This judgment was delivered in private. The Judge has given leave for this judgment to be published. The anonymity of the children and members of their family must be strictly preserved. All persons, including representatives of the media, must ensure that this condition is strictly complied with. Failure to do so will be a contempt of Court.
Before Recorder Sirikanda
Re J (Direction to Reconsider Care Plan and Consider Kinship Placement)
Between:
Westminster City Council
Applicant
- and -
The Mother
1st Respondent
The Father
2nd Respondent
The Child ‘J” through their Children’s Guardian
3rd Respondent
Ms Moore, Counsel for and instructed by the Local Authority
Ms McElroy, Counsel for the First Respondent, instructed by Anthony Louca Solicitors
Mr Matthews, Counsel for the Second Respondent, instructed by Amphlett Lissimore
Mr Ms Mellor, Counsel for the Third Respondents, instructed by Creighton & Partners
Hearing dates: 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 20 November 2025
APPROVED JUDGMENT
In line with the Practice Guidance of the President of the Family Division issued in December 2018, the names of the children and the adult parties in this judgment have been anonymised, having regard to the implications for the children of placing personal details and information in the public domain. The anonymity of the children and members of their family must be strictly preserved. All persons, including representatives of the media, must ensure that this condition is strictly complied with. Failure to do so will be a contempt of Court and may result in a sentence of imprisonment.
A: INTRODUCTION
Good morning Tish, the mother showed up at my door at 6:00 AM with J. J was cold and had wet socks probably from walking bare feet without shoes. The mother looked confused and upon enquiring why she brought J at this hour and without shoes or warm clothes she did not look herself and I'm really worried about her and J’s wellbeing Please advise
This is the arresting message the maternal grandmother sent Laetitia Moon, a social worker at Westminster City Council (the Local Authority), at 6.45am on Monday 12 February 2024. The mother is the maternal grandmother’s daughter and J is the mother’s daughter and the maternal grandmother’s grandchild, and is the subject of these proceedings.
The message above represented the culmination of concerns that the maternal grandmother had had about her daughter’s care of J over a number of years. Ms Moon confirmed to me that the maternal grandmother had regularly engaged with the Local Authority and ventilated her concerns about J’s welfare while in the care of the mother. There are emails going back to 2022 evidencing this.
All of these concerns stem from the sad fact that the mother has suffered very serious mental health issues in the past and is continuing to recover from them to this day. Dr Mayer has reported to the court three times. On each occasion he has reconfirmed his opinion that the mother is suffering from schizophrenia. After his examination of the mother in 2024 he said:
She has presentedwith a number of psychotic symptoms, including persecutory and grandiose delusions, auditory hallucinations in both the second and third person and possibly disorder of possession of thought,
On 5 September 2025, Dr Mayer reviewed the mother’s updated medical records (but he did not meet with the mother again). He noted that the mother had engaged with and responded well to treatment (in particular antipsychotic medication). But he observed the longer term sustainability of her well-being remains uncertain and her improvement is fairly recent.
While I will consider carefully the current state of the mother’s health and its impact on her ability to care for J, what cannot be in doubt is that her past state of mental ill health has negatively impacted the care she has been able to give J.
This is a case where all parties agree that the threshold for the Court to make public law orders is met. They accept that on the relevant date (being 15 February 2024), J had suffered harm or was likely to suffer harm and that that harm was attributable to the care of the mother. The mother’s ill health, it is agreed, effected many aspects of her parenting but in my judgment the most profound impact on J would be the emotional harm she suffered. She was a small child confronted by the fact her primary caregiver, the source of security and stability in her world, was suffering from schizophrenia. J has manifested emotional and behavioural dysregulation during the course of these proceedings. These have been reported by her foster carers and have included passiveness; destructive behaviour towards toys and furniture; occasionally soiling herself and being overly fastidious with clothing. On a few of occasions she has smeared her faeces against the wall. A doctor has met with J and provided a report to the court. Their unchallenged view is that J’s presentation is aligned to Social (pragmatic) Communication Disorder. Their view is that:
The emotional and behavioural challenges noted of J are coming from attachment rupture brought about due to the fluctuations of the mental health of [the mother].
..
As J’s challenges are attachment-based, it is imperative that, where possible, J has stability in her living situation as this lends itself to the formation of secure attachment relationships that can be utilised to scaffold J’s development.
What is also clear from the evidence is there has been a marked improvement in J’s behaviours in 2025 compared with 2024. In 2024 she had to move twice after being placed in foster care placements that broke down. In 2024 she was unable to spend extended time with the maternal grandmother, who was in Africa recovering from surgery. In 2024 the mother was not taking any medication and still clearly suffering from mental ill health. This created emotional turmoil for J that year.
B: THE ISSUES
The questions in this case are: what future placement and what legal framework would be in J’s best interests?
Each of the four parties has a different answer to these questions:
The Local Authority, represented by Ms Moore of counsel, propose that I make a final care order with a plan that J move from her current foster placement into long-term foster care with an unidentified foster carer. Although J has been doing very well in her current placement, the Local Authority are not happy with the current foster carer; they consider she does not have an understanding on the impact on children from parents with mental health difficulties and the impact of attachment based trauma. Their care plan is they continue a nationwide search for a foster carer who has been trained in trauma informed parenting. They have arrived at this care plan in part based on negative assessments of the mother, the father and the maternal grandmother.
The mother, represented by Ms McElroy of counsel, proposes that J be returned to her care. The mother’s case is she is on a “wellness journey” and she has accepted her mental health difficulties. She is now engaging with her treatment and on medication and is in a “good place”, enabling her to offer safe care for J.
The father,represented by Mr Matthews of counsel, proposes J be placed in his care. The father told me he is a committed father and believes it is best for J (if she cannot be with the mother) to be placed with her other parent. He considers the negative parenting assessments of him unfair and flawed.
J appears in these proceedings by her Guardian Ms Endlein represented by Ms Mellor of counsel. The Children’s Guardian proposes I make a final care order with a plan that J be placed in a connected person foster care placement with the maternal grandmother. The Children’s Guardian considers the maternal grandmother a loving and committed parenting figure with whom J has a deep pre-existing attachment. The maternal grandmother currently sees J every weekend overnight. J has spent extended time with the maternal grandmother at her home during occasional holidays. The Children’s Guardian disagrees with the negative special guardian assessment of the maternal grandmother. She believes the assessor has set the bar too high. Importantly for the Children’s Guardian, J’s clear view is that she wants to live with the maternal grandmother.
I am grateful to all counsel for the constructive way they have conducted the hearing and advanced their client’s cases.
Not a party to this case is the maternal grandmother. The maternal grandmother has attempted to obtain legal representation but has been told she does not qualify for legal aid. This has placed the maternal grandmother at a significant disadvantage in these proceedings. She is strongly supportive of the proposal that she care for J. But she has had no professional representation nor entitlement to documents in the case. One example of how hamstrung she has been is that she has been asked by various social work professionals about her daughter’s illness, but she has never been shown the medical reports on the mother nor had them explained to her before days 2-3 of this final hearing after I made an order and the Children’s Guardian went through the medical reports with her.
Despite this, the maternal grandmother, with my permission, and the agreement of the parties, has been present in court every day of this hearing. She has sat at the very back of court; she has made notes; she has listened carefully to the evidence that has been given; and finally she gave her own oral evidence for around 1.5 hours on the last day of the hearing.
C: THE BACKGROUND
The maternal grandmother is aged 67. She is of African origin. She used to work for an airline before she started a family and relocated internationally twice before moving to England. The maternal grandmother has been living in England for the last 26 years but she has retained links with her country of origin and owns some land there. The maternal grandmother has four adult children. The maternal grandmother lives in a 3-bedroom property with her adult son T. T is aged 31 and works for HMRC.
The mother is aged 30. The mother lives at a confidential address noted on the Court file. The mother does not work but suffers from the mental health issues described above. The mother is under the care of the NHS’s Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea Early Intervention service (KCWEIS) Team. Her care coordinator is Dani Fayard (community mental health nurse). Ms Fayard has prepared a letter for the Court. Since February 2024, the mother has attended c71% of her appointments and missed 29%. She will remain under KCWEIS care until February 2027, at which point she will be referred to a community mental health hub. Ms Fayard confirmed that the mother is reviewed by a psychiatrist every 6 months; the mother is taking Quetiapine (11mg BD) independently. This has resulted in an improvement of her previous psychotic symptoms. These symptoms were characterised by persecutory delusional beliefs, perceptual disturbances and thought insertion.
The father is South American. The father lives with his parents. He is the part-time manager of a pub. He has the option to work in his family’s cleaning business. The father has four other children apart from J. They are aged 14 to 2. The father sees three of the children every other weekend and the youngest on a more ad hoc basis.
J was born in 2019. She is aged 6. She is the only child of the mother. The father and the mother met in 2018 via a dating app. They had a brief relationship and the father was surprised to learn the mother was pregnant. After J’s birth, the father attempted to be involved in J’s life albeit not as the mother’s romantic partner. What was a cordial relationship between the father and the mother broke down, the father says because he formed a new relationship. The father did not see J for 4 years (2020 to 2024) until he was contacted after these proceedings began.
J currently attends primary school. She lives with a foster carer (‘X’).
After a particular deterioration in the mother’s mental health at the start of 2024, J was informally kept in the maternal grandmother’s care when the mother took her to the maternal grandmother’s home on the morning of 12 February 2024. The following week the maternal grandmother was observed to be confused and disoriented. She went to A&E and was diagnosed with a brain haemorrhage which required surgery. J meanwhile was kept in the care of T and one of the maternal grandmother’s daughters (‘U’). The mother attended at the maternal grandmother’s home on the evening of 14 February demanding her daughter back. On 15 February T and U reported to the Local Authority that they could not continue to offer care for J.
On 15 February 2024, the Local Authority sought and obtained an emergency protection order. J moved into the care of a local authority foster carer. J did not settle well in her first two placements with different foster carers and it was not until a transition to X’s care in April 2024 that there was improvement in her behaviours which had been dysregulated.
Meanwhile the maternal grandmother returned to her home country to recuperate from her surgery. She wanted to put herself forward to care for J, but the process of assessing her was hampered by the fact she was in Africa. Nevertheless Y of the Local Authority began meeting with the maternal grandmother over video in May 2024. The maternal grandmother having recovered from surgery was diagnosed with lymphoma (a cancer of the lymphatic system). The maternal grandmother has been treated for lymphoma and I have read a letter from Dr Baggio, a Haematology Fellow at the Lymphoma Clinic at the Department Haematology at University College London Hospitals Trust that the maternal grandmother is in clinical and radiologic remission from lymphoma.
D: THE ORAL EVIDENCE
I heard oral evidence from a number of social work professionals called by the local authority. They were all doing their best to assist the court:
Anna Buckley is J’s current allocated social worker (taking over recently from Ms Moon). She confirmed that the mother and the maternal grandmother have a close bond. Despite this and the views of the Children’s Guardian, the Local Authority’s plan remains that J be placed in long term foster care with a non-family member. Ms Buckley told me that despite the care plan being for a nationwide search, the search is now for a carer in London or around 1 hour outside London. The Local Authority consider it important that the carer is a trauma informed carer. If no foster carer is found J will simply remain with X and be subject to 6 monthly review. She confirmed that even if a carer was found, there would remain the risk the placement could break down. Ms Buckley confirmed J has a wonderful relationship with her grandmother and J would like to live with her. Ms Buckley was challenged as to why the Local Authority was not considering a family placement and she repeatedly stated that because of the negative assessments of the maternal grandmother, the Local Authority could not consider her to be a foster carer and that if put forward to an independent foster carer panel she would be rejected. Ms Buckley confirmed the extensive level of support and services that would be available were the maternal grandmother to be a foster carer. Ms Buckley accepted that J needs a secure attachment but commented that eventually with her non-family foster carer she would achieve this and stressed the need for “trauma informed parenting”.
Ms AY prepared the first special guardian assessment of the maternal grandmother on 27 November 2024. She confirmed she had not been involved in the case or with the maternal grandmother since this time. Ms AY assessed the maternal grandmother between May 2024 and November 2024. The reason the process was extended was that the maternal grandmother was in Africa until August 2024. At the very end of this process of assessment the maternal grandmother informed Ms AY that she had been diagnosed with cancer. This was an example of the maternal grandmother’s openness with the professionals. Ms AY told me her assessment of the maternal grandmother as a carer was informed by her concerns about the maternal grandmother’s health. If her medical concerns were not present it removed many of her reservations about the maternal grandmother (but not all of them).
Ms AZ is an independent social worker. She confirmed she had undertaken a special guardianship assessment of the maternal grandmother in 2025. She told me the maternal grandmother was forthcoming and engaged with the assessment process. While she had visited the maternal grandmother’s home, she had not seen the proposed third bedroom for J nor had she spoke at length with T, though she happened to observe J had a warm and affectionate interaction with T. She confirmed the reservations she had in her report about the maternal grandmother’s insight into the mother’s mental health, recalling that the maternal grandmother seemed to blame the father for the mother’s troubles. Ms AZ also stated her view that there was a lack of reflection about the impact of the maternal grandmother’s illness and absence from J’s life in 2024.
Toby Jenkinson conducted a parenting assessment of the father. This was the second in-house assessment by the Local Authority. He confirmed his view that he could not recommend the father as a long term primary carer for J. He told me there was no solid plan presented by the father for how he would care for J. This was particularly surprising since, after the first assessment the Local Authority had made clear to the father this was a deficit (indeed the father had not even read the initial assessment). Mr Jenkinson maintained his view that he was not sure how the father would reconcile his current responsibilities for his other four children, both in terms of contact and financial support (i.e. child maintenance), with becoming a full-time carer for J. The father was clear he would need to give his other children the same level of care as currently. The father also struggled to show insight into J’s needs. J has particular issues which have manifested in her behaviour. The father seemed to struggle to appreciate this. Over 20 hours of interaction Mr Jenkinson thought the father found it hard to show emotional insight. The father seemed to withdraw himself from difficult conversations.
Laetitia Moon was J’s allocated social worker for most of the proceedings. Ms Moon told me that J is now doing very well in her current foster care placement. The school have told Ms Moon she is a different child compared with the child of early 2024. Ms Moon repeatedly told me that the Local Authority want a trauma informed carer. X is not interested in talking about mental health issues and the Local Authority have therefore discounted her as a long term foster carer for J. She confirmed there is risk a future foster carer placement would breakdown. Ms Moon told me they have not recommended the maternal grandmother as a carer for J because: the maternal grandmother has not shown insight into the mother’s mental health issues; because there had been an initial back and forth about the maternal grandmother wanting to live in Africa; because after the maternal grandmother required surgery, T contacted the Local Authority saying they could not cope. With respect to the father and his decision to miss four successive contacts with J after being informed that the Local Authority would not be supporting him as a carer, Ms Moon was clear that when she told the father of the Local Authority’s view she did not say that this was inevitable and she encouraged him to contact his solicitors and tell them his view. Despite this the father immediately missed the next 4 scheduled contacts with J. Ms Moon told me how this upset J.
The mother told me things were going well with her health, she was on medication and she had come a long way. The mother agreed she previously lacked insight into her health and treatment. The mother told me she does her best to attend as many appointments as possible. The mother explained missed appointments by reference to the side effects of medication. She is now seeing a psychologist regularly. She is on a “wellness journey”. The mother told me her preferred option is for J to return to her care but she will respect the choice of the Court. Her secondary choice is for J to be placed with the maternal grandmother. If this happened, the mother told me she recognised the maternal grandmother would be “in charge”. The mother told me she disagreed with aspects of the expert view of J. She did not think she suffered “trauma” under the mother’s care. The explanation for her concerning behaviours was simply her movement into foster care. the mother told me that although there were times in the past that the mother and the maternal grandmother were not talking to each other there was no major falling out.
The father told me he would prioritise J if she were placed in his care. He was currently working part-time but would give up this employment. In the short term he would have to live with his parents (and he had adduced recent emails saying they were in agreement to this). But he would then obtain his own housing (possibly in the private rental sector with housing benefit). He intended that contact arrangements with his other 4 children would continue as they were. He said even if he were living in his parents’ home, which is far from J’s current school, he would still take J to her current school. He told me that even if he gave up work there might be the possibility to work in the family cleaning business part-time.
The maternal grandmother made clear in her oral evidence that she had not fully appreciated the extent of her daughter's ill health, having not seen any of the professional opinions about the mother until the week of the final hearing. She appreciated that her daughter had been suffering from schizophrenia not just psychosis and that took longer to treat and it was more serious. The maternal grandmother told me that she had worked in the mental health field before as a support worker and she told me about her increasing concerns about J in her daughter's care in 2022, 2023 and finally 2024. She said she had farmland in her home country and that she has leased that land on a long-term basis. As to J, if she was presenting as unwell she would call for help most obviously social services as she has done in the past. Ultimately, if things came to a head with the mother, and J was unsafe she would call the police on her daughter, if that was what was necessary. The maternal grandmother told me she would welcome the opportunity to take up support services offered by the Local Authority including trauma informed training. The maternal grandmother disagreed with the proposition that there was no support network for her: she has her son T who lives with her and a cousin called V who visits every other day; she is a regular member of the congregation at her local church.
The Children’s Guardian gave evidence last. She told me that hearing the live evidence over the course of the week had strengthened her already strong and clear recommendation that the Local Authority’s care plan was not in J’s best interests. the Children’s Guardian was disappointed that the Local Authority had not changed their position in the light of her final analysis. She told me she had a completely different view of the maternal grandmother than the assessors. the maternal grandmother was open about the mother’s mental health difficulties and did not minimise them. the Children’s Guardian was clear that the maternal grandmother would be able to meet J’s long-term needs; the maternal grandmother did not lack insight but lacked knowledge and information. The Children’s Guardian told me that she was very concerned about the prospect of J moving to a non-family foster placement, potentially outside London: this could “break her”. The Children’s Guardian’s view is the maternal grandmother’s retirement is actually a positive, it allows her to focus on J and the Children’s Guardian has no concerns that the maternal grandmother will want to relocate to Africa.
E: THE LAW
Threshold was almost entirely agreed. I deal with one discrete matter. At paragraph 4 the Local Authority allege that: the mother lacked insight into the nature of her mental health problems, did not accept the need for treatment and believed herself much better. This allegation was based on Dr Mayer’s view in August 2024 and was not accepted by the mother. I find this allegation proved for this time period. Currently, I also find that the mother lacks insight into the serious adverse impact her mental health issues had in the past, and could have in the future, on J. But I also find she has now accepted the need for treatment.
Threshold having been met, the focus of this judgment is a welfare evaluation of the realistic options for J’s future care. In conducting this evaluation first and foremost, J’s welfare is my paramount consideration (section 1 of the Children Act 1989). I must have regard to the welfare checklist at section 1 (3) of the Children Act 1989 and I also have regard to the statutory steer that any delay to the resolution of these proceedings is ordinarily not in the best interests of J.
I remind myself, when considering the Local Authority’s care plan, that a placement outside the family is an interference in J’s and the mother’s and the father’s article 8 right to respect for their family life under the ECHR and therefore it should be necessary and proportionate to the risk of harm to J if a different order is made. The evaluation that I make in this judgment must be a global holistic analysis of the realistic options which comparatively weighs the advantages and disadvantages of those options for J’s future welfare (Re B-S (Children) [2013] EWCA Civ 1146).
F: WELFARE ANALYSIS
My starting point is that I accept the unchallenged assessment of J’s doctor that J needs “stability in her living situation, as this lends itself to the formation of secure attachment relationships that can be utilised to scaffold J’s development.”. It is clear to me that J was suffering from emotional harm at the time these proceedings started, and I have already commented on the impact of this on her. The marked improvement is to my mind self-evidently connected to the stability J has been enjoying in the current foster placement.
Stability and risk of breakdown
These are key factors in any welfare valuation of the four placement options being advanced by the parties. J is a child who has suffered from ruptured attachments. In my judgment the mother demonstrated a lack of insight when she steadfastly refused to accept that her mental health issues had not seriously effected J. It must be difficult for a mother who is suffering from such issues to accept that their behaviour (however much they are not at “fault”) has adversely impacted their young daughter. But the impact has been serious. J has witnessed the mother she loves behave in a disturbing and alarming way: like someone she does not know at all. She has suffered serious psychological and emotional harm as result of this exposure; her guarded reaction at the start of early-in-the-proceedings contact sessions with the mother speaks volumes – J needed to ascertain which version of the mother was turning up, before relaxing and enjoying her time with her.
However, I do agree with the mother’s view that the attachment ruptures were worsened by other events leading up to the proceedings. J was moved out of the mother’s care and placed in the care of the maternal grandmother, the grandmother she loved. But this was short lived because of the maternal grandmother’s brain haemorrhage. J was then cared for by T and his sister for a few days, they could not cope because of the mother’s conduct. They were concerned about the mother’s behaviour in attending the property. An EPO was made and then public law proceedings issued. J was then moved to not one but three non-family foster carers, the first two placements breaking down. In the meantime, her direct contact with the maternal grandmother came to an end for large parts of the remainder of 2024 because the maternal grandmother travelled to her home country to recuperate. All of this would have been incredibly emotionally tumultuous for J.
It is no surprise whatsoever that the concerning behaviours I have described earlier in this judgement were heightened at this time and have improved with the stability of X’s foster care. Although X has obviously contributed to a safe and secure environment for J, another source of continuity for her is her school. She has a friendship group, a good relationship with the teachers and she is receiving therapy through the school. And a further continuity point is her regular attendance at Saturday theatre school. This is an outlet for her enthusiasm for performance.
But we know that the Local Authority have decided to discount X as a carer so, come what may, J’s life is to change again. All four of the options are acknowledged to carry risks of breakdown which would damage J’s sense of stability and security. The Local Authority’s plan involves a, currently unidentified, foster carer who will look after J for the next 10-12 years. It is well recognised that long term foster care does not carry with it any guarantee of permanence. A foster care placement can breakdown or be brought to an end by the foster carer at any time. J has experienced this twice during the currency of the proceedings. By contrast each of the three family members are unlikely in my view to ever say they no longer wish to care for J. They all love her and consider the best thing for her future is she remains in the care of her family for her childhood. But despite these expressed wishes there are still risks of things breaking down in each family member’s plan.
The mother is suffering from mental health issues. She is clearly much better than she was in 2024 but as, she herself accepts, she is on a “wellness journey”. After not engaging with treatment in 2024, she is now taking medication and engaging with support. But Ms Fayard has stated that she will be under the care of her team until February 2027. The mother found the final hearing stressful. When she was sitting in court and a witness said something she did not agree with on days 1 and 2, she could not occasionally stop herself from shouting out her disagreement. This lack of inhibition worsened on the final day of evidence when a number of witnesses had to consider the difficult but necessary subject of the impact of the mother’s mental health on J and risk to J of the mother relapsing. This provoked in the mother not just loud disagreement but also statements which did not make sense: for example she stated she had other biological children who were all fine. I am of course not able to say whether these outbursts were directly reflective of mental illness or a reaction to stress or a result of other factors. But when combined with the agreed medical evidence in this case I cannot be confident when in time the mother will approach full recovery.
The mother on her own case has not completed her wellness journey. The risk of J being returned to the mother’s care and the situation immediately breaking down and J having to be removed is high.
The father has never been the primary carer for any of his five children. Although he had some contact with J in the first year after her birth, he did not then see her for 4 years. J clearly has developed a bond with the father but that bond has been tested by periods where he has not attended agreed contact. The decision to simply stop seeing J after the Local Authority informed him of their care plan was especially unsettling for her. The father’s immediate plan for housing J is that she stay at his parents’ home. His parents have said contradictory things about this during the proceedings. That said, I consider the father would find some form of accommodation and the risks of a placement with the father breaking down are not as high as with the mother, but they are not non-existent because there is a real question mark about the father’s ability to offer the high level of focussed attention that J needs. the father has commitments to his other chid children both in terms of contact and in terms of financial support. Although his ostensible case is he would give up employment, he then told me that he could look to work part-time in his family’s cleaning business. But this would then impact on his benefits position (e.g. his primary option for future independent housing was the private rental sector with housing benefit). Beyond this, given the trauma that J has suffered, I am in agreement with the Local Authority that J’s primary carer needs to be open and receptive to J’s behaviours and feelings; this is a little girl who has not had a standard upbringing. I was concerned about both the father’s attitude to J’s distinctive needs as relayed by Mr Jenkinson, and in his replies to questions in oral evidence. The risk here is not of the placement breaking down because the father cannot practically obtain a situation which enables him to care for J, but the varied demands on him and his own personality mean he cannot meet J’s needs as well as someone like the maternal grandmother. The maternal grandmother does not work, she has a pension income and an income from some assets in her home country. Her adult son lives with her and contributes to the household practically and, if needs be, financially. The maternal grandmother would be able to offer J full emotional focus whilst of course supporting and sustaining J’s relationships with the father and the mother to the best of her ability.
The risk of a placement with the maternal grandmother breaking down primarily relates to her age and past health issues. If the maternal grandmother were to suffer another brain haemorrhage or develop cancer again then it may be she simply cannot care for J. But I make clear there is no actual evidence that the maternal grandmother’s health would deteriorate. She has recovered from the 2024 surgery and also undergone the necessary treatment for her lymphoma. The evidence of Dr Baggio is she is in remission. The Local Authority made the point that a further risk would be the potential for conflict between the mother and the maternal grandmother in the future if the maternal grandmother was making decisions about J’s care that the mother did not agree with. Although the mother dutifully told me in the witness box she would accept the maternal grandmother’s decision making, in my judgment her inability to hold back from loudly commenting when someone said something she strongly disagreed with during the hearing is a marker that she may lack the capacity in the future to accept the maternal grandmother’s authority. This could lead to conflict. The Local Authority have said this in itself would be a bad thing for J to be exposed to and that I should take this into account in preferring their care plan. But the key for me is not the likelihood of the mother’s future disagreement with the maternal grandmother but my assessment of the maternal grandmother’s response were it to happen. When “push comes to shove”, I consider the maternal grandmother will be able to put J first, over and above the demands or views of the mother. The maternal grandmother is an independent and determined woman. She has demonstrated her prioritisation of J already: before and during these proceedings. The disbenefit to J of being exposed to some conflict would be far outweighed by the emotional benefits of being securely placed with the maternal grandmother.
The attachment scaffold that has been built for J since 2024 has involved X but also the maternal grandmother, the mother and the father. The Local Authority’s plan represents a wholesale dismantling of this scaffold in favour of a hoped for rebuilding exercise with an unknown carer in an unknown location without any assurance of permanency for J. Although the Local Authority rightly revisited the level of contact they planned for J to have with her birth family while in foster care, it is still highly limited contact.
If J is placed at a home an hour outside London, I would be concerned about this limited contact actually being implemented. The Local Authority’s plan would have a profoundly negative impact on the attachments that J has fostered with the maternal grandmother and the father since 2024 and the residual core attachment with the mother. The Children’s Guardian put this in stark terms, she was concerned that the Local Authority’s care plan would “break” J. While I would not use the same language, I agree that the breakdown of attachment and disruption would be profoundly destabilising for J.
The capacity of each potential carer to meet J’s particular needs
The secondary position of each of J’s parents and the primary position of J’s guardian is that she be placed in the care of the maternal grandmother. They consider the maternal grandmother well able to meet all her needs. The Local Authority do not agree. They rely on two negative special guardian assessments of the maternal grandmother. In order to assess the competing positions in respect of the maternal grandmother, I need to evaluate the reasons advanced by the Local Authority and the authors of the special guardian assessment for discounting the maternal grandmother.
The assessment made by Ms AY completed in November 2024 but the process of assessment began in May 2024. This entire year is marked by the fact that the maternal grandmother had been seriously unwell and had been in her home country for a large part of the period. Ms AY ends her report by highlighting:
The maternal grandmother’s serious health issues which raise “significant concerns” about her capacity to provide a permanent placement.
The maternal grandmother’s plan to move to Africa which had not been possible for her to consider.
It is unsurprising that these factors played a prominent part in Ms AY’s thinking because her assessment period coincided with the maternal grandmother being in her home country and the aftermath of her brain surgery and her new diagnosis of cancer. But as Ms AY acknowledged the evidential picture has now changed. The maternal grandmother has recovered and is in good health. The maternal grandmother is also clear that it is not her plan to relocate with J to Africa. This may have been in her thinking in the spring of 2024, but it no longer is. Ms Moore on behalf of the Local Authority submits that the fact she had a plan to relocate and has assets in her home country increases the likelihood she might move there. I disagree. The maternal grandmother gave clear evidence that the agricultural land has been leased and the restaurant she owns in Africa is run by a manager. I can see no evidence that either asset requires the maternal grandmother reside in Africa.
The other weaknesses Ms AY identified were:
Concern about financial and accommodation arrangements. I do not share these concerns. The maternal grandmother has an assured tenancy for a 3-bedroom maisonette. Whilst I understand that some arrears of rent had built up, these have been reduced by a payment plan with the landlord. The maternal grandmother shares her accommodation with T who is in full time employment. The maternal grandmother herself has an income stream from Africa and will, if J is placed with her, receive further financial support to enable her to meet J’s financial needs.
The maternal grandmother has not been able to prioritise J’s needs in 2024 while she has been in foster care as she has been “in and out of the country”. This is a particular flawed asserted “weakness”. It shows no insight nor empathy for the fact that the maternal grandmother had brain surgery in February 2024. She took a decision to recuperate in her home country. This was a necessary prioritising of her recovery at this point in time. The fact she was in Africa did not stop the maternal grandmother trying to actively engage with Ms AY by videocall for the assessments.
The maternal grandmother has not connected the mother’s adolescent behaviour with her later mental health issues and might not do so again with J. Ms AY maintained this view despite in her own report recording that the maternal grandmother “took this on board and spoke about how she would identify if there were changes to J’s behaviour and would seek help as she got older”. Ms AY criticised the maternal grandmother for being “passive” and not curious when saying this, but I do not agree. The answer shows her being reflective and engaged. This criticism is at odds with the evidence I heard from the maternal grandmother who was clearly engaged and focussed with the serious mental health difficulties the mother has had. I simply cannot accept that if J exhibited any behaviours which might give concerns that the maternal grandmother would not actively seek support and treatment from the relevant professionals whether that be school, GP or community mental health team.
Ms AZ has completed a special guardian assessment more recently than Ms AY. In her report she identified the following concerns:-
The maternal grandmother does not have a strong support network. I reject this criticism. The maternal grandmother does have an adequate network of support in London. Most obviously her adult son T who has, with the maternal grandmother, taken the lead in prioritising J’s welfare by raising concerns about the mother’s care of J (I have seen an email from T to the Local Authority dated 17 March 2022 where he raises concerns about J being neglected by the mother (dirty home; the child not eating; J looking miserable). For this final hearing, T has jointly authored with the maternal grandmother a position statement for the Court. It is a powerful and articulate document which is a testament to the strength of his feeling that J should not be placed away from her family (i.e. his mother). Ms AZ curiously did not consider it necessary, as part of her Special Guardianship assessment, to speak to T at length despite the fact he is J’s uncle and is living with the maternal grandmother. This is a gap in her assessment. She did however observe a very warm interaction between T and J. Nowhere in the assessments was their recognition that the father too would offer support and respite for the maternal grandmother if J were placed in her care by taking up contact. The father too is now part of the maternal grandmother’s support network so far as J is concerned.
Moreover, the maternal grandmother has the support of V who is a family member who she is close to and is a regular visitor. She also has a neighbour she has a good relationship with and minutes away from her home is her local church. The maternal grandmother is a member of the congregation and worships there each Sunday. I do not consider that the maternal grandmother and J would be socially isolated or lack support and this criticism is misplaced.
Ms AZ stated that the mother’s childhood involved many transitions in terms of moving around and relationships and that the maternal grandmother did not believe that this had an impact on her children’s wellbeing and that her family were from nomadic tribe and used to moving around. This was clearly included as a criticism of the maternal grandmother but in my judgment it is flawed. It comes very close to creating a causal link between the mother’s mental health issues and family and personal decisions the maternal grandmother took in relocating from Africa. This would be unevidenced speculation regarding the mother’s mental health. The mother first went to a GP in relation to her mental health in 2017 when she was 23.
Ms AZ said that the maternal grandmother does not think that the mother presents any risk to J. This part of her report is impossible to reconcile with the long standing and active engagement with the Local Authority leading up to J being removed from the mother’s care. It is the case that the maternal grandmother has not been a party to these proceedings; has not received any legal advice; and was not provided with any of the medical evidence about her daughter until day 2 of the final hearing. The maternal grandmother gave clear and precise evidence that she accepts the diagnosis now after being given Dr Mayer’s report. In replies to Ms Mellor’s questions the maternal grandmother said:
Ms Mellor: You have heard a lot of evidence this week and been given sight of documents. I appreciate it has been little time for you to read it. But what were your thoughts about Dr Mayer’s report?
The maternal grandmother: Although I knew my daughter had mental issues, I did not look at it as schizophrenia. Him being a professional, I appreciated that.
Ms Mellor: You can have other medical conditions and psychosis, what do you mean by that?
The maternal grandmother: Hearing voices, people talking to her, but at no point did I connect that to schizophrenia. I was not sure, as there are some patients with psychosis but do not demonstrate schizophrenia. It helped me look at it from a different angle.
Ms Mellor: How?
The maternal grandmother: It’s much more serious. Schizophrenia probably takes longer to treat and needs more input from the patient for medication and other therapies. [emphasis added]
The maternal grandmother in fact worked as a support worker in mental health services for her first 7 years in this country. When pressed by Ms Moore about whether she thought the mother could ever care for J in the future she said this would be down to professional judgment not hers:
…. my wish is that my daughter gets better. Nobody can replace a mother. If the professionals reach a point in five or six or ten years that the mother is better, she will look after her child. But if that doesn’t happen, I will be here for her. [emphasis added]
The maternal grandmother told me she would do what is necessary to keep J safe and would call the police if the mother turned up her at her home unwell and disruptive. I should stress that the maternal grandmother gave this evidence in reply to Ms Moore’s questions in a calm and determined manner despite her daughter (the mother) being present in court and frequently and loudly vocalising her discontent at the line of questioning Ms Moore was pursuing.
A final example of the maternal grandmother’s focus on J was her unhappiness when J told her she had been punched in the stomach by another child at the foster carer. The maternal grandmother called X and informed her of this and asked her to ensure this did not happen again.
The father clearly has significant strengths to his parenting capacity. First and foremost I do not doubt that he loves J and he has taken steps to develop a bond with her and J too has affection for him. However, the reservations held by the Local Authority and the Children’s Guardian about him are not easily dispelled. Unlike the maternal grandmother, he has multiple other calls on his time and energy. Most obviously he needs to afford his other children contact and he currently supports them financially. The father did not really reflect on the impact on his other children of him suddenly giving up his work to be a primary carer for J. His financial support for them would end: this fact in itself is not a criticism, but the lack of reflection on the impact of this on his other children is. Sensing the loss to them he attempted to present a picture whereby he might work in the evenings. In my view, the father does not have a solid plan for J’s care. He has a variety of options but that absence of a solid plan is an indicator of a lack of serious thought about her future care. One example of this is when I asked him whether J would continue at her current school if she moved in with the father and his parents. The father said yes, but in my judgment it is not realistic that J would commute from his parents’ home in South London meaning she would change school and she would lose the emotional continuity of attendance at her current school. By contrast, if she were placed with the maternal grandmother, she would continue at the school as it is a bus ride away.
I do also find the decision to cut off contact a reflection of the father’s personal sense of grievance that the Local Authority would not support him. The father lacks a degree of emotional insight and maturity and did not consider how upsetting this would be for J. It was an example of him focussing more on his own feelings and that happened again when I raised with him how he would react to the Court deciding against him. He became exasperated and told me it seemed “discriminatory”. But I do acknowledge the father’s many strengths disclosed by the evidence. As Mr Matthews set out in his closing submissions these include:-
Positive interactions during contact and wanting a long term relationship with J
Openness, honesty.
Motivation.
The father being warm, calm and patient.
Responsive and attentive.
The mother shares a firm bond with J just like the maternal grandmother and the father, but there are question marks about her ability to deliver stable and secure care for J which meets her emotional needs. These reservations flow from her mental health issues which are not resolved and may take some time to resolve. The timing of the mother’s “wellness journey” is unknown and this is not a case where the timings for J allow anyone to wait to see the outcome; a decision really needs to be made sooner. The father and the maternal grandmother made clear they would welcome engaging in any family therapy and with LAC CAMHS services. They would also undergo trauma informed parenting training (which the Children’s Guardian told me lasts about 6 days). I have no doubt that they will need support services, but this not evidence of any incapacity to parent J.
Set against placement with J’s family, I accept a trained foster carer with trauma informed parenting skills would be likely to give J a high level of care. But there would be an initial phase of extreme disruption for J leading to a regression in her behaviours as she enters a stranger's care. There would be uncertainty whether even a trauma informed carer would be able to deal with J’s inevitable destabilisation and might choose to terminate the placement. One thing I am sure of is that J’s family would not consider giving up on her as an option.
J’s wishes and feelings
J is absolutely clear that she wants to live with her grandmother and is excited about the prospect. The Local Authority have tried to criticise the maternal grandmother for her suggesting this possibility to J but she was placed in a very difficult position when considering how to respond to J’s frequent questions about her future care. J’s bond with the maternal grandmother is extremely strong and enduring. A marker of it is J’s wish to sleep in the maternal grandmother’s bed despite having a bedroom of her own. The maternal grandmother has had regular overnight time with J including 6 nights when X went on holiday. The maternal grandmother understands she needs to push back against this request as it is important J develops the resilience to sleep in her own bed, but the request to sleep in her grandmother’s bed is reflective of the deep sense of love, security and safety J feels with her grandmother.
G: CONCLUSION
In my judgment the detriments involved in the Local Authority’s plan far outweigh the many benefits that a placement with J’s family would have. The Local Authority’s plan involves the dismantling of an existing attachment scaffold (to use J’s doctor’s terminology) and risky reconstruction at an unknown point in the future. By contrast family placement would maintain all three familial relationship and offer J the continued presence of two parents and one devoted grandmother. But J must be safe and secure in a family placement. I cannot conclude that the mother’s care could offer her this. This leaves a decision to be made between the maternal grandmother and the father. In the end I have formed the clear view that J’s best interest would be served by her being placed with the maternal grandmother rather than the father:
The maternal grandmother has a strong and powerful bond with J.
The maternal grandmother has prior parenting skills having brought up 4 children earlier in life.
There are no medical issues which contra-indicate the maternal grandmother being a suitable foster parent.
The maternal grandmother has secure accommodation.
The maternal grandmother is utterly committed to J on practical level (e.g. going out of her way each Saturday to cross London to take J to her Saturday theatre school – something she told me she would continue because it was so important).
But, most importantly, the maternal grandmother is well aware of the harm J has suffered whilst in the mother’s care (however much that harm was not the “fault” of the mother). The maternal grandmother can, in my judgment, put J first. She has a track record of doing this, which the assessors in this case have overlooked, by engaging with professionals like social services over an extended period of time. She clearly can and will stand up to anyone including the mother (if the occasion demands it) to protect J.
By contrast I was not persuaded by the father that the reservations expressed above by both assessors and by me in the judgment are not valid and, despite his many strengths, I am unable to elevate him above the maternal grandmother. I make clear to the father there may come a time in the future where he is called upon to “step up” for J as a primary carer. It is vital he remain in her life and contact should develop to overnight stays so that the attachment between him J can be reinforced and broadened. I hope he can cope with his disappointment at this decision for J’s sake.
A further benefit of J being placed with the maternal grandmother is that it facilitates an ongoing relationship with the mother (provided it is safe) and the father. I do not currently propose that contact be defined by an order but I indicate that any revised care plan should contemplate:
The mother having supervised contact with J.
The father having increased contact to a stage where J has overnight contact with him every other weekend. The many strengths identified by the assessors amply justify this level of contact.
H: NEXT STEPS
My core welfare decision above should be combined with my agreement with the Children’s Guardian that the optimum legal framework in this case would be for a final care order to be made with a plan for J to be placed in a long term connected persons foster care placement with the maternal grandmother. At the direction of HHJ Oliver, the Local Authority have produced a “hypothetical” care plan based on J being placed in such a foster placement with the maternal grandmother under a care order. That plan sets out the following support for the maternal grandmother:-
Financial support of £462 pw
The on-going support of the LAC Team and supervising social worker;
6 weekly visits by J’s social worker.
6 monthly LAC reviews (to which the maternal grandmother could attend and support be re-assessed).
Access to fostering support groups and LAC CAMHS to assist with sourcing trauma training. Develop the maternal grandmother’s insight into trauma informed parenting.
The Local Authority to supervise contacts with the mother.
My welfare decision does present a quandary. I have no jurisdiction to change the Local Authority’s care plan nor can I order the independent fostering panel to approve the maternal grandmother as a foster carer. In Re T (A child)(Placement Order) [2018] EWCA Civ 650, Lord Justice Peter Jackson considered the position where there was a conflict between the Court’s welfare assessment and a local authority’s negative stance on a kinship foster carer:
…… it is not open to a local authority within proceedings to decline to accept the court’s evaluation of risk [81] and that a local authority cannot refuse to provide lawful and reasonable services that would be necessary to support the court’s decision [83]. I would agree with these propositions to the extent that the court’s assessment of risk is sovereign within proceedings and that a local authority cannot refuse to provide a service if by doing so it would unlawfully breach the rights of the family concerned or if its decision-making process is unlawful on public law grounds. However, the family court cannot dictate to the local authority what its care plan is to be, any more than it can dictate to any other party what their case should be. What the court can, however, expect from a local authority is a high level of respect for its assessments of risk and welfare, leading in almost every case to those assessments being put into effect.
In that decision reference is made to statutory guidance on Family and Friends Care issued by the Department of Education in 2011. I note in October 2024 the Department of Education issued Kinship Care: Statutory Guidance for local authorities. This states at page 24:
Standard 30 of the NMS clarifies that when a foster carer is being assessed for approval for a specific child or children only, there is no need to consider their suitability to care for other children. In considering whether a relative, friend or other connected person should be approved as a foster carer, account must be taken of the needs, wishes and feelings of the child and the capacity of the carer to meet those particular needs. In order for the placement to be in the child’s best interests, the carer will need to have the capacity to meet their needs for the duration of the proposed placement, whether this is short or long term. The assessment should take into account the likely length of the placement, the age of the child and, if appropriate (as may be the case where the carers are older), the capacity of the wider family to contribute to the child’s long term care. [emphasis added].
………
When making decisions about kinship foster carers, the fostering panel should not make negative recommendations solely based on prospective kinship foster carers not meeting the NMS for fostering during the assessment. As outlined in MBC & Ors [2018] EWFC 4214 , the deciding question should be: ‘Is the proposed placement in the child’s welfare interests?’ If the placement aligns with the child’s best interests, then the prospectivekinship foster carer should still be considered for approval to foster the child, and then they should be supported by the fostering service to attain the standards.
Kinship foster carers will usually bring with them knowledge and experience of the child they are to foster, and in many cases they will have already been providing the child with a home prior to the child becoming looked after. Whether or not the prospective foster carers have direct prior knowledge of the child to be placed, the assessment should focus on the experience and strengths that they bring and the support that they will need to enable them to provide safe care for the specific looked after child. The assessment will need to balance the strengths of the carers due to their position within the family network against any aspects which may make them less suitable. The needs of the child should be kept central to the process, as the assessment will also be a matching process of the child to the carer.
A different approach may be needed to assessing kinship foster carers compared to other foster carer applications. The format used by a local authority for presenting assessment reports to the fostering panel may not be appropriate for kinship assessments if it does not allow for a focus on how the carers will meet the specific needs of the child concerned.
In this case, the maternal grandmother has not been presented to an independent fostering panel yet. I am confident the Local Authority will respect and acknowledge my welfare decision and endorse the maternal grandmother’s presentation to the panel. Ms Moore in her written closing submission served a day late (and after the other parties had served their submission) incorporated an email from another member of the Local Authority’s staff (Steve Pearson, interim head of Service, Fostering and Permanence), stating the vulnerabilities outweigh the strengths in the assessments and the Court cannot influence the panel. In my judgment while the Court has no jurisdiction to direct the panel to take a decision, the panel (and the Local Authority) can and should take full account of this judgment including the conclusion that the two negative assessments of the maternal grandmother were flawed. In this sense Mr Pearson is wrong: the judgment of the Court can and should influence (in the sense of being taken fully into account) the panel and the Local Authority’s decision maker. It is important that the Local Authority’s staff understand this and I shall direct copies of both the judgment in Re T and the 2024 statutory guidance be sent to Mr Pearson for his future information.
I consider an outcome whereby J is placed with the maternal grandmother in a connected person foster placement is a necessary and proportionate interference with her right to family life and the equivalent rights of her parents (Footnote: 1). It will allow contact to continue (a) between the mother and J (on a supervised basis) and (b) between the father and J. As to the frequency of the contact given the bond the father has with J and the positive attributes he has I do not see why that contact cannot be unsupervised and extend to overnight contact for 1-2 nights on alternate weekends. That will allow J to further develop her attachment to her father and her half-siblings with her father. As to the frequency of contact between J and the mother, I will hear further representations from the Local Authority about that in the light of their corporate parental responsibility and their provision of supervision.
A final order cannot, at this stage, be made because I do not endorse the Local Authority’s care plan. I will hear submissions about the next steps so that this court can hopefully be in a position to make final orders speedily giving effect to the welfare analysis above. I would very much hope any further processes such as assessments can be accelerated in the light of the terms of this judgment.
I give permission to the Children’s Guardian to disclose and discuss this judgment circulated in draft to the maternal grandmother.
That concludes my judgment.
I: POSTSCRIPT DATED 10 FEBRUARY 2026
After the judgment above was handed down on 20 November 2025, the Local Authority undertook a further abbreviated assessment of the maternal grandmother having regard to the terms of the judgment. The maternal grandmother was then presented to the independent fostering panel for approval as a connected person foster carer with the support of the Local Authority.
On 18 December 2025, the fostering panel met and decided to formally approve the maternal grandmother as a connected person foster carer for J. The next day the Local Authority’s Agency Decision Maker concurred with the fostering panel’s recommendation.
On 13 January 2026, the Local Authority filed an revised care plan for J based on her living with the maternal grandmother.
On 10 February 2026, after a further brief oral hearing, I made a final care order on the basis of the revised care plan. By the time this judgment is published J will be living full time with the maternal grandmother.
Recorder Sirikanda