders were made in respect of the four youngest children. On that day, and thus after a court hearing, TR, T and JL were placed with experienced foster carers, a Mr. and Mrs. L, but C and S remained at home.
The immediate trigger to the commencement of the proceedings was the state of the family home and when the proceedings were launched the local authority based their case as to the establishment of the threshold criteria and the making of public law orders on the allegations of neglect and emotional abuse that are still pursued.
At that stage, although there had been some concerns relating to Uncle B, who is a maternal uncle and a Schedule 1 offender with a number of convictions spreading over a number of years, the local authority were not alleging that any of the children had been sexually abused.
Given the involvement of the local authority with this family over the years, a point relied on by the mother, the father and C in disputing the allegations of sexual abuse that were advanced, was the lack of any concern or allegation relating to sexual abuse prior to the commencement of the care proceedings.
As the case on sexual abuse was opened and advanced in evidence, the first allegations thereof that was relied on was made by T to his foster mother, Mrs. L, on 22 October 2000. These allegations were said to come out of the blue. They were shortly followed by allegations made by JL. Initially, the allegations were denied by TR but, within a few days, he, too, made allegations of sexual abuse that were relied on by the local authority.
The local authority also relied on memorandum interviews of TR and T. JL also had a memorandum interview, but in it he did not make or repeat allegations he had made to the foster mother concerning sexual abuse.
Further allegations of sexual abuse were made by the boys after the memorandum interviews, which were also relied on by the local authority.
The initial allegations relied on in opening and in evidence, included allegations against the father, C, Uncle B and TR. As presented in opening and in evidence, later allegations were made by JL against the mother.
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