Re W (A Minor) (Wardship: Publicity)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 1992 |
| Year | 1992 |
| Date | 1992 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
NEILL, BALCOMBE AND BELDAM, L JJ
Wardship – male ward of court – ward subjected in the past to sexual abuse by older men – local authority placing ward with male homosexual foster parents – newspaper seeking to publish an article about the case – local authority obtaining injunction to restrain publication – whether public interest in freedom of the press outweighed potential harm to ward by publication.
Wardship – media interest – summary of guidelines for approaching issues raised.
A boy, now aged 15, was received into the care of the local authority in September 1989 and was made a ward of court on the local authority's application in October 1990. He remained in contact with his mother but she was unable to provide a home for him and she was not made a party to the wardship proceedings. The boy had a disturbed background and it was clear that for several years he had been involved in homosexual activities with men very much older than himself.
Shortly after the boy had been made a ward of court, the local authority obtained an injunction from the High Court restraining publicity about the ward. The terms of this injunction were later modified in November 1990. In December 1990 the local authority placed the ward with two men as foster parents. The two men had had a stable homosexual relationship with each other for many years. Despite the existence of the wardship, the court was not informed that this placement had taken place. A newspaper then became aware of the placement of the ward with those foster parents and the editor decided that the newspaper should publish an article about the matter. The local authority applied for and obtained an ex parte injunction to restrain publication. On 20 June 1991, after hearing argument inter partes, the Judge continued the injunction previously granted.
The newspaper appealed.
Held – allowing the appeal: It was clear that the Judge recognized that he had to perform a difficult balancing exercise. The court would only interfere in the exercise of that discretion if the Judge had misdirected himself in law or was plainly wrong. There was no adequate basis for an argument that the Judge was wrong in law. However, on the facts of this case he was plainly wrong. Wholly insufficient importance had been attached to the fact that this was a matter of great public interest and concern. Media interest surrounding children who were wards of court raised difficult issues. From recent cases certain guidelines could be extrapolated. The court attached great importance to safeguarding the freedom of the press: per Lord Donaldson of Lymington, MR in Attorney General v Guardian Newspapers Ltd (No 2) [1990] 1 AC 109. Such freedom was, however, subject to exceptions which included restrictions upon publication
imposed for the protection of children. In considering whether to impose any such restriction to protect a ward of court, the court had to carry out a balancing exercise in which the welfare of the child was not the paramount consideration: per Butler-Sloss, LJ in Re M and N (Minors) [1990] FCR 395, 401C. The court would weigh the need to protect the ward from harm, against the right of the press to publish or to comment. An important factor would be the nature and extent of the public interest in the matter. The freedom of the press to publish matters of genuine public concern should not be restricted by the exercise of the court's jurisdiction in wardship any more than was essential to protect the ward from clear and identifiable harm: Re X (A Minor) and Re M and N (Minors) (above). In the former case it was made clear that it would be a wholly exceptional case where publication would be prohibited in order to prevent the ward being harmed by himself reading the publication in question. It was and always had been common ground that the placement of a male child with two male foster parents was a matter of legitimate public interest. This particular case was one of genuine public interest and not mere public curiosity: see Re C (A Minor) [1990] FCR 220, 223. Therefore, the public interest in the freedom of the press outweighed any potential harm which might be caused to the ward by publication of the...
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