North Lincolnshire Council v M & Ors

This case concerns C, a girl. Within these care proceedings her interests are represented by her children’s guardian, Sarah Urruty, who instructs Francesca Steels.

C’s mother is M, represented by Sarah Fearon.

C’s father is F, represented by James Goodwin.

C’s paternal grandparents are PGF and PGM (together, the PGPs). They have cared for C throughout these proceedings under an ISO and CAO and, indeed, cared for her for a significant period of time prior to that, without any court order. They were joined as parties to proceedings by order of DJ Hanslip on 16 December 2024. They are represented by David Phillips.

The local authority which brings these proceedings is North Lincolnshire Council, represented by Gaynor Hall. The allocated social worker is Samantha Barnaby.

C has 2 older maternal half-sisters: D and E. D and E are full siblings; their father is G who is now in a relationship with H. D and E live with their father. They previously lived with their mother and F. Neither child is subject to these proceedings.

In September 2023, when they were still living with their mother and F, D and E alleged that F had been sexually and physically abusing them. F denies those allegations and always has done. From the point at which those allegations were first made, M made it clear to everyone that she did not believe them. She says that D and E are liars. Such was the strength of her conviction that M was not prepared to separate, even temporarily, from F in order to care for any of the children. It is by reason of that fact that C has been in the care of her grandparents since September 2023, although it is agreed by the relevant adults that C was already spending a significant amount of time, including weeknights, in their care prior to that. It appears to be an accepted family narrative that C came out of the womb and into the care of her grandparents. That is what PGF told C’s previous guardian.

D and E have also alleged that F and M physically assaulted them on multiple occasions.

Around 3 months after her initial allegation of sexual abuse against F, E alleged that her mother was involved.

The local authority issued proceedings on 25 November 2024.

I have not had conduct of this case until recently, following the retirement of HHJ Cooper, and it is not immediately obvious to me why the local authority brought proceedings 14 months after the allegations were made. Nor has that been raised or addressed as an issue before me at this fact-finding hearing. I therefore simply set it out by way of chronology and background.

My first involvement with this matter was on the 20 May 2025 when I dealt with an application by F to require D and/or E to give evidence at a contemplated fact-finding hearing. Having heard from all parties and from the Humberside police, who HHJ Cooper had previously given permission to attend, I refused that application for reasons I set out in an ex tempore judgment given on 20 May. That decision is un-appealed and as a result I have not heard directly from D or E.

I then listed the case before me for fact-finding on the 14-19 July 2025. I heard evidence across the first 4 days and submissions on Friday the 19 July 2025. I originally listed the case on 22 July 2025 for the handing down of judgment, which I then anticipated delivering orally. Unfortunately, due to a personal family situation that I explained to the parties at the time, I was unable to deliver a judgment on that date. This, therefore, is my written judgment. It was sent out in draft form to the parties on 4 August 2025. Having received an agreed list of typographical and factual corrections, for which I am grateful, this is the approved version being handed down at a hearing on the 4 September 2025.

The local authority seeks findings set out in a Schedule dated 28 March 2025. In summary, the local authority alleges that C is likely (Footnote: ¹) to suffer significant sexual, physical and emotional harm by virtue of the fact that:

F and M strenuously deny, as they always have done, all allegations of sexual or physical abuse. M denies that she prioritised her relationship over the welfare of her children. The parents appear to accept, as a fact, that C has not had a relationship with E and D, but it is less clear to me that they consider she has suffered any harm as a result of that. It is also a matter of fact that whilst the local authority has not had parental responsibility for C, they have been involved as supervisors in care proceedings for 8 months now and have failed to achieve any direct contact themselves between the sisters. They deserve criticism for that. That criticism would not absolve the parents of their responsibilities.

The paternal grandparents do not believe that their son has harmed E or D. Notwithstanding that, Mr Phillips told me they are neutral with respect to the findings sought by the local authority.

The guardian supports the findings sought by the local authority.

A concise summary of the applicable case law was given by Baker J (as he then was) in A Local Authority v (1) A Mother (2) A Father (3) L & M (Children, by their Children’s Guardian) [2013] EWHC 1569 (Fam). I adopt the following principles set out at paragraphs 46-53 of that Judgment:

My numbering differs from Baker J’s by virtue of the fact that I have omitted paragraphs from his judgment that were specific to non-accidental injuries and expert medical evidence.

I remind myself that precisely because the local authority bears the burden of proof, the parents do not have to prove any alternative explanation for D or E’s allegations. That is particularly important in this case where the parents have developed one central theory as to why they say the girls have lied and have also proffered a number of other potential explanations.

I have also considered the following with respect to ABE interviews, drawn from the case of Re JB (A Child) (Sexual Abuse Allegations) [2021] EWCA Civ 46, at paragraph 11 of the judgment of Baker LJ, as he had by then become, limiting myself to those parts which are most relevant to the case before me:

I have reminded myself of the above guidance and also of the updated ABE guidelines (Achieving Best Evidence in Criminal Proceedings: Guidance on Interviewing Victims and Witnesses, and Guidance on Using Special Measures; January 2022). That said, no party has raised any issue with the quality of the ABE process either in evidence or in submissions.

I have borne in mind that due to the delay in reaching this fact-finding hearing I was hearing from some witnesses nearly 2 years after events they were telling me about. I have therefore taken into account that their memories will have faded or, in line with the process described by Legatt J, as he then was, altered with the passage of time: Gestmin SGPS SA v Credit Suisse (UK) Ltd and Another [2013] EWHC (Comm).

There is an electronic bundle uploaded to Caselines which I downloaded as a 1508 page PDF prior to the fact-finding hearing. There was a reading list, agreed between the parties. I have read all of the documents on that reading list – many of them on multiple occasions – as well as other documents that have been referred to in evidence. I have viewed the ABE interviews of both girls on more than one occasion. In addition, I heard from the following witnesses:

It is not necessary for me to address all of the evidence I have read and heard, nor all of the submissions. Instead, I focus on those aspects of the evidence and submissions that have assisted me in making findings.

Before I turn to more controversial aspects of the evidence, and my analysis thereof, there is a relatively clear background leading up to the girls’ allegations.

Prior to the first Covid-related lockdown, the girls used to see G on a frequent, if somewhat ad hoc, basis. There was an incident, the precise circumstances of which are disputed, during Covid when E went for contact with G (D had tonsillitis). The contact ended prematurely (how prematurely is in dispute) with M attending and taking E home. M says that G and H were effectively holding E against her will. G and H deny that and say that M dragged E through an open window and that she was upset. Whatever happened, this incident led to the girls not seeing G again until 2023, when D may have come to stay for a while (although G was unclear about that). There was certainly no contact with E until September 2023 when, due to the allegations, both girls came to live with G and H. It is agreed that between 2020 and 2023, G’s relationship with his daughters was, at the very least, significantly disrupted. He was frank in his evidence that he was unhappy about that.

On the 10 September 2023 in the early afternoon there was an altercation between F and NC outside F’s then address in North Lincolnshire. The agreed context for this altercation is that NC and NB’s daughter, L, was friends with E, who was a similar age, and, through her, D. In the afternoon of the 10September 2023 she attended at F’s house. NB says that L was calling on them as friends. F says that he could hear a commotion outside and, on looking, could see that L was trying to drag D to a nearby field to have a fight with another girl. It does not matter, for current purposes, who is right about that. What is agreed is that F swore at L, telling her to ‘fuck off’. L told her parents this and they were, understandably, upset. NC therefore attended F’s house. Again, there is some dispute as to precisely what happened although, again, it is not necessary for current purposes to settle that dispute. NB attended the scene as did PGF and PGM. It is clear that things between NC and F were heated, with others trying to calm the situation down. NC threatened to punch F and subsequently accepted a police caution for his behaviour.

At the conclusion of this altercation F locked himself in his house. As a result of that action, D and E were locked out of their own home for a considerable period of time.

NB told the police in an email and subsequent statement both of which she confirmed to me were true, that later on that afternoon D and E were distressed at the fact that they were locked out of the home and were worried about what awaited them when they returned. Later still some children who were playing on a local field with the girls knocked on NB door to tell her that D was self-harming. (It is an agreed fact that D has a sad history of such behaviour). NB says that this caused her to call the police to report the situation. She says that when she informed D and E of this ‘they started panicking saying that their mum had told them if they ever told anyone anything they would be taken away. I reassured them and went inside to my own children to make sure they were ok for 5 minutes’.

At around 7.30 pm, NA, whose daughter J was also friends with the girls, told them that they needed to go home as it was getting late. E told her that they couldn’t go home because their stepdad had locked them out. NA’s statement says that E told her she was scared to go home, and that F wouldn’t be happy. It goes on, ‘it has always stuck in my mind that in front of me, D then said to E “shut up, don’t tell her anything, they’ll take us away”. D’s comment made me question whether they were being harmed at home, so I asked them if someone is hurting them at home and E said, “not really hurting, he just does his thing”. E seemed to be terrified’. She sets out that at this point the girls went to NB’s house.

NB says that NA told her that she had heard D and E talking between themselves: ‘E asked D if they should tell the truth about what is happening, D said no because they would take them away. When I came back out NA told me this, so I asked E what she meant and she said it doesn’t matter, I assured her I’d make sure she was ok and she said he touches me. With that the police came and dealt with it all from there so I couldn’t ask what she meant’.

NB’s evidence is that she told the police she was concerned for the girls’ welfare and the police reassured her that they would undertake safeguarding checks.

At this juncture, there was no clear allegation by either girl to report. I accept, however, that E’s claim that F ‘touches’ her, was strongly indicative of sexual abuse. NB’s evidence about this was that ‘with them being troubled girls sometimes things came out of their mouths that weren’t appropriate but yes I was worried that something was going on’.

It is unclear from the evidence before me what enquiries, if any, the police made of either girl on the 10 September. There is no recorded police evidence that either girl was spoken to or that they repeated any allegation made to NB. NB’s oral evidence was that she didn’t tell the police that E had alleged she was being ‘touched’ by F. In her ABE interview, D said that the only allegations discussed with the police on the 10 September were of being hit and that ‘my mum and F were saying that it was just play fighting … and then the police said “Alright then we’ll leave it” and then a couple days later, like the next week, we told the girl, the woman [NB] about it’.

NB’s evidence is that due to the level of her concern about what the girls had said to her on the 10 September 2023, she read up on the NSPCC website about different ways to talk to E. On the 13 September she then invited E to come for tea at her house. She says that E made allegations of oral and digital sexual abuse by F. She called the police who attended. D, who had attended her address separately to E, denied to the police that she had been abused by F, but later, after F had been arrested, did tell NB that she too had been sexually abused by her stepfather, thereafter, telling the police. The circumstances and detail of those allegations are considered below.

F was interviewed under caution on the 14 September 2023. He gave a prepared statement, denying the allegations and also denied the allegations within the interview.

Both girls were ABE interviewed on the 30 October 2023 and gave accounts of being sexually abused by F. Those accounts are again considered in greater detail below.

Both girls declined to undertake medicals and accordingly there is no medical evidence before the court.

On 18 December 2023, E told PA that her mother had been involved in the abuse. PA communicated this to the police. The police have never interviewed M about this and six months later, in June 2024, when PA again repeated this information to the police, their response was ‘this would need exploring more’. DC Cocks spoke to E, by telephone, on 12 June 2024 who confirmed that her mother had known what F was doing. E was never formally re-interviewed about this.

F was interviewed under caution for a second time on the 19 August 2024. It is not immediately apparent what the reason for this further interview was. He again gave a prepared statement denying abuse. F described a good relationship with D and E, stating that they called him ‘dad’. In this interview F said he believed the girls may have been ‘brainwashed’ by NB and NC to make their allegations against him.

It is F’s case, supported by M, that E and D’s allegations are false and were encouraged by NB and NC as a vendetta against him and M. He says that once those false allegations were made, G and H knowingly adopted them and encouraged the girls, now in their care, to repeat them on multiple occasions. As Mr Goodwin’s cross-examination developed, it became clear that F also says that NA has been co-opted into that conspiracy. I have borne in mind, throughout the following consideration, that F and M have not assumed any evidential burden by virtue of advancing their case theory.

I heard from NA on the 14 July 2025. She is a sometime neighbour of the parents, E and D. She told me that as of September 2023 she had known E and D for around 2 years, as they were friends with her daughter J. She knew M, but not especially well. She told me that she did not really know F at all. She told me, as per her written statement, that prior to the allegations she was aware of occasions when E would ‘flash’ by lifting up her top or skirt, although later she told me that this was mainly behaviour that was reported by her daughter and she herself had only witnessed it once. She was also aware of E using sexualised language, talking about things like ‘blow jobs’. She had seen self-harm marks on D. Whilst these various observations had caused her concern, they were not sufficient to cause her to notify either the police or social care.

NA accepted that her statement – which wasn’t prepared until very late in proceedings – did not set out that on the 10 September she had told NB about the discussion between D and E in which D had told her sister to ‘shut up’ lest they got taken away. She did tell me this as part of her oral evidence and when Mr Goodwin asked her why it was not in her written statement, she told me she had forgotten that detail when she spoke to the local authority solicitor. I accept that explanation. NA also denied, when it was put to her by Mr Goodwin, that she had made up her oral evidence about the conversation with NB, in order to make her account tally with NB’s statement. Again, I accept NA’s evidence to me about that. For one thing, if she was lying – having somehow become aware of what NB’s statement says – then it would make no sense for her to give a different account of the actual conversation, to that given by NB. The fact that NA’s recollection of what she heard D saying to E is somewhat differentto NB’s evidence about what NA told her she had heard, is, in my judgment, consistent with the way that two witnesses can have slightly different recollections, especially many months later, of the same event. It is inconsistent with any suggestion that the two women have got their heads together to concoct an agreed account.

I reject Mr Goodwin’s submissions that NA’s evidence was inconsistent by reason of her saying that she was worried about the girls’ behaviour and by what they had told her on the 10 September, as well as an earlier occasion when E told her that F had bruised her arm, but had not reported these concerns to the police or social workers. Experience shows that members of the public are reluctant and slow to contact authorities with unevidenced, or partially evidenced, concerns. I don’t find that NA’s affirmative answer to the broad question put to her by Mr Goodwin – ‘if you heard the children say that F hurt them, is that an allegation you would have revealed?’ – undermines her credibility. Context and circumstance are everything in that regard.

F’s case, put in robust terms by Mr Goodwin, is that NA is part of a conspiracy, with NB and NC, to fabricate information about the circumstances of the girls’ allegations and to encourage the girls to make false allegations against F. I found NA to be a straightforward, palpably honest and decent witness. She had no axe to grind with either parent. In NA’s case there is not even any speculative reason as to why she would perjure herself in order to pursue a vendetta against these parents. I further accept her evidence that she was not particularly close to either NB or NC themselves and had not spoken to them for around a year by the time she came to give her evidence, which further undermines any suggestion that she is their co-conspirator. This aspect of Fs’ case is nonsense.

I am satisfied that, on the 10 September, D was worried that if E disclosed details of their home life that could lead to them being removed from the care of their mother and F.

I also accept NA’s evidence that E told her, in answer to a direct question about whether they were being ‘harmed’, that F was ‘not really hurting, he just does his thing’. That strikes me as an entirely plausible way that a child of E’s age might try to tell or indicate to a relative stranger that they are being sexually abused, without yet saying as much directly. Of course, that is only the start of a process, as part of which E has later, and consistently, said that F has sexually abused her in a number of specific ways.

NB gave evidence via video-link on the 15 July 2025. She had emailed the local authority that morning to say that she was unwell and unable to attend court in person but was able to attend remotely. She didn’t appear well. She said that when she had first met M, they had got on. However, prior to these allegations there had been an occasion around Christmas (in which year she couldn’t remember) when she had called social services due to concerns about an injury to E’s eye. E had told her that this happened when she had fallen up the stairs. However, when she and her daughter had taken a Christmas present round for E, and NB had commented on the injury, M had said, ‘she deserved it, she shouldn’t have been a rude bitch and I wouldn’t have kicked her head into the carpet’. M accepts that E had this injury but denies either that she caused it or that she ever admitted causing it to NB.

NB struck me as a fair and frank witness. She readily conceded that by the 10 September 2023 she didn’t like M and had formed a number of negative opinions about her, including, she says, her admitted violence towards E, and her apparent lack of care for C. She also conceded that even though she didn’t really know F, the fact that he had sworn at her daughter, L, made her very cross. She did not seek to hide the fact that she had reasons why she might want to get those adults into trouble. However, when Mr Goodwin put to her that she was lying about her account of NA advising her to look on the NSPCC website for advice on how to talk to children who may be making allegations of sexual abuse, she was clear that she was not lying about that. She also denied that she had encouraged E (or D) to say untrue things about F or M.

NB’s written account of what happened on the 13 September, which amounts to the first direct allegation by the girls of sexual abuse is that, as set out above, she invited E round for tea.

When the police attended at NB’s address, E confirmed that what she had told NB about her experience of sexual abuse was true. D said that nothing had happened (to her). However, in line with NB’s statement, quoted at length above, she later confirmed to the police that she had been orally and digitally penetrated by F. When the guardian asked NB about D’s initial denials to the police, she said D’s demeanour was ‘really upsetting to see; she was sat in a swivel chair in my room, constantly shaking her feet. There was no eye contact and she looked like she was riddled with anxiety. It wasn’t nice’. That struck me as a detailed and credible answer. This was the point in time when D was telling the police that F was a good guy who might miss out on a promotion as a result of what was being said about him. There is no reason for me to doubt that the latter part of that proposition is true: it is Fs’ case that he lost his job as a result of the allegations. It may well be that there was an extent to which D held the former part to be true: children love good, kind and attentive carers; they also, often, love abusive and negligent carers. What seems entirely improbable to me is that if D’s claim that F was a good guy etc. was all there was to say about F, that NB (whether working alone or in combination with NC and/or NA) would have the malign and manipulative power to persuade her, within minutes, into making an entirely false claim that the good man she had just defended, had sexually abused her. On the other hand, in my judgment, it is entirely explicable and understandable that in the face of a dark and life-altering secret being revealed, a child might initially panic and worry about the consequences, including for an abuser.

To put that another way, the (false) claim that F is sexually abusive would be psychologically inconsistent from D’s perspective with the (true) claim that he is a good guy who is going for a promotion. However, and conversely, the (true) claim that F is a good guy who is going for a promotion would not be psychologically inconsistent with the (true) claim that he also is sexually abusive.

NB and NC disagree as to when E wrote things down on the 13 September. NB’s evidence is that because E couldn’t get her words out, she began writing down her allegations (at NB’s suggestion) before the police were called. NC’s evidence is that E made her initial allegations verbally and after the police had been called, wrote them down. The fact that they disagree about that, in my judgment, undermines the suggestion that they have simply fabricated or otherwise engineered the entire occasion. It is consistent with the passage of time affecting how two people remember the same event. In this regard the couple clearly haven’t got their heads together.

NB and NC also give apparently contradictory evidence with respect to what E said about her mother’s knowledge of any abuse. NC’s evidence is that E told him that her mother was aware of what was happening, whereas NB, as set out, was clear that E told she didn’t think her mum knew what was going on. On the one hand, insofar as there is an inconsistency, the inconsistency would on the face of it be E’s, not NB’s or NC’s. However, I accept and prefer NC’s oral evidence, which was initially given unprompted on this issue. He told me that at the outset, E was talking about her experience of physical abuse at home. It was in this context that he told me he asked E if her mum knew, which she told him she did. NB’s statement about E telling her she didn’t think her mum knew is in the context of her allegations of sexual abuse. It is not inconsistent for E to claim both that her mum knew about physical abuse but did not know, or might not know, about sexual abuse. I accept, considered separately below, that the latter claim is inconsistent with things E is later reported to have said to others.

NB rejected as absurd that she had pressured D into making allegations against F. I also reject that case. To be clear, I reject the proposition that NB working either alone or with named others has pressured either girl into making false allegations.

Both parents gave oral evidence that a reason NB and NC might hold a vendetta against them was that F had come into money – a sum of £25,000, by way of settlement from his ex-wife. They both told me that the other couple were jealous of the fact that they could therefore afford holidays and a new car. That explanation for NB and NC’s supposed motivation had never previously been mentioned by either parent. Nor was it put to either NB or NC. Given the thoroughness with which the parents’ cases were otherwise put to those witnesses, I am entirely satisfied that this element of the parents’ case is one that M made up in the witness box and F then adopted. It may – or may not – be factually true that F came into this sum of money; what the parents have clearly invented in the witness box is that they have ever held any belief that his inspired jealousy in their neighbours and motivated them to engineer false allegations against F.

I find the proposition that NB, NC (and NA) have entered into a conspiracy with G and H especially ludicrous. They had no real relationship on which to found such a conspiracy. NB and NC, who on F’s case are the prime instigators, could have had no real basis for knowing or believing that the girls would be placed with G and H. The idea that, following a conspiracy by the adults living in North Lincolnshire, G and H have independently conspired to encourage the girls to repeat false allegations is nonsense on stilts. It is quite clear that G and H have struggled significantly with the girls’ behaviour and its impact on their already busy household. It is inconceivable, in those circumstances, that they would encourage allegations that they knew or even suspected to be false when it was those allegations that were causing D and E to be part of their household. It is particularly inconceivable, in my judgment, that G would simultaneously accuse D of being an attention seeker because of her behaviours whilst encouraging her to make false allegations that were bound to keep her in his care.

I have viewed the ABE interviews on a number of occasions, both in preparation for the Re W hearing and for the finding of fact. DC Noble, the interviewing officer, did not establish in the usual way that either girl understood the difference between truth and lies. However, he did explain clearly to both girls the importance of telling the truth and in D’s case, in particular, it might be assumed that a child of her age would understand the difference between truth and lies. Moreover, it is the parents’ case that the girls do understand the difference between truth and lies because M, in particular, has been vehement from the very outset that her daughters are lying about F. As already set out, no party mounted any challenge to the ABE process in evidence or submissions.

The thing which struck me most about D’s interview was that in the initial, long, urgently delivered and free-flowing section, she does not directly describe or allege sexual abuse by F. Instead, she talks about the circumstances in which it would happen – ‘when my mum wasn’t in the house, my step-dad would basically come in my room and try and get me out of my bed to his bed’ – and incidental detail such as him pinning her down with his body and it making her feel claustrophobic and unable to breathe or F throwing her ‘phone across the room. She does allege that he would ‘get on top and then strip me’ but doesn’t, at that point, make any further allegation of sexually abusive behaviour. In my judgment:

Within her interview, D was clear that despite trying (including with lubrication as set out above) F had never successfully penetrated her with his penis. She described multiple incidents of sexual abuse – ‘so many, I’ve lost count’. She said that he had put his penis in her mouth and that this had happened ‘every single time’. D said that F had hit both her and E.

E, by contrast, was much more closed and less forthcoming in her interview. At the outset of the interview, when asked what she had come to tell the police she said that her stepdad ‘raped me’ and that now she had told someone she felt ‘a bit better’. When the officer asked her for detail she said she couldn’t remember. She clarified that her understanding of ‘rape’ was being touched in her private parts without consent and that this is what her stepdad did. She said that F had tried to put his ‘dick’ into her vagina. Like D, she described the abuse as predominantly happening in F’s bedroom. She said the abuse had happened too many times to count. She gave a balanced view of her life with her mum and stepfather, talking about good times as well as bad. The bad times included being hit by her mother and an occasion when she ‘kicked my head onto the carpet … and … I had a massive black eye for one week’. She said that F had hit her, on one occasion causing a red mark to her face and that he had kicked D into a radiator. She did not repeat the account, given to NB, of F making her suck his penis. As set out, she was generally quite closed and clearly nervous in her interview and told the officer that she couldn’t remember specific details.

I have set out the reasons for which I reject F and M’s explanation for D and E’s allegations, i.e. that various adults have encouraged or pressured them to make and, thereafter, maintain false allegations.

Although it is not their primary case (and nor, of course, do they have to advance any positive case) I have separately considered whether D and E have, independently of outside pressure, decided to make false allegations against F. That would, necessarily, involve the girls themselves getting their heads together to agree on their false allegations.

NA gave evidence that E had, in her experience, a tendency to fib: ‘she has a tendency to tell you what you she thinks you want to hear to stay out of trouble, so you take it with a pinch of salt’. NB gave evidence that both girls had a tendency to tell untruths. H accepted that D told lies, at least to her mind, about a number of issues including being bullied at school (though I note that D has clearly been unhappy in her school environment, and it is not at all unusual for children to perceive themselves as being bullied in such circumstances). G accepted that D had told lies but was clear that he had never known about her lie about ‘anything big’. NA and NB both told me that the types of lies or fibs they had heard the girls telling were to get themselves out of trouble. Mr Goodwin submitted on behalf of F, that D had made an untrue allegation that her father, G, had once tried to ‘kill everyone’ in his family but that this ‘has since been resolved as it was nearly a decade ago’. Mr Goodwin’s point was that this ‘lie’ was just as serious as her claim about F. I do not accept that submission:

Most children lie. I accept that the evidence is that independent parties – in particular NA – had formed the view that these girls had a tendency in that regard that was perhaps more notable than for other similarly aged children. However, there is no sense, in my judgment, in which on either the 10 or 13 of September 2023, the girls were in trouble, such that making up a serious and false allegation against F would help them (and this was the context in which both NA and NB told me they had heard the children telling untruths). On the 10 September they were clearly worried about what would happen when they were eventually re-admitted to the family home. But a lie about F touching her (which is what E told NB on that date) makes no sense in that regard: it wouldn’t minimise any perceived or feared trouble; it would exacerbate it. On the 13 September 2023 there was no obvious trouble that either girl would have wanted, or needed, to get out of by telling lies about F.

I can see no reason why either D or E, let alone both, would lie about F. He told the police that he had a positive relationship with them.

I have set out above multiple features of D’s ABE interview that I found to be credible, including the fact that in her initial free-flowing account she didn’t make any direct allegation against F. In a similar regard, and again as already set out, E’s initial ‘allegation’ to NA, when asked if someone was hurting them at home, was to say, ‘not really hurting, he just does his thing’. In my judgment, it would have involved a level of sophistication well beyond E for her to plant the idea, without any detail, that she may be being harmed at home and to manifest, as she did, fear, in order to lend credibility to the account that she would give 3 days later. E’s words to NA are consistent with a child who wants to tell others about a frightening lived experience but is, as yet, unsure whether or how to do so.

Both G and H were clear that neither girl has ever retracted their allegations against F or told them that those allegations are false. Indeed, there is no evidence at all of either girl retracting their allegations. This is despite the fact that they have been bullied at school as a result of other pupils’ knowledge of the allegations. It is also despite the fact that D clearly felt for a considerable period of time that she was unsupported and unwanted in her father’s house. That latter point also significantly undermines F and M’s case about G and H having encouraged the girls to maintain their lies simply to keep them in their care. If D knew that the only reason that she was with G and H was because of untrue allegations she had made, then she would have had every reason, at multiple points in the last year and a half, to withdraw her allegations and return to the safety of her mother and F. She has not done so.

Similarly, it is clear that the girls themselves have not always been happy with each other – E moved school to get away from D. Yet neither girl has withdrawn their allegations (which there would be reason for them to do, if they knew that they were false and only ever made because of a previous agreement between themselves or pressure from an outside party). Rather both girls have repeated their core allegations to a number of people over a significant period, including to H and G and PA. PA told me that she worked separately with the girls in part because E is scared of upsetting D by what she says. In my judgment that further undermines any suggestion that these girls have got their heads together and have themselves conspired to tell lies about F and their mother.

I weigh in the balance that D and E’s accounts are hearsay, and that F has not been given an opportunity directly to challenge them. I also accept Mr Goodwin’s submission that both girls gave different accounts, at different times, as to when they first experienced abuse. However, sexual abuse, when experienced, is confusing and frightening. Independently of that, children often have a poor concept of time.

F and M put forward a number of secondary, less developed theories as to why D and E might have lied which I have considered. I do not need to address each and every one of them because, as I have set out, I have found the girls’ accounts to be credible and true. However, by way of example I do not accept that D’s poor mental health (which is a fact) has caused her (and E) to make up serious lies about F. I strongly suspect that the causal link runs the other way. Nor do I think for one minute that the girls have made these claims because they wanted attention. As already set out, the claims have brought them both unwanted attention, but they have not retracted them. Nor do I accept that the claims could have been motivated by jealousy of C’s living circumstances. As described by the parents, the girls were living in relatively good circumstances – a new car, trips and holidays. The result of their claims is that they have moved to overcrowded accommodation where they share bedrooms with multiple half-siblings. D has complained about her treatment at the hands of some of those same family members. She has never retracted her allegations against F.

Having considered all the evidence in context and stepped back and considered the wider canvas, I find D and E’s allegations to be credible and true accounts of real, lived experiences.

I find, in line with the allegations made by D and E that:

Having made that finding, in my judgment it is unnecessary to deal with the separate finding sought by the local authority that on at least one occasion F made D (Footnote: ²) watch pornography whilst he masturbated. That is not to say that I find D to have lied. It is simply that this particular finding would add precisely nothing to a risk assessment or welfare analysis: the finding I have already made could not be more serious.

Similarly, whilst both girls have alleged that F threatened them in the event that they told anyone about the abuse, I do not find it necessary to make any separate finding about this. The harm flows from the abuse. It is entirely usual for sexual abusers to warn their victims not to report what has happened, but it is not necessary in the context of this case to make a separate finding.

PA’s evidence is that on the 18.12.2023 E told her that ‘my mum did it as well she planned it all’ and that when she had asked E what she meant by this, E had told her that her mum was ‘involved in it; she said she doesn’t know anything but she does; she didn’t do it to D just me cos she planned it’.

H gave evidence that on an unspecified occasion – which she thought might have been the winter of 2024 – E shouted in front of her (and her other children) that her mother used to take photographs of her with no clothes on and send them to F. She didn’t ask any questions as she was with her other children but told E to tell her dad about this. E had not repeated the allegation to her knowledge. G told me that both girls have said that they think their mother went out of the house in order to facilitate the abuse.

E’s allegations to PA and H are different to each other. Of course, they could both be true. But they are at odds with what I accept E told NB at the time of her initial allegations, which was that her mother didn’t know about sexual abuse. E does not suggest that her mother was aware of the abuse in her police interview (although D does hint at this). G’s view was that initially E may have sought to protect her mother, in the mistaken belief that she would separate from F. On realising that her mother had sided with F, she had concluded that there was no longer any reason to protect her. I accept that is a possible explanation for the evolution of E’s account. Conversely, in my judgment, it might be the case that E was angry with her mother for siding with F and this impelled her to exaggerate a suspicion – that her mum may have been aware – into a firm assertion. The allegation to PA was not properly investigated by the police. The reported repetition of the allegation to DC Cocks, six months later, is poorly recorded. For these reasons I have come to the conclusion that the local authority has not proved, on balance of probabilities, that M was complicit in the sexual abuse.

Both girls have alleged that their mother and F have physically assaulted them.

M and F deny physical abuse of D or E. I find that D and E have made repeated allegations of being hit, slapped and kicked and that on occasions each girl has had injuries consistent with their allegations. I accept NB’s evidence about M’s admission to her. I find that E and D have told the truth about these experiences. I find that:

The evidence that M has prioritised her relationship with F over her children is overwhelming. No reasonable person could read my judgment up to this point without forming that conclusion. M actually told me in her evidence that she wouldn’t leave F even if I made the findings of sexual abuse against him. She, of course, has neither read the transcripts nor watched the videos of her daughters’ allegations and has not, to that extent, even tried to put herself in a position of forming an objective view as to whether her children might be telling the truth.

I find without hesitation that:

M accepted in evidence that she has told C that the reason E and D have disappeared from her life is because they have been ‘naughty’. In her response to threshold M accepts that she has not promoted a relationship between the sisters but says ‘I do not accept that C has suffered … as a result of this’. That is a staggering proposition about a child who has stopped seeing her two older siblings. Even if I accepted M’s evidence that C has not said she misses her sisters (or has positively asserted to professionals that she doesn’t wish to see them) this would not obviate her obligation, as a parent, to promote that contact. Both M and F have refused to agree to C having contact with E and D. I accept that in the very latter stages of these proceedings, and well over a year and a half after she last saw her sisters, M and F appear to have relented somewhat, with there now being plans in place to facilitate reintroductions. The point, however, holds and the harm is already done.

I find that:

For the avoidance of doubt, the local authority pleaded this finding against M only. C is the child of both parents. They have both failed to promote what was (and is) an important relationship for her.

It is nearly 2 years since the children made their allegations. There have been no charges. All parties – the children, their mother, F, C – remain in limbo. It is no sort of explanation at all that the original Officer in the case left the force. That ought to have caused the police to immediately allocate the case to a replacement, safe pair of hands and take steps to oversee and ensure progress. Instead, the case has been passed from one officer to the next. The police logs cut and paste the same investigative lines of enquiry over and over (and over) again without anyone employed by the police displaying any obvious inclination to make those enquiries or move the case on. It is extraordinary, in my view, that 6 months after the ISVA reported that one of these children had alleged their mother was involved in their sexual abuse, that same ISVA was left to chase it up, the police having done nothing in the meantime. The police appear to have let these children down woefully. Perhaps the police say otherwise and point to a diligent and timely investigation. However, in my judgment, their investigation has been, on the face of it, extraordinarily poor. I say ‘on the face of it’ simply because the police have not had an opportunity to give their own account. I am now ordering them to do so. I direct that the Chief Constable, or his nominated deputy, file and serve a signed statement, explaining the apparent delay in concluding any investigation into these allegations. The statement must be filed and served by 4pm, 4 weeks from the date of the order so directing. There will be the usual liberty to apply within 2 weeks of the same date.

That is my judgment.