F v M

The people involved in this case are:

Both parents have Parental Responsibility in respect of U as the Father and the Mother were married to each other at the time U was born.

U lives with the Mother. A final order directing that U was to live with her was made by DJ Woodward, as she then was, in previous proceedings between these parties on 21 February 2022.

Subsequently, I re-stated the lives with order by consent within these proceedings on 31 October 2024.

The order of DJ Woodward on 21 February 2022 was made to conclude proceedings which included a finding of fact hearing that took place in 2021.

In those proceedings the Mother had alleged that the Father was responsible for perpetrating a campaign of domestic abuse against her. All of her allegations were dismissed by DJ Woodward, save that the judge accepted that the Father had unintentionally hurt the Mother when he slammed a door during an argument. The order provided for a stepped progression from indirect contact to Facetime contact and then ultimately for direct contact at a contact centre. That order was made by consent.

The Facetime contact did not take place and so, neither did the direct supervised contact. The Father applied to enforce DJ Woodward’s order on 08 August 2022. That application came before me on 02 March 2023 at a FHDRA. At that hearing I dismissed two C2 applications made by the Mother, one of which purported to be an application to vary DJ Woodward’s child arrangements order. The Mother agreed that DJ Woodward’s order should restart, and the Father agreed not to pursue his enforcement application should contact take place. I stayed his application with permission to apply to lift the stay should contact not take place, and concluded the proceedings with a child arrangements order mirroring, but re-starting, DJ Woodward’s order.

On 04 July 2023 the Mother applied to vary the child arrangements orders made by DJ Woodward and myself as she took the view that the Facetime contact that was taking place was detrimental to U who was reacting very poorly to it. U’s school were concerned about her presentation on contact days, and she was unable to say the word ‘daddy’. On 18 July 2023 the Father wrote to the Court to request that the stay on his enforcement application be lifted.

Ultimately, the two applications were case managed together by me and I directed that they be consolidated with the enforcement application, case number MA22P50159, which was designated as the lead action.

Accordingly, although both parties have their own applications, I will refer to the Father as the Applicant and the Mother as the Respondent.

Within these proceedings the Mother made an application for a prohibited steps order on 22 September 2023. I made an interim prohibited steps order preventing the Father from attending at U’s school or any place where he knows U is present at a hearing on 01 November 2023.

The Father seeks the following orders:

In the alternative, if I am against him in respect of direct contact due to the need for the Mother to undertake therapy, he would seek an extension of these proceedings to allow that therapy to be sourced and undertaken.

At the end of the evidence in May I sought an understanding of what the parties’ cases were. Miss Khan told me that the Father sought permission to apply for an order for a change of residence. I did not allow him to pursue that application for reasons given in a separate judgment on 22 May 2025.

The Mother seeks the following orders:

The findings sought by the Mother were outlined in paragraph 3 of Dr Proudman’s position statement. The Father seeks finding that the Mother has alienated the Father from U and has obstructed U’s relationship with him.

I had determined that the Mother was a vulnerable party. As a result, I made a number of participation directions within proceedings:

The Father had the benefit of an Urdu interpreter. There were different interpreters provided on different days of the hearing. None spoke his dialect, Mirpuri, but he confirmed that he could understand them, and they could understand him. Further, his counsel also spoke and understood Urdu and she raised no issues with the interpretation, save for an instance where she asked the interpreter to understand that the Father would sometimes stutter and so could often not finish his answers and there was an answer on day two which she suggested had not been properly interpreted. The interpreter agreed and the answer was clarified.

The Father’s application for enforcement is governed by Section 11 of the Children Act 1989.

Sections 11I – 11P of the Act make provision for the enforcement of child arrangements orders that contain the mandatory warnings required by Section 11I.

In order to enforce an order, the Court must be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that a person has failed to comply with a child arrangements order made under section 8 of the Act. If so satisfied, the Court may make an enforcement order or a suspended enforcement order, imposing on that person an ‘unpaid work requirement’.

Section 11J(3) says that the Court may not make an enforcement order if satisfied that the person in breach had a ‘reasonable excuse’ for breaching the order.

The Mother’s application to vary the child arrangements order of DJ Woodward is governed by section 8 of the Children Act 1989 as is her application for a prohibited steps order.

A prohibited steps order is an order which provides that no step which could be taken in meeting their parental responsibility for a child, and which is of a kind specified in the order, shall be taken by any person without the consent of the court.

Her application for overriding parental responsibility in respect of medical and educational decisions is an application for a specific issue order which is also governed by section 8 of the Children Act,

In reaching my decisions in respect of the section 8 applications I am required to make U’s welfare my paramount consideration.

I am required to have regard, in particular, to those matters listed in section 1(3) of the Act (‘the Welfare Checklist’) which are:

Sections 1(2A) and 1(2B) of the Children Act 1989 provide for a presumption that unless the contrary is shown, the involvement of both parents in the life of the child concerned will further the child's welfare. “Involvement” means involvement of some kind, either direct or indirect, but not any particular division of a child's time.

When considering whether or not to make an order, I am not to do so unless making an order would be better for U than making no order at all.

I am also required to have regard to the Article 8 rights of the parties and the child involved in this case. Article 8 is a qualified right, and any interference with the right to family life can only occur if the interference is proportionate.

As I have previously mentioned, DJ Woodward conducted a finding of fact hearing in which all of the Mother’s allegations bar one were found not proven. She made allegations of significant domestic abuse, controlling behaviour and rape against the Father. In family litigation that means that the facts alleged by the Mother did not occur. The Mother had sought, during the currency of these proceedings, to overturn those findings on appeal, however that appeal was ultimately withdrawn. As a result, DJ Woodward’s determination on those allegations remains binding on me, although Dr Proudman says that I am entitled to look at those findings in the context of a mother who was required to give evidence without participation measures being in place and without the assistance of an intermediary.

There is a dispute between the parties as to whether or not the single finding made by DJ Woodward amounts to a finding of domestic abuse. If there has been domestic abuse, then Practice Direction 12J of the Family Procedure Rules is engaged.

The finding of DJ Woodward was that the Father had slammed a door during an argument. The door had accidentally caught the Mother who was injured as a result. The Father did not intend to cause her harm.

The PD imports the definitions from the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 which states as follows:

“(3)

Behaviour is “abusive” if it consists of any of the following—

(a)

physical or sexual abuse;

(b)

violent or threatening behaviour;

(c)

controlling or coercive behaviour;

(d)

economic abuse (see subsection (4));

(e)

psychological, emotional or other abuse;

and it does not matter whether the behaviour consists of a single incident or a course of conduct.”

The Act and the PD both specify that witnesses of abuse, such as children in a household where abuse has taken place, are to be considered as victims of abuse themselves.

I have considered PD 12J and in particular paragraphs 35 – 38 which remind me of the factors that I must take into account when a child arrangements order is to be made when domestic abuse has occurred. I have re-read them before reaching my decision in this case but I don’t intend to read them into this judgment.

The position in relation to orders under section 91(14) of the Children Act 1989 has changed. There is an additional section in the Act, section 91A, and a new Practice Direction in the Family Procedure Rules, PD12Q. These provisions, the guidance in the Red Book and recent caselaw all remind me that such an order is a filter, not a bar to future applications, however an order under this section is a fetter to the parental responsibility enjoyed by a parent and so must be clearly justified. If such an order is made a parent must seek the permission of the court before making an application for a section 8 order for as long as the order is in force.

A decision under this section requires the child’s welfare to be a paramount consideration. There are a wide range of circumstances where such an order may be appropriate. Specific examples are provided for in PD12Q. When making an order under section 91(14) the Court may prohibit service of the application for permission until an initial determination of the merits of the application for permission has taken place.

There is an allegation in this case made by the Mother that the Father is only pursuing this application as a means of remaining in the UK. I have underlying experience in immigration law through my career at the bar and my experience sitting as a judge in the family court at Manchester. That experience has reminded me of the significant, and somewhat circular, relationship between family and immigration proceedings. It is plain that once a spouse’s right to remain has been lost upon the breakdown of a marriage, the only remaining way to stay in the UK may be through demonstrating a subsisting relationship with a British child.

My experience is that UK citizenship is often a prized commodity. It can be worth significant sums of money for someone to obtain or retain leave to remain and it can take them and their family from relative poverty in their own country to relative wealth when money is sent back home. It seems to me therefore that the establishing of a relationship with a child in the UK can be hugely profitable and could secure a future for a spouse and their family. That leaves open the possibility that foreign spouses from failed marriages will seek to use the child as a vehicle to remaining in the UK without any real desire to form a relationship with that child.

But as I have said before in a published case, two things can be true. A separated spouse can be desperate to remain in the UK and may seek to avail themselves of any opportunity to try and do so, but they might also desire a relationship with their child.

It seems to me, therefore, that simply having pursued proceedings for a protracted period of time cannot be seen only as a marker of commitment to the child, it could equally be a commitment towards maintaining a valuable right to remain in the UK.

I have to measure the quality of the evidence suggesting that, in this case, this is a father who wants a relationship with his child and that he is not someone who is pursuing that simply in order for his status to be maintained.

As part of this judgment, I may have to make findings of fact. Any findings are to be made on the balance of probabilities, except for those in respect of the enforcement application. In other words, I have to decide if something is more likely than not to have happened in a particular way. If a party makes an allegation, they have the burden of proving it on the balance of probabilities.

When making findings of fact, the criminal case of Lucas reminds me that people can lie for many reasons, such as shame, humiliation, misplaced loyalty, panic, fear, distress, confusion or emotional pressure, however because they lie about one thing does not mean that they have lied about others. I have to analyse why they might have lied about a particular matter and determine whether they have lied about other matters.

The question as to the extent of the findings that I am entitled to make has loomed large in these proceedings. There has been no application for me to reconsider the findings made by DJ Woodward. Further, I have not set this hearing up as a hearing to litigate the parties’ behaviour during their marriage. Dr Proudman cross-examined the Father over the veracity of his allegations of domestic abuse made against the Mother at the time that he sought to remain in the UK under the domestic abuse concession. She also questioned him over his complaint against the Mother that she was a perpetrator of human slavery against him. When I expressed concern at the extent of the questioning in relation to these matters Dr Proudman told me that she would be seeking findings that the Father had falsely reported the Mother and that he had done so with little regard for U’s welfare given the potential for involvement from the police and social services as a result of those allegations.

I indicated that I was not prepared to determine the veracity of those allegations in these proceedings, and I remain of that view. I do not consider it fair for the following reasons:

Notwithstanding that approach I am entitled to note that his claims to be a victim at the hands of the Mother were dismissed by the Immigration Tribunal.

In setting up this hearing I was clear that my task was to consider the Mother’s allegations that the Father was only motivated by his immigration status, to consider the Father’s allegations that the Mother was responsible for alienating behaviours designed to prevent him from having a relationship with his daughter and to determine the right welfare outcome for U in circumstances where she appeared to be set against any form of contact with her father, where the contact that had taken place was of poor quality on everyone’s account and where U was resistant to even saying the word ‘daddy’.

I heard oral evidence from Ms Jennifer Lomas, the Cafcass Family Court Adviser (‘FCA’) on day one, Dr Hannah Jones a Registered Psychologist on day two, followed by the Father on days two and three. At the end of his evidence, it became clear that we could not complete the Mother’s evidence in the allotted time. I therefore adjourned the case part-heard, directed that a transcript be obtained at public expense and ensured that the Mother’s evidence was not started to avoid her remaining on oath during the extensive adjournment.

The hearing recommenced on 21 May 2025 and continued into the next day. The Mother gave her evidence across those two days, but unfortunately there was insufficient time to hear submissions, primarily because of the need for special measures to be put in place at the recommendation of the intermediary. I was therefore forced to adjourn once more until today, for submissions and judgment.

I have also had regard to all of the documentary evidence within the bundles and the videos of the contact that I watched, however I will only make reference to the key parts of the evidence for the purposes of this judgment.

Ms Lomas was calm and measured in her evidence. She had set out in her initial report a recommendation that direct contact resumed before ultimately reaching a conclusion in her later report that only indirect contact was supportable at this time. That initial view suggests to me that she had not approached this case with any form of bias against the Father and was keen to ensure that his relationship with U could be promoted if safe to do so.

She told me that her final opinion, and in particular her view of the Mother’s anxieties, was not predicated on accepting the Mother’s account of abuse that the Court has found not to have occurred. She says that she based her opinion on the Mother’s general presentation, her life history as recorded in the psychological assessment, the effect that the court hearings appear to be having on her and the pressure that she has experienced around marriage and her loss of agency in her life. When she interviewed her, the Mother was shaking and out of breath at times.

If the Court makes an order for indirect contact only, Ms Lomas plans to provide a narrative for U in a child-focussed way, such as through a post-proceedings letter or piece of life-story work. She was of the view that the Mother needs space to access therapy and to allow it to work outside of proceedings. She was deeply concerned that these proceedings were at week 141. Ms Lomas was asked by Ms Khan how concluding the proceedings at this stage could benefit U, when the Court could simply wait until the Mother’s therapy had concluded before finalising the matter. Ms Lomas’ response was that an end to the proceedings would benefit the Mother in undertaking her therapy which will benefit U in the long-term. Really careful and well-thought out indirect contact would be excellent stepping stones towards an eventual move to direct arrangements. She is opposed to video contact or videos being sent but supported good quality letters and a colouring book which was U’s own suggestion.

Ms Lomas told me that when she visited U she asked to see the Father’s indirect contact. The Mother went to U’s room to get the letters which she had stored in a box. She believes that the Mother had retained the contact in a place where U could access it and that the Mother had continued attempting to get U to engage with the video contact over an extended period when U was upset. She referred to the video footage shared with the Court as a prime example of that.

Ms Lomas was prepared to accept Ms Khan’s assertion that the Mother had failed in providing enough updates and photos when she told her how many had been sent.

Ms Khan asked Ms Lomas why U would be behaving in the way heard on the video (in the event that it is U who can be heard during the video) and as described by the Mother and the school, given that she has had no relationship with the Father. Ms Lomas was of the view that she had likely picked up on the Mother’s anxieties about the Father. A child can see how a parent reacts and even though the Mother can be heard encouraging U during the video contact it may well have been plain to her that her mother was anxious and distressed at having to deal with the Father.

Ms Lomas said that she had not supported an order under section 91(14) of the Children Act as this was not a case of repeated applications, however when the wider application of section 91(14) was put to her by Dr Proudman she accepted that there was an urgent need for these proceedings to end and that should proceedings be reissued immediately there would be a real risk of harm to U and her mother. That led to her expressing the view that if section 91(14) could provide a mechanism for preventing further proceedings and providing a break for the Mother to get therapy and for U to be removed from the pressure around court proceedings and video contact then she would support an order being made.

Ms Lomas said that in her dealings with U, she had found her to be bubbly and full of character. During cross-examination by Dr Proudman, she said that it would have been very distressing to the Mother that the Father raised the issue of a change of residence in his position statement immediately prior to the final hearing. She cannot see how it could be child-focussed or appropriate to suggest a change of residence when the Father has no existing relationship with the child. It would frighten U.

She believed that the Prohibited Steps Order at P112 should remain in force given the reports of the Father’s attendance at the school where he is reported to have been insistent on seeing U.

Addressing the Father specifically, Ms Lomas was of the view that the Father’s level of English would likely mean that he finds it difficult to communicate with the sort of nuances that U requires. Given the history with this family U will require careful and understanding letters and conversations from her Father to help her with the conflicted feelings she is likely to have. English is her first language. She understands very little Urdu. The Father’s letter at P258 is not appropriate and is not child-focussed.

Ms Lomas said that in her discussions with the Father he did not discuss his allegations of domestic abuse against the Mother. He did not raise that he was a victim of domestic abuse or modern slavery at her hands.

The Mother alleges that she has received threatening phone calls from a withheld number. She suspects the Father or one of his associates or family members. The caller said that they knew where she lived and that she was alone with a child. Ms Lomas agreed that the phone calls, if they occurred, would have had a negative effect on her.

As far as the Mother is concerned, Ms Lomas agreed that even outside the unproven allegations, her background has seen her coerced and put under a lot of pressure. It would explain her current mental health issues. She agreed that the Mother’s situation was far more serious and nuanced than this being simply a case about a mother who made a number of allegations that were almost entirely unproven. Her background as recorded in the psychological evidence is deeply concerning.

Ms Lomas agreed that it was troubling that the Father’s application for enforcement was made six months after contact broke down but instead, was immediately proximate to an immigration illegal working raid. It would be a concern if the Court found that it was his immigration status that was triggering his applications to the family court as opposed to their being born of a genuine desire to see U. The timing of his applications causes her to question his motivation. When his immigration history was outlined to her, Ms Lomas stated that, on reflection, she does not believe that he was open and honest with her about his status.

She ended her evidence by stating that this is a family that needs a period of calm. She supports a final order for U to live with her Mother, for indirect contact only with the Father by way of letters, cards and gifts, for a prohibited steps order against the Father, for the Mother to be able to exercise overriding parental responsibility over decisions on medical treatment and schooling and for there to be an order under section 91(14) of the Children Act.

In her answers to my questions, she told me that her interactions with U were compelling. She clammed up when talking about her father in a way that seemed natural and not in a way that came across as rehearsed, forced or instructed.

Dr Jones is a registered and chartered psychologist. She gave immediate, detailed answers to questions and her answers demonstrated a deep knowledge of the papers. She qualified her answers with phrases like ‘if accurate’ suggesting that she had not approached her analysis with a closed mind and was not assuming a role as a finder of facts. Dr Jones assessed the Mother in these proceedings.

Her case analysis is that the Mother’s conservative upbringing will have started the erosion of her self-worth and understanding of herself. She is of the view that it is likely that she was controlled and coerced by her family in entering into an arranged marriage at a very young age to her first husband and this would have led to significant pressure on her. This would particularly be the case if she was subjected to abuse from her husband and the families.

The breakdown of that marriage and the lack of support will have further contributed to the erosion of her self-belief. She will have felt increasingly isolated, and her choices will have narrowed. She will have felt blamed and responsible and could not fulfil her own self-sacrifice schema which is described in more detail in the report.

Her second marriage, the marriage to the father in this case, was also arranged by her family. She described feeling pressures with no choice but to get married to a relative she had never spoken to before. She talked of being horrified at the thought of a colleague intervening. Dr Jones believes that the Mother has been coerced in a familial and cultural sense. She did not meet the Father until their wedding day, and whilst that may be culturally normal it is also scary and intimidating.

Dr Jones was asked to focus on the finding of fact hearing before DJ Woodward. The Mother had told her that she found the hearing impossible. She said that she had a breakdown following the hearing. She has had very little agency in her life and had no agency in the Court proceedings. Whilst Dr Jones understands that the family court has to adopt a binary approach to findings of fact, and that the findings remain undisturbed, she is concerned that her analysis of the Mother’s ability to perform at that hearing and her view of the Mother’s presentation causes her to have grave concerns as to whether the Court’s conclusions are sound.

She said that if the Mother’s account of the harassing phone calls is true they would have caused a sense of hypervigilance and would contribute to a sense of danger.

The Mother’s diagnosis is Complex PTSD (CPTSD) as opposed to PTSD. Classic PTSD involves flashbacks and hypervigilance usually due to a one-off frightening event. CPTSD incorporates the acute trauma reactions but adds in a relational aspect with difficulties in relationships with emotional regulation issues usually stemming from repeated reinforced traumatic events.

Victimhood plays out in many different ways. There is no direct link between victimhood and resilience or an ability to obtain and retain work.

In assessing the Mother’s reliability Dr Jones was of the view that she did not overplay her symptoms or her level of distress. She was emotional but not dysregulated. Her view that the Father’s applications are motivated by his immigration status would be a further lack of autonomy for her assuming that those views are genuinely held.

Dr Jones was asked about U’s response to the Father. She said that the Mother’s explanation to her was that U had told her that she did not wish to engage with a man that she did not know. The Mother was clear that she wanted to support U having a positive relationship with the Father. She believes that U may have picked up on her emotional distress.

Dr Jones believes that the Mother requires EMDR and Narrative Exposure Therapy (NET). She needs 12 x 90-minute sessions of weekly EMDR following an initial assessment by a treatment provider. Then she would require the NET. EMDR is easily accessible privately. It is also available on the NHS but there are long waiting lists. She would ideally wait for proceedings to end as the therapy would be less meaningful if proceedings were ongoing due to the significant triggers that these court proceedings entail for this mother.

According to Dr Jones the finality of proceedings is important. Whilst the therapy will assist the Mother it will not relieve her distress at seeing U in distress. That is a normal parental reaction. A stay of proceedings would be unlikely to engender a feeling of psychological safety for the Mother.

I asked Dr Jones about the fact that her analysis includes reference to trauma that related to events that the Court has found did not occur. She said that she had been careful to separate out those events in her case theory for that very reason. The Mother’s other life experiences as reported include systemic evidence of the erosion of her autonomy through cultural and familial pressures. Her concerns primarily relate to U’s distress and not her own experiences. Dr Jones accepted her analysis does depend on whether or not the Mother is telling the truth about her other life experiences although she also relies on the results of the Mother’s assessments and not just her oral account to her.

The Father gave evidence through an interpreter. He had different interpreters over the two days but, other than those matters I referred to previously which were raised by Ms Khan, there seemed to be no issues at all over the interpretation.

I did not find the Father to be an impressive witness. He appeared to me to be being careful to ensure that he did not say things which might prejudice any applications that he might be making to the immigration authorities. Even taking account of the difficulties of giving evidence through an interpreter I found him to be frequently evasive. There were large elements of his evidence which he had confirmed under oath but which he then sought to resile from.

I have made it clear that I am not prepared to make findings about domestic abuse in this marriage, however I harbour significant concerns that the Father is maximising his prospects of succeeding in each piece of litigation that he has been involved in by producing statements that go far beyond the reality of what has occurred. I will come to an example of that shortly. The Father has been represented throughout his family proceedings and in his immigration applications. He has not prepared statements and applications as a litigant in person with limited English language skills. As the Father has not suggested to me that he has included untruths in his accounts at someone else’s instigation, where there are accounts that I find are not accurate I am bound to find that those accounts have come from the Father.

When he got into difficulties, he resorted to a stock answer that he was not accusing anyone of lying but there must have been a misunderstanding, maybe as a result of his difficulties with English. Given that a central plank of the Mother’s case is that the Father is unable to speak English well enough to communicate with U and that his lack of English demonstrates his lack of motivation to have a relationship with her, this was an unfortunate position for him to adopt.

The Father told me that he had spent three to six months learning English in an ESOL class. He had two lessons per week. He achieved Level 1 but has not yet started Level 2.

It has transpired that the Father entered into another Pakistani marriage whilst in Pakistan this December. He denied that he had concealed this from Cafcass, the Court and the Mother. The Court was only made aware of the wedding because the Mother saw reference to it on Facebook. He did not think that this marriage had any relevance to these proceedings.

When the events that he described in paragraph 19, P280 were put to him, namely that a friend had reported on U getting upset around one of his friends because she did not have a dad, he said that he did not say it. He was pressed on the account and suggested that a friend of his, Salman, who lives on the maternal grandmother’s street, saw a girl who he thought might be U, walking to school. He said that his friend thought that she was U because she had a resemblance to him. When the account in paragraph 19 was put to him he said that it must have been a misunderstanding between him and the solicitors who drafted his statement. This explanation was deeply unconvincing. The story about his friend recognising U is incredible and I find that the account inserted at paragraph 19 was put there to fortify his application and was not true.

He agreed that the first time that he spoke to the Mother was on their wedding night. He told me that he had no particular interest in coming to the UK, he just wanted to live with his wife wherever she lived. The question had to be asked a number of times before he answered it and, once again, I found his disavowal of any interest in coming to the UK unconvincing and designed to take attention away from any suggestion that he was pursuing this application for immigration purposes.

He said that he applied for status initially once the marriage broke down on the domestic abuse concession in the immigration rules. He stood by his allegations of domestic violence and modern slavery but said he was trying to patch up his relationship with the Mother. He said that he reported the Mother to the police to assist with his immigration application, but he told them not to arrest her.

When cross-examined around the immigration chronology he told me that indirect contact stopped in January or February 2022 and did not progress as DJ Woodward’s order provided for. He did not apply for enforcement until August 2022 which was around the same time as his workplace was raided by the immigration authorities and he was found working without permission, although he believed that he had permission.

He told me that he had been getting the money together to apply for enforcement and it was simple coincidence that he finally applied as his immigration status was brought into focus by the raid. I find that too to be unconvincing.

When asked how he was improving his English if he had not progressed to the next ESOL course, he said that he watched YouTube in English.

The Father denied that he went to the school to see U. He said he took the Court order and wanted to seek information, but he was inconsistent around this. He told Cafcass that he went to the school to develop his relationship with U but when asked about this he said that there must have been a misunderstanding. It is also notable that this occurred following the failed Facetime calls which he complains about now, questioning at Court (for the first time) whether it was actually U present in the room. That makes me concerned that he had gone to the school to see if he could see her.

He was asked about the suggestion in his statement, and in his counsel’s position statement, that there should be a change of residence. Again, he denied ever having said it, and said that there must have been a misunderstanding. This is such a fundamentally important matter I struggle to understand how he could not recall discussing it with his solicitors or his counsel.

There are a number of serious concerns that I hold about a lack of child-focussed behaviour from the Father:

The immigration chronology is also telling:

I have also found him to be misleading in a number of ways:

I find that the Father has been primarily driven by his need to regularise his immigration status in the UK. I do not find that he has a compelling interest in spending time with U. His lack of improvement in his English language skills and his failure to reflect on the professional evidence demonstrates an inability to prioritise her. The delay in making applications to Court and their tie in with his immigration appeals and applications leads me to conclude that those applications are his primary motivation. The Mother is right in that respect. I accept that he had very little to do with U when the parties were together and that he focussed primarily on working.

The Mother’s intermediary assessment was updated in the gap between the adjourned hearing and the final two days with a new intermediary report to which no objection was taken. I implemented the recommendations with the agreement of Ms Khan. The additional measures were that there should be breaks at a maximum of 40 minutes during her evidence, there should be measures in place for others to leave the courtroom should she become dysregulated, and the Father was asked to leave the courtroom during her evidence. I ensured that he remained present virtually during her evidence by setting up a video link where he was present with the Court interpreter.

I found the Mother’s evidence to be mixed. For the majority of the time, she was clear and confident and appeared to me to be speaking from memory, but at other times she was hesitant and contradictory. I have kept in mind the psychological evidence in this case, and how her evidence might be affected by trauma or unresolved negative life experiences, however it was clear to me that the least impressive aspects of her evidence were those times where she was asked how she positively reinforced the Father with U. I suspect that the reasons that she found these questions so difficult to answer was because she has very little positive to say about the Father, both within these proceedings and to U.

When she was talking about her past, and her early life experiences, I found her evidence to be compelling.

She told me that she had been promised as a bride to her first cousin when she was a young child. They married when she left school at 18. He was unhappy during the marriage as he had previously met someone else. The marriage broke down. Her second marriage was her marriage to F. She told me that this was also an arranged marriage with a heavy degree of pressure and expectation around it. F was related to her father. She recalls that when she flew to Pakistan for the wedding a group of men were present at the airport, but she did not know which one was the Father. She met him properly on their wedding night and her perception of what happened that night was that she was raped, although that was an allegation not accepted by DJ Woodward.

On her return to the UK, she told me that she developed anxiety and issues around eating at the thought of the Father coming to the UK to join her.

She was asked why she thought U reacted so badly to the video contact given her assertion that she never came into contact with the Father. Her belief is that it is because she has no idea who he is, and he was not encouraging her in a child focussed way by demanding that she showed herself on video. She later explained that the video contact and U’s pronounced reluctance to engage happened after incidents that had greatly affected the Mother, such as a period of time where she had been subjected to threatening telephone calls and where she claims that she saw the Father following her home one day in his car. She was prepared to accept that U would have understood that she was scared and accepted that she had not managed to shield U from her view that the Father was likely responsible for scaring her.

The Mother explained that she had tried to encourage U by taking her in front of the camera, however she became distressed. As a result, the Mother sought advice from the school. She said that she felt attacked by the Father’s solicitors who were demanding that U be placed in front of the camera. She said that U was blaming her for trying to force her to go in front of the camera.

She refused to accept that U was not engaging because of her negative influence. She told me that she had tried methods to engage U by placing colouring books and an iPad near the camera, but it had not worked. She said that the Father had failed to engage with the suggestions the professionals had made. He had not improved his language skills and was unable to implement any strategies to assist her in engaging, other than telling her to come in front of the camera.

The Mother said that U would have become distressed had she seen the Father at the school when he attended in September 2023. She subsequently learned about his attendance from discussions that took place in the school and became fearful that he would attend again and take her. It is very difficult to believe, if this is true, that these fears can have come from anywhere other than the Mother.

In her evidence in chief the Mother expanded upon the phone calls that she says that she received in 2022. She said that they occurred between January 2022 and March 2022 which would have been around the same time or just after the final consent order made by DJ Woodward. She said that the phone calls referenced U and were very specific and very personal. They were from the same male voice who she did not recognise but she could hear people in the background laughing. She says that she contacted the police about the messages twice, and on the second occasion she said that she thought that the Father might be involved. She understood that the police were going to go and warn the Father and her evidence is that after the police contacted him about the calls they stopped.

When cross-examined about the calls she was inconsistent over her actions when she received them. She initially said that had been forced to turn her phone off and use a pay as you go phone. She said that when she turned her phone on there would be a number of messages. Later she said that she had kept the phone on but had it on silent during the day as she would be looking at it, but the threatening calls would wake her during the night. The reason why she alleged that it would wake her during the night was because that explained how U knew about the calls, but when pressed as to why she would have the phone on at all given her earlier evidence she said that it was because her mother was unwell at the time.

The Mother was cross-examined at some length about the immigration applications from the Father which she supported as a sponsor through the application process and in the immigration tribunal. The thrust of the cross-examination appeared to be that, as the Mother had asserted that she was unhappy with the marriage and was dreading the Father’s arrival in the UK, she was either lying in those assertions or she had lied to the immigration authorities and the Tribunal when she claimed that they met the immigration rules in her supporting letters, applications and witness statements for the Tribunal.

I accept the Mother’s explanation for this apparent inconsistency. The situation was far more nuanced than what was being put to her. There is no inconsistency between someone who fears her arranged unknown spouse who does not speak her language joining her in the UK, and her acknowledging that she has married him and needs to make that marriage work because of the pressure put on her by their families, and also probably by herself. She told me that they were being assisted by solicitors and her family to get him into the UK and no doubt the multiple failed applications added to the pressure. I find it likely that she said what she was told needed to be said to ensure that the applications met the immigration rules and gave a clear impression that they had a subsisting marriage and that she met the financial rules around sponsors. Having regard to the Lucas direction I referred to earlier I do not see that any untruths given during those application processes taint the rest of her evidence. There were clear reasons why she would have felt compelled to produce accounts that met the immigration rules.

Ms Khan put to the Mother an inconsistency that was also placed before DJ Woodward, over an issue that it seems influenced her findings. I have to be careful as to how I treat those issues that were ventilated before her as there is no transcript of the hearing or her judgment. It would appear, however, that I have some additional information that was not available to her at the time that the matter was before her. The Mother maintained her position that U was born out of rape in these proceedings. In the immigration documentation there is a letter from the Mother at SB346 where the Mother says that U was born by way of artificial insemination. The Mother’s explanation for this is that she did not want the Father to be able to use U to remain in the UK when in her view he was not interested in her.

I found it hard to accept the Mother’s evidence that she is able to promote the Father’s relationship with U. She appears to have nothing but contempt for his attempts to, as she sees it, use U as a basis for remaining in the UK when she believes he has no interest in having a relationship with her.

It is important that I ask myself why she might have that attitude. I find it likely that she has been traumatised by her early life experiences and her view of the Father’s motivation is genuinely held. The timing of his applications will have cemented that view as will his failure to improve his English and develop strategies to interact with U. I cannot underestimate the traumatising and debilitating effect of a woman’s own family coercing her into marriage and relationships against her will.

I accept that she received threatening calls in 2022, it would have been incredibly risky to report them to the police had they been a fiction, and it is likely that those calls further traumatised her and caused her to suspect the Father’s involvement. I accept that the calls were received despite the inconsistencies in her accounts around them as she did not strike me as someone who would make a barefaced lie to the police that could be easily disproved. That sort of lie would be very different to an undetectable lie in an immigration application that she had been in regular phone contact with the Father and it is different to having perceptions of abuse that were ultimately rejected. Whether or not the calls were made at the Father’s behest, the fact that they occurred was likely to be extremely frightening and upsetting for the Mother.

Subsequent to their breakup the Father reported her to the police alleging that she was responsible for domestic abuse against him. As I stated earlier, I am not prepared to make findings about the veracity of that allegation but the fact of the report, which he did not pursue and which did not lead to a conviction will have caused her to justifiably lack trust in building a relationship with him and to question how she could positively promote him to U.

Her accounts of her early years were compelling and were accepted by Dr Jones who was not undermined by cross-examination in respect of her analysis of those aspects of the Mother’s life experiences, notwithstanding the caution I must attach to her evidence given her acceptance of events that the Court found did not occur.

The Mother’s narrative around the Father is likely to infect her ability to promote him to U and is likely to exacerbate her trauma around her early experiences. It feeds into the therapy that she requires.

It seems plain that she made efforts to frustrate his relationship with U. The letter to the Home Office around artificial insemination demonstrates that. However, I do not find that her approach is baseless. She has a supportable view that he is using U for his immigration purposes, and she is justified in forming the view that having someone like that in U’s life would be harmful to U. She demonstrated some insight when she accepted that allowing U to overhear her complaint to the police about the threatening phone calls would have been harmful to her.

I am not sure whether or not I need to determine whether the single finding made by DJ Woodward, that the Father slammed a door shut during an argument which caused an unintended injury to the Mother, amounts to domestic abuse within the meaning of the Domestic Abuse Act or PD12J. It will have been a distressing incident for the Mother and will have fed into her distrust of the Father, but this case does not really revolve around how that particular finding is to be characterised.

The Father seeks to enforce the order of DJ Woodward dated 21 January 2022. He alleges breaches of paragraphs 1, 4 and 5 of the indirect contact ordered by DJ Woodward in that the Mother refused to accept indirect contact, did not respond to it and did not start the Facetime calls provided for in paragraph 5. By virtue of that supervised contact did not commence which it is alleged put her in breach of the direct contact ordered in paragraph 6.

It seems plain that the Mother did fail to comply with paragraphs 1, 4 and 5 of DJ Woodward’s order. She did not accept any further presents or send any updates and did not facilitate Facetime contacts. I find that those provisions were breached beyond reasonable doubt, which really means that I am sure that they were not complied with.

I am also sure that the Mother did not ensure that U spent supervised time with the Father in breach of paragraph 6 of DJ Woodward’s order. That provision was conditional upon the Father complying with paragraphs 1 – 3 of the indirect contact provisions of the order. I am satisfied that he complied with those requirements.

I am, however, satisfied that the Mother had reasonable excuse for not complying with those provisions of the order. The Mother had been subjected to a deluge of correspondence following the consent order. It would seem that neither the Father nor his solicitors had understood that there was not to be direct contact with at the Mother’s address and yet both wrote to her every fortnight with indirect contact for U. That was not part of the order and I accept that it had a negative effect on the Mother. The Father’s solicitors must have known that they had overstepped as an email apology followed. I accept that the Mother believed that this was a targeted attempt to harass her and that she was entitled not to take the Father’s solicitors at face value given how she believes the Father’s lawyers have conspired to take advantage of the immigration rules.

At the same time, she was being subjected to threatening telephone calls which I have found were taking place, and which she understandably connected with the Father. The approach she adopted was that the Father had breached the order and had harassed her, he then put someone up to making harassing phone calls, and so if he wished to enforce the order he could try, but she would inform the Court that contact had not taken place because he could not be trusted to follow the order or to provide safe care for U. I am also satisfied that the Mother’s agreement to the terms of that order was partially informed by the unresolved trauma, resulting from her life experiences, exacerbated by not having been believed during the fact-finding process which has been considered in substantially more detail during these proceedings.

For those reasons I do not find that I am empowered to make an enforcement order pursuant to Section 11J(3) of the Children Act 1989.

When this final hearing started these proceedings were in week 141. A further 16 weeks have passed. At the heart of this application is a little girl who appears to be extremely anxious at the prospect of spending time with her father. The evidence in support of that comes from the school, the evidence contained within the videos of contact and the fact that she appears to have difficulty even saying the word ‘daddy’.

The Father says that this must be because of alienating behaviour by the Mother given the absence of findings by DJ Woodward. He identifies multiple behaviours that he says point to her attempting to exclude him from U’s life. His view is that she has frustrated court orders deliberately, even ones reached by consent.

The Mother denies attempting to damage the relationship between U and her father. She blames him for behaviours that she says have contributed to the inability to form a relationship.

The psychological evidence paints a compelling picture of the Mother. It identifies her life experiences and how they have come to define her function. I had significant issues with the psychological evidence in this case as some of the conclusions were obviously influenced by the Mother’s account of systematic domestic abuse by the Father which the Court has found not to have occurred. I have to ask myself whether that irreparably damages the expert’s conclusions. Dr Jones was tested thoroughly about this in the questions that were put to her by the advocates and by me during her evidence.

I did not find her evidence to be fundamentally undermined by her acceptance of abuse that the Court has found not to have taken place. She maintains that her assessment is suggestive that the allegations were true, but she is prepared to accept that given the Court’s findings the most that she can accept is that the Mother believes it to have occurred. She was able to identify how that might be the case given the circumstances around her upbringing.

I accept that the Mother suffers from C-PTSD and requires extensive therapy to assist her in coming to terms with her life events. I also accept that, notwithstanding the absence of direct domestic abuse, the Father’s role in her symptoms is central. Her sense of self was undermined by her feeling a commodity to be married off. I accept her evidence that just the thought of him coming to the UK caused her to suffer issues around eating.

Ms Lomas formed a clear view that U was behaving naturally with her. There was no evidence that she had been given a narrative or a script. The cross-examination of her did not undermine her use of assessment tools or her methodology. I accept that the fact that U was bubbly when she met her suggested that she was not feeling weighed down with an account that she felt compelled to give. I accept her assessment that U appeared to naturally clam up when talking about her father. She noted that the Mother had volunteered ways in which the Father could engage with U.

I accept Ms Lomas’ evidence that the Mother’s presentation with her around U contrasted with her presentation when the Father was discussed. I accept that the failed Facetime arrangements were an attempt to engage U with the Father, but he lacks the insight and the practical and language skills to be able to interact with her. I have little doubt that U is reacting to the Mother’s anxieties, but I also accept Ms Lomas’ evidence that she has attempted to engage U by making the Father’s cards and presents available to her.

I must consider the sort of humanity urged by Lieven J in the case of Warwickshire v A Father, X and Z. This is a girl who has a significant aversion to her father, who she doesn’t know and who has never really parented her. Whilst her mother is a contributing factor to U’s aversion, that behaviour is explicable given her history.

When applying the welfare checklist, U’s wishes and feelings are overwhelmingly against arrangements with her father, however she is only 7 years old, and so the weight to be given to those wishes and feelings has to be limited. Her wishes and feelings, however, would mean that a change of circumstances in spending time with her father is likely to have a significantly negative reaction, particularly in the short to medium term. Her age means that she will be dependent on her caregivers for her physical and emotional needs to be met, and the Father’s ability to meet those needs is untested, save that he has demonstrated an inability to put strategies in place to communicate with her and engage her.

The reality is that my analysis must focus on the balance between the potential lifelong harm to U’s identity of restricting her relationship with her father, a decision which could see him lose his status in the UK, and the harm that would be caused to her and her mother by ordering direct arrangements.

I accept the professional assessments, which are clear that the harm to her identity is outweighed by the immediate direct harm to her at being required to make a further attempt at direct contact which proved to be so distressing for her. Given the Mother’s narrative, I am also concerned that direct arrangements would cause U significant harm when observing the Mother’s reaction to the arrangements restarting.

The harm to her identity needs must be looked at in context. Her identity needs would not be served with a relationship with a father whose primary relationship aim surrounds his immigration status. Life story work from the Family Court Adviser will go some way towards assisting her in understanding his absence from her life. An order today does not mean the end of his relationship with her. It is to be hoped that the Mother will undertake the therapy indicated which would hopefully assist her in managing arrangements in future. The Father can undertake some parenting work to assist him in developing strategies and he can commit to improving his English so that he can communicate with her better. If he is able to resolve his immigration status finally, that might convince the Mother that any future desire to spend time with U is born out of a genuine desire to have a relationship with her.

I find it is essential that the Mother is able to resolve her own issues through therapy before direct contact could take place. If she is not able to do that in the short term, then more time needs to pass before a direct relationship would outweigh the harm that would currently occur should I order direct arrangements. I cannot accept that these proceedings should be extended to allow that therapy to take place. I accept the evidence of the professionals in that regard. It would dilute the effectiveness of the therapy for the Mother to have these proceedings hanging over her. U has been in proceedings for most of her life. The existence of proceedings is likely having a debilitating effect on the Mother which is being transmitted to U. Further extending proceedings is likely to provide less opportunity for the improvement of U’s responses to the Father.

I find that it is likely that he seeks an extension of proceedings to assist with his immigration status, as he will be aware that continuing proceedings would likely see his discretionary leave extended.

I take the view that finality is required and that at the current time the appropriate order is for indirect contact only between the Father and U. I accept the professional recommendation which was anxiously made after careful analysis. I am therefore varying DJ Woodward’s order in that respect.

The indirect contact is to take place six times a year. The Mother is to facilitate updates to the Father regarding U’s welfare. Those updates are to include photographs. It is essential for U’s identity needs that any items of indirect contact received are made available to U, and as she gets older, she should be encouraged to respond.

A prohibited steps order is a statutory restriction on a parent’s exercise of their parental responsibility for a child and can have profound consequences. It is an order that must be based on objective evidence. I must not make such an order without having good reasons and I must consider carefully the duration of any prohibition.

I find as a fact that the Father attended the school in the hope of seeing U. Although I have not heard evidence from any member of the school staff there is a clear account from the school at P260. He went during school hours at a time U would have been there. That is enough to cause me concern that, at the very least, he lacks insight as to how his actions would be perceived by her. This followed the failed attempts at Facetime contact which were obviously distressing for her.

His allegation, raised for the first time within this final hearing, that the child in the video may not have been U, tells me that he is not able to understand the reality of where U is at and what she needs from him. I reject that allegation. Nothing that he said in his evidence suggests that he has developed that insight subsequently. As I am concerned about the Father’s motivation for his relationship with U, I am concerned that his motivation in attending the school was to obtain information to support his immigration applications, through establishing evidence of his spending time with her when he saw her or through obtaining information from the school to bolster an application.

I am satisfied that U’s welfare needs justify the making of a prohibited steps order. I have to balance the impact of that order on the Father’s parental responsibility with the need to protect U. Given that I have determined that there will be no direct contact the imposition on the Father is significantly less than it would have been had he been spending time with her directly. Given the distress currently experienced by U it should last for long enough for her to put these proceedings behind her and allow her a period of calm to complete her primary education. I will therefore make an order that lasts for a further 5 years from today in the terms sought by Dr Proudman.

I have had regard to section 91(14) and section 91A of the Children Act together with PD12Q of the FPR. I have little hesitation in accepting the analysis of Ms Lomas in this respect. She accepted that there was an urgent need for these proceedings to end and that should proceedings be reissued immediately there would be a real risk of harm to U and her mother. Given his precarious immigration status and his litigation history, which has seen repeated applications of all types in order to obtain and preserve that status, I have real concerns that the Father would immediately re-issue an application in order that he could claim an unresolved application when seeking an extension to his right to remain.

Further proceedings would be harmful to U and her mother. I cannot allow that harm to eventuate if it can be avoided. I am clear in my view that an order under section 91(14) is necessary and proportionate in respect of any section 8 applications that may be brought by the Father for a period of 5 years. That would allow U to have transitioned to high school should a further application be made following that period.

A section 91(14) order is not a barring order, it is a filter that allows the Court to determine whether or not a future application has merit. I will direct that any future application for permission within the currency of the section 91(14) order is referred to me (or another district judge if I am not available) in the first instance for an initial decision as to whether the granting of permission is to be considered before it is served on the Mother. I would expect to see in any such application evidence of improved English language skills on the Father’s part together with evidence as to his immigration status and perhaps some evidence regarding his parenting skills. I am not permitted to make those factors conditions on any future application, but it is important that the Father understands what I would expect to be considering when looking at the question of permission.

The issue of orders providing for overriding parental responsibility was recently considered by the Court of Appeal, with Peter Jackson LJ giving the leading judgment and the President of the Family Division in agreement, in the case of T-D (Children: Specific Issue Order) [2024] EWCA Civ 793.

They summarised the law at paragraphs 28 – 32 of the judgment where they stated:

Later in the judgment, after citing the relevant caselaw, they drew the following propositions which I have distilled:

In the circumstances of this case, I am not satisfied that U’s welfare interests justify my granting overriding parental responsibility for future parenting decisions around health and education to the Mother. It may be more convenient for her, and it may be that the requirement to consult is likely to cause anxiety and distress on her part which I do not seek to underplay, however it is unlikely that such distress would outweigh the significant impact of an effectively wholesale removal of huge tranches of the Father’s rights and responsibilities as a parent.

I have not found that the Father has no interest in U and is only interested in his immigration status. I have found that his immigration status is his primary driver. He should continue to have the rights and responsibilities afforded to him as her father. He has not demonstrated within these proceedings that he is determined to interpose himself within the major decisions that have been taken for U to date. I have protected U (and her mother) through the making of a prohibited steps order, by making an order under section 91(14) of the Children Act and through the child arrangements order I have made.

This is not an extreme case that justifies this father being stripped of his rights to make individual decisions for his child. To do so would be more than is necessary and would not be proportionate when balancing the various welfare factors.

In summary, therefore, I make the following orders: