Local Authority A v N & Ors

Introductory

These are care proceedings in relation to two children, a young woman C, who was born on [date stated] and is now aged fourteen years and D, a girl, who was born on [a date stated] and is now aged six years. C is currently under a full care order to Local Authority B and is cared for in a small residential unit. D is in the interim care of Local Authority A and is cared for in a foster placement where she has lived since December 2012. The parents of the two children are [name stated] whom for convenience I will call ‘the mother,’ and [name stated] whom for convenience I will call ‘the father.’ The other two parties in the case are the girls’ maternal grandparents whom for convenience I will call ‘the grandmother’ and ‘the grandfather’. Both children are represented by their Children’s Guardian, [named] who has been C’s Guardian since October 2014 and D’s Guardian since February 2012.

As regards C, the issues are as follows:

As regards D the issue is as follows. Local Authority A seek a Care Order on a Care Plan for permanency by way of adoption. They also seek a placement order. Both such orders are strongly opposed by the parents and grandparents. They wish for D to be returned to the parents’ care. If that is not possible, then the grandparents would wish to care for D themselves. Indeed they wish to look after C as well if the parents are found unable to do so.

Local Authority A has been represented by Miss Thomas; Local Authority B by Miss Stanistreet; the mother by Mr. Hurst; the father by Mr. Godfrey; and the Children’s Guardian by Mr. Comaish. The grandparents have both participated as litigants in person. I am grateful to all counsel for the calm and properly cooperative way in which they have conducted a case underlying which there are understandably very high emotions.

I have read a very substantial quantity of documentation and heard oral evidence from the following witnesses:

It goes without saying that the children’s respective welfare is the court’s paramount consideration and that the rights to respect for family life of all the family members involved, parents, grandparents and each child respectively, must be respected. Any interference with those rights or any of them must be for reasons recognised as valid under the Convention jurisprudence and in particular must be the least restrictive as possible and be proportionate.

Before leaving the introduction I wish to add that this is a particularly sad case in an area of family law where sad cases abound. It is sad because it combines (a) assertions of serious mental ill-health (in respect of the father) with (b) assertions that his allegedly distorted ideas have been absorbed and replicated by the mother and the grandparents; together with (c) the fact that the love and affection of the parents and grandparents for both children is undoubted and (d) that when in the care of the family, the children were happy and well looked after. These dynamics are compounded by the fact (e) that C’s period of time in care since 2008 has not in the event been one of stability or consistency and (f) by the fact that, for whatever complex reasons, she is now a very troubled teenager indeed. It is also the fact (g) that this hearing is itself a rehearing of the care and placement proceedings in respect of D. Care and placement orders in respect of her were made as long ago as December 2012. There was then a long delayed appeal to the Court of Appeal, which eventually allowed the father’s appeal in October 2014 remitting the case for this rehearing. D’s life has therefore been on hold for a very long time. She is living in a foster placement which does not offer her a permanent home. It has been uncertain whether she may be returned to her parents, or to her mother and grandparents, or to her grandparents, or go for long-term fostering, or go for adoption.

I have therefore devoted particular care and attention to the case, having spent very many days on it out of court as well as the time spent in court. I have read, reread and in some cases read again all the documents in the court bundles. I hope I have been indulgent to all family members in giving them time to say everything they could reasonably wish to say. I want them to know I have listened to them with the greatest sympathy. I am of the clear view that Mr. Hurst and Mr. Godfrey have said everything that could be said on behalf of their respective clients to achieve the outcomes for which they profoundly wish; and the same goes for the grandparents, who have represented themselves.

The information in this case is voluminous, going back not only to the birth of C in 2000, but further back into the lives of the mother, the father and even the grandparents. Much ground has been covered during this hearing, although Counsel have been successful in containing it within reasonable proportions. There is no way I can cover all the issues which have emerged on paper and in the oral evidence and submissions. That does not mean that I have overlooked them or failed to take them into account. I shall deal with and rule only on those issues which seem to me to be reasonably necessary in coming to the conclusions which I have reached. Obviously I look at each child separately, but it is equally obvious that considerations relating to C and her life may inform the decision about D and vica versa.

I reiterate not only that the family deeply love both children, but also that their practical care for them was good. There is no reason to doubt that the children returned the family’s love for them. When they were living with the mother and father (and subsequently in D’s case with the mother and grandparents) they were well cared for, clean and tidy. The home circumstances were good. Immunisations were up-to-date. Health visitor appointments were kept and D never missed her nursery even when it involved a long journey following the mother and D’s move to the grandparents in March 2012. There were toys around the place. The grandmother told me, and I accept, that there were lots of outings to the seaside, to nature parks and so on. D was to the grandfather’s mind ‘good as gold.’ These are all true positives about life within the family.

Last in this introductory segment I warn that I shall have to say some painful things, as it is my duty to do so. Although the family cannot or will not or may not recognise so, it is in their interests and in the interests of the children that these things are said, however much I would prefer not to have to do so. Why is it in the interests of the adult family members that this Judgment should be blunt? The answer is because the family would still have something of benefit to offer both children whatever were the outcome. It matters to all children to know that their family members are alright and are thinking of them, even where circumstances do not enable the family to be together. Why is it in the children’s interests in cases like this that the Judgment should be blunt? This is because it is right that when they are older they should be able to read and know why, if this is to be the outcome, they were not able to be brought up by a loving family. It is right that they should have direct access to the court’s reasons as distinct from receiving the perhaps quite different views and perceptions of the family.

In 1984 the mother and father began their relationship, which has endured to this day. The mother was then about nineteen and the father about forty. On [date] C was born. She is now therefore fourteen years old. From later that year there was child protection involvement by a number of local authorities according to where the family was living, notably [three towns stated] and in the area of Local Authority B. There are before me three chronologies starting in 2000, some aspects of which have been investigated, but I fully accept most aspects have not, for good reasons of time and proportionality. Between mid-November 2006 and early December 2007 the father was ‘sectioned’ under the Mental Health Act. At the end of that period he was discharged by a Mental Health Tribunal. The consultant psychiatrist reporting to that hearing gave her opinion that the father had had a paranoid psychotic illness, but the tribunal ruled that it was not such as to warrant his compulsory hospitalisation. The father has consistently denied that there was any justification for this ‘sectioning.’ He says it was a ‘set-up’ and describes himself as having been ‘abducted.’

Amongst a large number of professional concerns at about that time there is a recording on 19^th February 2007 that the parents ‘simply cannot see how they could be at fault,’ and on 7^th March 2007 that all the father’s ‘... suspicions were back with virtually no insight.’ On 2^nd April 2007 he and the mother did not agree with the concerns of the Local Authority about their parenting and described them as ‘fabricated.’ The view of the then social worker was that it was impossible to move forward as the parents did not accept any need for support. At a core group meeting on 18^th June 2007 the father is recorded as having refused to sign a consent to proceed with SEN and educational psychological assessments of C.

On 23^rd November 2007 in care proceedings brought by Local Authority B in the [town stated] County Court Her Honour Judge P QC made a full care order in respect of C on a care plan of her living with the parents at home. That is the order which the parents now apply to discharge. The parents were represented, but they did not attend court. The father told me in evidence that they had instead taken C to see Father Christmas and to give her a Christmas dinner, because they expected that she would be removed from them after the hearing. He said that if they had known the plan for C was to remain at home with them, then they would have attended the hearing. This strikes me as very odd reasoning, but be that as it may. The Judge decided to proceed in their absence since they had had ‘considerable notice of today’s final hearing’ and had not provided their lawyers with any reason for their absence. Unfortunately, no transcript has been found of her Judgment. It is clear though that she found the threshold for intervention satisfied on the basis of a Threshold Statement (cross-referenced to the pages of supporting evidence in the then court bundles), which she herself signed [192(a) and (b) of the orders’ bundle]. It was to the effect that C had suffered significant harm whilst in the parents’ care ‘... in respect of the impairment of her emotional, social, behavioural and educational development.’ In addition the judge was satisfied that C would be likely to suffer further significant harm if a care order were not made. Her, C’s, educational development was stated in the threshold document and thus established by Judge P’s finding as being ‘significantly delayed’ following poor school attendance. C’s ‘behavioural, social and emotional development’ was found to have been ‘adversely affected.’ It was further found, as per the threshold document, that the parents had been ‘unwilling to acknowledge the concerns in relation to C, or to cooperate with the relevant agencies,’ and that this had impacted on C’s welfare.

A subsequent Judgment of Her Honour Judge P QC dated 7th April 2009 (to which I will shortly come) makes findings as to what happened immediately after that care order was made. She records that the parents refused to sign a written agreement drawn up by the Local Authority to ensure their cooperation and she notes a visit by the social worker and an Educational Welfare Officer on 13^th December 2007 (three weeks after the hearing in November) when access to the family home was refused. Her finding was that ‘... it is plain that the parents had no regard at all for the intervention by the Local Authority, which was then sanctioned by the court.’ In the early part of 2008 Local Authority concerns increased when the parents were invited to a number of meetings but failed to attend. On one occasion in April 2008 it is stated in the Chronology – and I accept that this was not investigated in the evidence – that two social workers attempted a home visit, but were turned away by the father. In any event the judgment to which I have just made reference made a finding that following the order of 23^rd November 2007 ‘... there was a history, regrettably, of non-cooperation ...’. Consequently, on 22^nd May 2008 Local Authority B sought and obtained a recovery order which required C, then aged seven, to be removed from the parents’ care and placed into the care of Local Authority B under the care order dated 23^rd November 2007. She has not lived with her parents since.

On 7^th April 2009 Her Honour Judge P QC heard and dismissed an application by the parents that the care order relating to C be discharged. Her Judgment is the one I have cited from above. It is at page 193(a) of the orders’ bundle before me and needs to be read in full for the court’s detailed reasoning.

On [date stated] 2009 D was born. A couple of days later under police powers of protection she went to be cared for by foster carers. This was because the father was saying he would not allow social workers in to see her. On [date stated], clearly following discussions, Local Authority B obtained an interim supervision order and D, a few days old, was returned to the mother and the father with an agreement of expectations [page 75]. On 25^th February 2011 at the final hearing of Local Authority B’s supervision order application relating to D, a supervision order for twelve months was made with a contract of expectations [114].

In June 2011 the family moved from the area of Local Authority B to the area of Local Authority A. On 28^th February 2012 the supervision order was extended for a further twelve months with another contract of expectations [196 in the orders’ bundle]. That contract was, among other things, for the parents (a) to engage in the process and attend all meetings held (two meetings to discuss the parents’ contact to C, having been failed by the parents in November 2011); (b) to allow D to be further assessed by an independent paediatrician and a geneticist; (c) to allow the health visitor to observe D at her nursery; and (d) to attend appointments with an agreed independent psychiatrist and possibly psychologist if so ordered by the court.

Although everything looked set fair for parental cooperation, this was not to be and Local Authority A returned the case to court on 20^th March 2012. On that day the supervision order was continued for a further period on the basis of an agreement reached at court that the mother would move with D from the family home and go to live at the maternal grandparents’ home. A residence order was made in her favour. That was the last time that D has lived with the father. Since then both parents have asserted that this arrangement reached at court was forced on them. The father told social worker Kerry Chafer that his lawyer had purposely made him late with the result that the decision had already been made before his arrival.

On 15^th June 2012 Local Authority A (by now the designated local authority regarding D) obtained an interim care order. This was on the basis that the mother and D would continue to live at the home of the grandparents whilst further evidence was prepared in respect of Local Authority A’s application for a final care order relating to D. The mother did not oppose this interim application. The purpose of it was to enable the Local Authority to put in hand SEN funding for D so that she could have ‘one to one’ attention at her nursery, which the parents were refusing to agree. By sharing parental responsibility under an interim care order, the Local Authority could and did organise this.

On 29^th June 2012 court appointed psychologist Dr. McGeown, who had met and examined the parents, recommended a full, up-to-date psychiatric assessment of them both. Neither parent has however been willing to undergo such an assessment.

On 21^st August 2012 the mother rang 999 following some disagreement with the grandmother. The police were not best pleased. It led to an application by Local Authority A for an interim order that the grandparents should care for D on their own. However, on 14^th September 2012 Mrs. Recorder Q refused that application.

On 13^th December 2012 His Honour Judge R, sitting in [town stated], heard Local Authority A’s application for a final care order and a placement order relating to D. He found the threshold for state interference to be met, made various findings of fact and made a care and placement order. D was removed from school that day and placed with foster carers, causing the family understandable distress which still pertains. She still remains with the same foster carers. The father immediately applied to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal, but there was a very considerable delay. The application first came before Black LJ on 7^th November 2013, but she had, I think, been deluged with information by the father (as I get the impression) in a convoluted and difficult to follow form. She was anyway without a transcript of the Judgment of Judge R.

In the result the matter had to be put off and was further listed before Black LJ on 24^th February 2014. It was then directed that it be heard by a three-judge court with a time estimate of one day and it came on for hearing on 9^th July 2014. On that occasion the father for some unexplained reason did not attend, nor was represented. However, he was granted permission to appeal on the single ground that the Judgment of Judge R was arguably deficient as to reasons. Permission was refused on all his other grounds.

Meanwhile, a little earlier than this, on 31^st March 2014, contact between the parents and C was reinstated after a very long break. It ran until 4^th September 2014 when, for reasons I will come to, it was stopped again. On 7^th October 2014 Her Honour Judge S at [town stated] made an order, amongst other things, permitting the Local Authority to suspend contact between C and her parents until further order.

On 9^th October 2014 the Court of Appeal allowed the father’s appeal against the order of Judge R regarding D dated 13^th December 2012 on the basis of a deficiency of reasons for the decision. The care and placement orders relating to her were thus set aside. An interim care order was made in respect of D until the conclusion of the proceedings, which were remitted for hearing by a High Court Judge, myself as it has turned out. It was recorded by the Court of Appeal that the father, who appeared in person, was not willing to comply with any psychiatric or psychological evaluation and that the mother was not willing to engage in any updated psychological evaluation. It can be seen between paragraphs 37 and 39 of the Judgment of McFarlane LJ on 9^th October 2014 that he tried very hard to persuade them to change their minds.

On 15^th October 2014 the remitted care proceedings regarding D came before Moylan J. As the father then again declined the opportunity to be involved in an assessment by a psychiatrist, the court directed (in the face of his opposition) that the parties have leave jointly to instruct an expert psychiatrist to conduct a paper overview of his mental health history. That had been suggested as a possibility by McFarlane LJ in the Court of Appeal. The father was refused permission to appeal that direction. I am told he has since applied to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal it.

On 27^th January 2015 the case came before me, being my first sight of it. Various case management directions were made to ensure that this hearing would be effective. I again impressed on the father the desirability of his changing his mind and being prepared to engage in a psychiatric assessment. He has not however agreed to do so.

When the case came on before me at this hearing on 17^th March 2015 Mr. Godfrey made two applications on the father’s instructions. First, he applied that the paper report of Professor Mortimer, consultant psychiatrist, should be removed from the bundle and that she should not give evidence. It was submitted that she was either biased or corrupt and was party to an unfair conspiracy against the father; further, that the father had a pending appeal against the order giving leave for her to be instructed. Second, Mr. Godfrey applied for an adjournment of this hearing in order that C could have separate representation, i.e. separate from the Children’s Guardian. I rejected both those applications, giving a short, extempore Judgment on 18^th March 2015, which needs to be read alongside this one. In short, I could see no objection to Professor Mortimer’s report, which Moylan J had regarded as ‘necessary’ for the resolution of the issues before me. I took the view that it was the responsibility of anyone wishing to go to the Court of Appeal about an interlocutory (i.e. case management type) decision, such as that of Moylan J, to ensure that it was heard there before the final hearing came on. That had not happened.

I have called for any documents that the father may have about this appeal. He has produced a letter to the Court of Appeal office, but without, I think, its annexes. Certainly without them it is quite impossible to see what the father was seeking and it did not standing alone constitute a Notice of Application for Permission to Appeal. I cannot say what happened to it in the Court of Appeal office, but no evidence has been produced to show that it was followed up.

As regards separate representation for C, this was strongly opposed by Local Authority B and the Children’s Guardian on the basis that they did not consider C has sufficient understanding to instruct her own lawyer. On what I had read at that time that seemed very likely. In any event an adjournment of this hearing would have meant that the children’s lives (or at least C’s) would have continued to be on hold until a further lengthy period of High Court Judge time could be identified. I therefore rejected the second of Mr. Godfrey’s submissions.

I am fortified in that particular decision by everything I have heard during this hearing about C. In particular I have now heard the views of the experienced Children’s Guardian, about C’s level of understanding. The Children's Guardian told me that she and C’s solicitor had considered separate representation for C earlier on and had wholly rejected it. She says she is in no doubt at all that C would not have the necessary understanding to give instructions to a lawyer, that being a view which she said is shared by the manager of the home where C is placed. The Children's Guardian considers it would absolutely not be in C’s welfare interests to be asked about or given the opportunity for separate representation, since it would destabilise and make her even more anxious.

For completeness Mr. Godfrey was also later instructed to make a further application supported, as I understand it, by the other family members. It was that I should rule out the evidence of two female social workers on the basis that they are pregnant. The submission was that the hormonal changes of pregnancy lead to mood changes and an absence of sound judgment such that the two witnesses should not be heard. I rejected those applications. Women work routinely during pregnancy in every walk of life.

The father was born on [date stated] 1944 and is therefore aged seventy. He describes himself as a musician and entertainer and internet innovator. He has worked in the carpentry trade and in other things. He is not presently in work, but hopes to get back to work when, if the outcome of these proceedings is as he would like, the children have returned to the care of the mother and himself and have settled down. He hopes there may be an opening for him in the press and media. He was married and divorced before starting his relationship with the mother in 1984 and he has a son, U, from that marriage, who is in his forties. U has stated that he would not wish to care for either of the two children, his half-siblings, and has never met them. He plays no part in the proceedings.

As I have said, the case of both Local Authority B and Local Authority A is that the father is quite seriously mentally ill, although, if so, it is not immediately obvious. He robustly denies this and always has done throughout all the papers I have seen, notwithstanding consistent evidence supporting the local authorities’ case.

I have already mentioned Professor Ann Mortimer, who has prepared a report on the father as a paper exercise, as he declined to be psychiatrically examined for the purpose of this hearing. She is from her CV a very experienced psychiatrist, having been involved in the work since 1982, having become a consultant in 1988 and a Professor of psychiatry in 1995. I accept her evidence that she has had no prior involvement with this family, there being no evidence or suggestion that she has had. Her report runs to thirty closely typed pages and presents a complete overview. Most particularly she summarises two previous psychiatric reports which are not in the papers and one psychological report which is. She records that on 15^th October 2007 Dr. Mumford, consultant psychiatrist, made a thirty-nine-page report on the father following six hours of interviews. Dr. Mumford had at that time reviewed all the case papers then in existence regarding C. He alluded to the parents having refused a special educational needs’ assessment for C on the basis that it was a ploy to put her into care; and to the fact that the father had described a core group meeting as illegal and had referred to a head teacher using C to acquire money for his or her school. Professor Mortimer records Dr. Mumford as having found that the father felt everyone was conspiring against him to protect the system, the police, local authority and teachers. He, Dr. Mumford, recorded the father’s views as being ‘abnormally paranoid.’ Dr. Mumford’s report under discussion also contained an overview of the father’s GP records, which included periods of depression and the use of antipsychotic medication.

A letter sent by the father to a general practitioner in [town stated] in August 2006, which had apparently eventually led to the father’s being ‘sectioned’ in November 2006 (as above) was referred to in Dr. Mumford’s report as recorded by Professor Mortimer. The father’s letter to the GP alleged that the GP was part of a conspiracy unlawfully to participate in secret family courts, racism and religionism against the father’s family, falsifying and manipulating documents and files to reveal secret third parties and participation in genocide against British families. The father’s letter went on to assert that the GP had forcibly taken various body samples, including ‘female part samples backdated to 2005.’ The psychiatrist involved in the father’s ‘sectioning’ in 2006 was recorded by Dr. Mumford as being ‘staggered’ to find that the father had been released by the Mental Health Tribunal (paragraph 12 above).

Professor Mortimer records in her report Dr. Mumford’s opinion that the father had suffered from paranoid ideas going back to 1984 with the paranoia escalating since C started school. Dr. Mumford spoke of a paranoid personality disorder and felt it extremely unlikely that the father would voluntarily comply with any form of assessment, therapy or treatment.

Professor Mortimer then summarises a report on the father by Dr. John Pilgrim, ‘an extremely experienced consultant psychiatrist,’ dated 13^th November 2009 prepared for the court. Following interview, Dr. Pilgrim made a diagnosis of a paranoid personality disorder, considering that the father fulfilled the personality trait of suspiciousness with a pervasive tendency to distort experience by misconstruing neutral or friendly actions as being hostile. He, Dr. Pilgrim, felt that the father had a combative and tenacious sense of personal rights with a tendency to experience excessive self-importance and that he was preoccupied with unsubstantiated conspiratorial explanations of events.

Last, Professor Mortimer summarises the report of Dr. Emily McGeown, psychologist, dated 29^th June 2012, which I have read and have already referred to at paragraph 21 above. It is a report on both the mother and the father. The father at first asserted that Dr. McGeown would be acting illegally in assessing him, but to his credit he did attend the interview. Dr. McGeown’s view was that there were risks to a child of being exposed to the father’s paranoid ideation, to his distrust of professionals and his assumption of malicious intent. The risks would be such that a child would assimilate such views. Dr. McGeown points out that the father is dismissive of his psychiatric history, which is in fact lengthy. She recommended a full psychiatric assessment of both parents.

Professor Mortimer’s own opinion is that the father is suffering from untreated paranoid schizophrenia. There is thus a difference in diagnosis between the psychiatrists, but not of significance in the terms of the issue in these proceedings. In her opinion the father’s false beliefs preclude him from accepting the reality-based perspectives of childcare professionals or health and educational professionals in respect of D’s needs. She does not think that any treatment is possible and she views his capacity to engage in such treatments as there are as being zero.

As I have said, Professor Mortimer gave oral evidence at this hearing. She denied the father’s case properly put to her by Mr. Godfrey on his instructions that she had been dishonest or untruthful, or had reached her decision first and then adapted her report accordingly. She refuted the suggestion that she had come to preparing her report with ‘malicious intent’ as was put to her.

At the outset of this hearing Mr. Godfrey relayed to me the father’s strong objection to the court’s attitude to his, the father’s, evidence. It was suggested that the court’s (my) attitude was biased because there were numerous documents (I was told about a thousand pages in three Lever Arch files) and five DVDs which I had not seen. I had in fact simply received and pre-read the agreed bundles which had been placed before me. I immediately said in response to Mr. Godfrey’s submission that I was more than willing to read the three bundles which the father was anxious for me to do and to watch the DVDs. Anyone with a due and proper interest in this case should read the three bundles. It is a long and daunting task. This is due in no small measure to the singular and complicating way in which the father expresses himself in numbered paragraphs using numbers for people or organisations; also because, as I said during the hearing, many of the originally attached documents to which cross-references are made by the father are no longer attached. However, I did succeed in reading the three bundles by setting aside the whole of the first weekend of this case to do so. They have been called ‘Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3’.

It was very clear to me that no summary in a paragraph or two could begin to put over the singular and out of the ordinary content of the father’s correspondence, nor the extent and diversity of the recipients of his emails. I have therefore prepared an Appendix as best I can (not an easy exercise) drawing inferences when the numbering system used by the father (in place of people or entities or events) seems to me to break down. I have included a sub-appendix of the people and organisations to whom he has sent complaints and so forth and one of newspaper articles which he has attached from time to time. These appendices should be read alongside this judgment. I shall not read them into this judgment now for lack of time, but I will give some examples later under my heading ‘Findings.’

I viewed the five DVDs in court, so that everyone could see them who had not done so. The first three showed normal, happy interactions between the children and family members. The other two showed speeches at the European Parliament. Just before submissions started on Monday (today is Thursday) Mr. Godfrey on further instructions from the father asked me to view a further thirteen DVDs. This I have done whilst preparing this judgment. I have marked them all with a Post-it note to show that I have looked at them. Again, like the many photograph albums which the mother has passed up to me, they show normal, happy interactions between the children and their family members.

Reverting for a moment to the European Parliament, the father has petitioned the European Parliament [Reference stated] about [an aspect of English children law]. A letter to him from the Committee on Petitions of the European Parliament dated [date stated] says [content stated]. The letter also refers to [text removed to impede identification of the father]. The letter to the father enclosed a letter dated [date stated] to the European Parliament from the UK Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Children and Families seeking to explain the position under English law. References to the father’s petition to the European Parliament make frequent appearances in his complaint letters in his Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3.

The two DVDs referred to in paragraph 45 above which the father asked me to watch and which I did watch in court were of speeches being made in the European Parliament by individuals criticising aspects of the English childcare system. One can see the link between the father’s asking me to view these speeches and his grievances about his own children, even though the blunt reality is that nothing was gained thereby which could not have been put over in a couple of sentences. It goes without saying that whatever may be the conclusion of the European Parliament when it has investigated the matters concerned (and when one imagines it has heard the competing arguments) I have to deal with D’s case on the basis of the current law in the 2002 Act and rule on Local Authority A’s valid applications before me.

As to the impression given by the father in the witness box, he was by and large very polite, courteous and respectful. His knowledge of the matters under discussion was remarkable. He put an end to any wonderings which I may have had about capacity to litigate. There was, however, on the face of it a significant disconnect between the witness before me and the author of some of the demanding and grandiose letters which he has written. It came over nevertheless that he is a strong and forceful character. He was unshakeable in his beliefs that the Local Authorities’ actions in respect of both of his children have been part of a conspiracy targeted on his family perpetrated by multiple lies and fabrications by many people. He dates everything back to an incident in [town stated] in or about 2005 when he fell out with the school attended by C and became what he regards as a whistleblower.

Under cross-examination by Mr. Comaish for the Children’s Guardian, when he was put under a measure of challenge, the father demonstrated an ability to become defensive and irritated, blocking or parrying questions in order to talk about what he wished to put across. Sometimes there was a clear, forceful statement, ‘That answers your question,’ clearly intended to impose finality. He declined to answer a question from Mr. Comaish as to whether the mother agreed with all the letters and complaints etc. in his Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3.

The father was unshakeable in his view that social worker Kerry Chafer had not been fit to work on this case. He describes her in his three correspondence files as ‘an obese dwarf.’ He made references in cross-examination to the fact that he had told her in 2012 that there were concerns about her obesity (which he says can lead to cancer and serious side effects) but that she remains obese in 2015. He told me that she has had two years to do something about this, but has not taken the opportunity and that therefore she is not fit to do the work she does. He was quite impervious to the unusual nature of such a point of view or to the feelings of Miss Chafer.

I deal with my view of the dynamics of the relationship between the mother and the father under the next heading and I deal with my conclusion about the issue of the father’s mental health under heading ‘I’ where I state my findings.

The mother was born on [date stated] 1965 and is therefore aged forty-nine. She is a housewife and mother, although from circumstances has not actually cared for C since 22^nd May 2008 when C was taken into care by Local Authority B. She has not actually cared for D since 13^th December 2012, when D was taken into care by Local Authority A pursuant to the (now overturned) care order of that date. She has lived with the father for thirty years or so since 1984, with the exception of the period of around nine months between March 2012 and December 2012 during which she and D lived with the grandparents. Both parents say that their relationship is a strong one and there is nothing to suggest otherwise. There is no doubt, as I have said, that the mother, like the father, greatly loves the two children and that she finds separation from them painful. She worries about them in care. She is convinced that they are being abused in care and, like the father, she dearly wants them home. She and he have established a nice two-bedroomed home in [town stated], which she keeps clean and tidy.

The mother says the same things as the father about the removal and retention of each child in care. She believes that this relates back to the argument in [town stated] in or around 2005 involving C’s school, in respect of which school the father ‘blew the whistle.’ Through Mr. Hurst, she allied herself with and adopted Mr. Godfrey’s questions to do with conspiracies, bias, malice, fabrications and ‘copycatting.’ She told Miss Thomas in cross-examination that there was nothing which the father had said in the witness box with which she disagreed. This extended to agreeing with the father’s belief that art therapy arranged to help C at the F Children’s Unit was a form of abuse of her (C). She told me that she thinks the father’s letters of complaint etc. in Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3 (although she has not read them all) help her case in respect of the children. She defended them by saying that they are not really complaints, but rather facts obtained from newspapers, the television and so on. She supported the father’s application that the two pregnant social workers should not be permitted to give evidence on the basis of possible hormonal imbalances.

Asked which were in her mind the two most serious fabrications by Kerry Chafer, the mother replied by saying that Kerry Chafer’s evidence was all complete fabrication and lies. Pressed, she identified (i) first Miss Chafer’s evidence that she, the mother, had said after the 999 call in paragraph 22 above that she (the mother) had ‘blackened her parents’ name’ (see further below) and (ii) second, Miss Chafer’s having ‘made her own medical diagnostics.’ The mother was there echoing the father’s terminology.

In the witness box the mother’s evidence was given so quietly as to be on occasions inaudible or almost so. At one point I was passed a note by the court clerk which reads, ‘Sir, the mother is speaking so quietly it is not picking it up to record.’ I rose for a few minutes therefore to enable the air conditioning / warm air heating in the courtroom to be turned off. I must and do make all allowances for the mother’s being nervous in the witness box and for the inevitable stress which she is under during these proceedings. However, she came over as hesitant and timid to an extent rarely seen. She just seemed to be lacking in confidence. Although she was adamant that she always stands up to the father and does what she herself wants to do, which she may believe, it was difficult to envisage that as being the reality of their relationship together. Having seen them both give evidence and noted their differing demeanour throughout, it came over strongly that the father greatly dominates within the dynamic of their relationship and that the mother by and large goes along with his views, beliefs and decisions.

In discussion with Rachel Payne, social worker for Local Authority A, during her assessment of the grandparents in 2014, she, Rachel Payne, recorded the grandfather stating that, ‘the father domineers the mother.’ She recorded the grandmother saying that this was because the mother is ‘placid and good natured.’ The grandfather denied saying anything about the father ‘domineering’ the mother. (There was no challenge about the grandmother speaking of the mother being ‘placid and good natured’); but Rachel Payne put both those alleged comments by the grandparents into quotation marks, so as to demonstrate that they were the actual words used. Having seen Miss Payne and heard her give evidence and be cross-examined, I do not find that she made those records up. I therefore accept that the grandparents did say those things to her, although they may genuinely believe now that they did not do so. Such assessments by them of their daughter in fact accord well with the impression given by the father and mother respectively in the witness box.

In her long psychological report on both parents dated 29^th June 2012 Dr. McGeown noted that the mother ‘... is likely to either share the father’s paranoid disposition or to be of a passive dependent nature’. It could of course be both. She, Dr. McGeown, said that in order for the mother to reduce any risk posed by the father towards D as regards the impact of his paranoid disposition on her (D) the mother ‘... needs to accept the paranoid nature of the father’s views and actively show that she does not agree with those views’. It was her opinion that the mother would ‘... benefit greatly from therapy, in particular cognitive behavioural therapy to help her with her assertiveness, confidence and her mistrust of professionals.’ None of this has happened.

Professor Mortimer’s view of the relationship between the mother and the father is that it represents a ‘folie à deux’, where the symptoms of a delusional belief or beliefs are transmitted from the original holder of those beliefs to another person.

The grandmother was born on [date stated] 1942 and is therefore aged almost seventy-three. She has mainly been a housewife and mother, although she also worked as a supervisor at a leisure centre. The grandfather was born on [date stated] 1939 and is therefore aged seventy-four. They have a nice home in [town stated] in the area of Local Authority B, which is about twenty-five to thirty miles or so from [town stated] where the mother and the father live. The grandparents have represented themselves at this hearing and have done themselves credit in the way in which they have firmly and clearly put their case across. They are, if I may say so, decent, well meaning, ‘salt of the earth’ people. As the grandfather said, they were not the sort of people ever to expect to be involved with the Social Services. They brought up their own three children successfully, as they stressed in their questions, and they cannot see at all why anyone should suggest that they could not therefore bring up their grandchildren. They made it clear by their questions, evidence and demeanour that they cannot see that the circumstances in respect of their grandchildren are entirely different. There was a palpable sense of bewilderment as to why either child was taken into care and as to why the children might not be able to be returned home to the parents, or else to themselves, to be brought up within their own loving family. They are aghast at the way C has turned out in care.

It is clear that whilst the grandparents had the mother and D staying with them between March 2012 and December 2012, they did their very best in difficult circumstances. They loved having D. They spoke with obvious affection for her and told me of all the things they used to do in the way of outings and so on. They remembered her fondly in her Minnie Mouse pyjamas and spoke sadly of the day when she was removed from school on 13^th December 2012, just at the time when her presents were under their Christmas tree.

Unfortunately, however, it is abundantly clear that the grandparents have absorbed most, if not all, of the thinking of the father and the mother about how the case has got where it is. They ally themselves with him about ‘fabrications’ and ‘copycatting’ to the extent of using the father’s very words. Asked for examples of the worst such ‘fabrications,’ there was nothing suggested of substance. They had unfortunately not read the father’s complaints’ communications in his Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3, nor Dr. Melia’s report about D, to which I will come. They accept that the grandmother told Rachel Payne that ‘autism does not exist.’ Asked whether they could see any reason why D should not be with the mother and the father, the grandfather said they could not, adding almost plaintively, ‘What have they done wrong?’

There are some issues between the grandparents and the Local Authority about how things went when the mother and D lived at the grandparents’ home between March 2012 and December 2012. Whilst agreeing wholeheartedly that D was well looked after and happy, Local Authority A say that in fact the grandmother was doing most of the mothering of her and that D was seen to go to the grandmother for reassurance (etc) to the extent that the mother was beginning to feel pushed out. Local Authority A say that the grandparents told Kerry Chafer that disagreements began and got worse, culminating in the mother’s 999 call on or about 21^st August 2012 (paragraph 22 above). The grandparents deny telling the social worker that. I deal with that issue at paragraph 126(k) below.

Jessica Southwell told me that on every visit she saw D go to the grandmother rather than to the mother and that the mother appeared to need support with all the routines in the home. Miss Southwell saw the mother as very lacking in confidence with D and as not picking up on D’s cues as to what D wanted or needed. She described the mother as coming over as more like an aunt or a sibling. The family do not accept this at all.

A further respect in which Local Authority A expressed concerns about the arrangement for the mother and D to live with the grandparents concerns the grandparents’ supervision of D. I mean as regards their supervising D when in the presence not only of the father (which was specified in a contract of expectations), but also when D was with the mother, their daughter. Kerry Chafer says that she told the grandparents on 22^nd August 2012 that D was not to be left with the mother alone. This was due to concerns about the mother’s emotional well-being following her 999 call to the police the previous day. Kerry Chafer says it was reiterated by Jessica Southwell on 4^th October 2012. The grandfather did not, as I understood it, deny in evidence that the social worker had said this to him, his comment being that there was ‘…nothing wrong with the mother being alone with D, as she loves the child.’ When it was put to him by Mr. Comaish that he and the mother had breached Local Authority A’s requirement by leaving D alone with the mother (for example to go for a doctor’s appointment and to attend a panel meeting about D), the grandfather said that if so then the agreement was ‘rubbish.’

In response to these concerns expressed by Local Authority A about how things had gone when D and the mother lived at the grandparents’ house, the grandfather told me that at an interim hearing on 14^th September 2012 Mrs. Recorder Q had preferred the family’s evidence to that of the social workers. I am quite sure he genuinely believed this and was not trying to mislead me, partly because he told me that he had not actually read the Judgment. When one does read the Judgment however, it can be seen that it in no way provides support for the grandfather’s case against the social workers; if anything the other way about. The hearing concerned (14^th September 2014) was for an order requiring the mother to move out of the grandparents’ house, leaving D with the grandparents. The Recorder heard oral evidence, including from the social worker (unnamed) who she said had ‘... given an account of the mother arguing, shouting and swearing and of D being present throughout and of needing to intervene to ensure that D was removed.’ The mother was recorded by the Recorder as seeing no basis for the requirement for her to live with D at her parents’ home and the grandparents as feeling the same. The finding of Mrs. Recorder Q was: ‘... I am satisfied from what I have heard that the grandparents and the mother are minimising and have minimised the extent of the difficulties in their relationship. They have alluded to disputes and little arguments. Those have undoubtedly occurred, but I think at times it is probable that the mother has expressed her views and feelings very strongly, because she does feel very strongly that she is losing her role in relation to D. She is angry with the way in which these proceedings have been brought and continue and has expressed that anger.’ The Recorder felt that Local Authority A might have become ‘overly anxious because of the backdrop and lengthy history of the case,’ and in the circumstances she did not think it necessary that the mother and D should be separated prior to the final hearing, which was then pending in December 2012.

I too am satisfied from all that I have heard that consciously or subconsciously the family have minimised the amount of difficulty and stress within the grandparents’ home whilst the mother and D lived there. The 999 call was an expression of this and I accept Kerry Chafer’s evidence that the grandparents told her that the mother had said afterwards that she had blackened their names by calling the police. I accept too Jessica Southwell’s clear impression as to the dynamics as between the mother and the grandmother in respect of D’s care and I am satisfied that the mother was feeling increasingly pushed out. This (as I find the grandparents told Kerry Chafer at the time) led to increasing arguments. I agree with Mrs. Recorder Q that Local Authority A may well have become overanxious about the strictness of supervision of (respectively) the mother and the father by the grandparents, which the family found put them under additional stress. They came to regard it as Local Authority A trying to ‘catch them out’.

There were a large number of social work visits, some thirty or so, in the nine months between March and December 2012, although such visits were not on a more or less daily basis as the grandparents suggested in evidence. There were also a couple of police visits. Local Authority A were concerned about things which the father might say to D if left alone with her (a) because of their concerns about his distorted ideas and (b) because of his objection to having to live apart from the mother and D. They felt, although they were wrong, that he might have been at the grandparents’ house outside permitted contract times. They were also concerned because the mother had threatened to take D and collect C and go off with them. The mother accepts she said that, but says she never really meant it. These concerns for D’s well-being caused Local Authority A to keep checking on the arrangements in the grandparents’ house, which, as I say, caused resentment and therefore a reduction in the quality of the relationship between the grandparents and the social worker. Most importantly for today’s purposes is the fact that the grandparents showed themselves to lack insight into why it was considered necessary for them closely to supervise the father’s contact with D and to ensure that the mother was not left alone with her either.

A timeline has been prepared by Local Authority B in respect of C’s various moves in their care since the recovery order dated 22^nd May 2008. She was placed in foster care to start with; but that broke down inside three weeks. Then, following a short placement with temporary foster carers, she was placed at the G Childcare Unit on 30^th June 2008. There she stayed until 27^th October 2009. During her time at the G Child Unit, there are reports of two disclosures by C of sexually inappropriate behaviour. The first was on 30^th October 2008 when she was playing ‘doctor and patient’ with another young person, who, she said, put a stethoscope ‘on her private parts.’ The second was when she told the staff on 9^th May 2009 that a young person had laid on top of her and kissed her on the lips whilst their lower halves were exposed. This has ‘morphed’ (and one can understand how and why) into a repetitive complaint by the father of sexual abuse of C in care.

There was before Her Honour Judge P QC in April 2009, when she dismissed the parents’ application for a discharge of the care order relating to C, a psychological report on C by psychologist Pam Tower, dated 28^th January 2009, with a supplemental letter dated 13^th March 2009. By that time C was at the G Child Unit and had been cared for by Local Authority B for about eight months. The mother and father had strongly objected to C’s being psychologically assessed, which had been requested by the then Children’s Guardian. They refused to be interviewed by Dr. Tower. She, Dr. Tower, therefore described her report as being incomplete for lack of any input from the parents about C’s development and early life experiences. What she did say though was that C presented (in January 2009): ‘... as a child who has not mixed with other children from an early age and, although she can learn the rules of simple games, she has not learned to share or play cooperatively. In effect she presents as a child who has not had the opportunity for developing reciprocal peer relationships. She is also a very anxious little girl who displays that anxiety through controlling behaviour and a need for routine. This pattern of behaviour often arises as a response to having few boundaries and in effect to being ‘in charge.’ This assessment of C provides some evidence that the pattern of her care she has received has been of the nature described above. The documentation includes many indications that the mother and father have parented C in this way and may have mental health difficulties themselves, which would reinforce the particular fixations or obsessions that C has.’

Dr. Tower referred to the mother and grandmother as being exceptionally important to C (still referring to January 2009) and said that C would be likely ‘... to automatically adopt their views of how the world works and reject the views of her carers if they are different.’ She continued that if C’s parents were not accepting any placement away from them, then C would struggle to settle and to trust her new carers sufficiently for them to be able to meet her needs. She spoke of C’s withdrawing into a fantasy world at times of stress and of her having a marked delay in her emotional development. She said ‘... most children of C’s age have developed a very clear investment in peer relationships and relate to peers in depth. C does not show signs of having an understanding of how to relate to peers. It is as if she is functioning at a level much younger than her chronological age in social terms.’ She regarded C as presenting as a ‘complex little girl with considerable emotional and social difficulties.’

Her Honour Judge P QC heard oral evidence from Dr. Tower at the hearing on 7^th April 2009. She, the judge, recorded Dr. Tower’s opinion that C was not an attachment disordered child, but that she had an attachment of an avoidant defended nature. She, Dr. Tower, did not consider that C had problems falling within the autistic spectrum or that she suffered from pathological demand avoidance syndrome. The judge accepted Dr. Tower’s view that C would have received good enough parenting up to about the age of two, but that the difficulties became clear at around the age of three (August 2003) when C was at nursery. C’s presentation was, in the view of Dr. Tower, as recorded by Judge P: ‘... that of a child whose basic attachment needs have been met and who knew that her parents had kept her safe and looked after and cared for her, but who had no clear boundaries and was not encouraged to have independence.’ Dr. Tower’s opinion as recorded by the judge was that C needed ‘... a highly structured environment where there are very clear, consistent boundaries imposed by carers who could decode her distorted emotional signals.’ Her Honour Judge P described C as ‘... a highly troubled child’ and expressed herself as being ‘... driven to the belief that this is as a result of the parenting she has received.’ The judge further recorded the views of the then Children’s Guardian, who she said had known C for some time, as being that ‘... C continues to have difficulty relating to her peers within school and is observed to play as if she were much younger. Academically she is still far behind her peers, remaining at levels expected in infant school.’ C was then aged about eight.

Still referring to the hearing in April 2009, when going through the welfare checklist, Judge Preferred to there being ‘... no doubt that C’s emotional, social and educational development was significantly impaired whilst she was in the care of her parents: she has made some progress, but her development is difficult [and] she continues to be violent and aggressive towards others and [is] at times uncontrollable.’ She mentioned ‘... the considerable written material contained in bundle B, which, if it does anything [sic] else, simply shows and confirms the parents’ hostility towards professionals and their inability to work in a cooperative manner for the benefit of C.’ The judge expressed a clear view (as she put it) that to discharge the care order ‘... would be actively against the paramountcy of C’s welfare.’

On 27^th October 2009, C was placed at the H Special Unit where she remained until 14^th December 2012, a period of just over three years. During this time there were many occasions when contact with the parents was recorded as going well, contact which included D, who had been born in January 2009. There were, however, periods of time when a therapeutic worker or workers at the H Unit thought it would be in C’s interests for contact to be suspended so that various works could be done with C and that is what happened. In November 2011 the Independent Reviewing Officer recommended that the parents should sign and adhere to a contract of expectations since it was being alleged that they had undermined and been negative about the placement at the H Unit. Meetings were set up to discuss this, but the parents did not attend. So a letter was sent to them followed by a reminder that contact would be and would remain suspended until they engaged with social care.

At a meeting on 3^rd July 2012 about contact the father said he would be suing Local Authority B and that he wanted C home the following week; but he refused to sign any written agreement about contact. During this period of time a foster placement was identified for C and it was intended that she should move out of the H Unit; but unfortunately that placement did not come to fruition.

On 14^th December 2012 C moved to a foster placement in [town stated], which lasted for some fourteen months until 14^th February 2014. She asked to have contact with her parents once she was settled in, but she did say that the father should not say to her that she was ‘coming home.’ When a meeting accordingly took place with the parents about contact to C, the record says that it was difficult to have a coherent conversation, because the father was more interested in talking about Local Authority B’s management. It is recorded that the meeting ended when the father became abusive. After a time the foster placement in [town stated] began to go wrong, with C’s challenging boundaries, going missing, throwing tantrums and speaking of wanting to kill herself. The carers were not meeting her emotional needs and she said she wished to see her family.

On 3^rd January 2014 the parents were invited to a meeting regarding contact to C, but they did not attend. When a telephone call was made to the father on the day of the meeting, he said he would only attend if it was to discuss C’s returning home.

On 14^th February 2014 C’s placement in [town stated] broke down. Thereafter there were a number of temporary and failed placements. In April 2014, C was placed at the F Children’s Unit. She remained there until November 2014. She was then placed in the J children’s unit where she remains to date. Altogether this amounts to some twelve moves in care from May 2008 to date, although some of them unavoidably short and temporary when placements suddenly broke down.

On 10^th March 2014 at a meeting with social workers the parents declined to enter into a written agreement about their contact to C, as Local Authority A were requesting. They did however give a verbal agreement that they would not talk to C about coming home. The importance of that was impressed upon them. Thereafter there were ten contact sessions between C and her parents at the F Unit between 31^st March 2014 and 4^th September 2014. The first three were monthly and the remainder fortnightly. Several of the sessions went well, giving pleasure and enjoyment both to the parents and to C herself. I have read all the contact notes in Supplemental Bundle 5, which confirm this. C’s behaviour was unpredictable. She had swings in mood and behaviour which were difficult to handle, although the parents did their very best. What was particularly difficult for the parents (and understandably so) was when C spoke negatively about the placement since this chimed with the parents’ own very strong view that she should not be in care at all.

The Unit Manager of the J Unit recently reported to the Children's Guardian that C is uncommunicative, disruptive when moved, and has assaulted people; but also that she is ‘much calmer now.’ C still has issues with eating and will wet herself if she does not want to do something. Her [type stated] therapist, Miss V, told the Children's Guardian that there have been seven [type stated] sessions, with funding secured for twelve more. Miss V says she is beginning to see a benefit and reports that C is now engaging with her. C has to have two escorts in the taxi to go to school, because she kicked a taxi driver in the head. There are [number stated] other girls at the J Unit. Local Authority B’s plan for C is to continue at the Unit until she has completed her [type stated] therapy, probably around January 2016, and then to re-assess whether it is possible to find a suitable foster placement, being the preferred course; or whether she may stay at the J Unit. The J Unit meets the recommendation of Dr. Khan. He advised that the F Unit was not ideal as it turned out for C’s needs and that she would be better served by a small residential unit with no more than [number stated] children. Both Dr. Eke and Dr. Khan were clear in their evidence that it is impossible to disentangle C’s life experiences as between before and after her going into care, in terms of the likely causation of her being the seriously troubled teenager she has become. Dr. Eke described it as an accumulation turning on the whole of her life.

There are dispersed among the papers a large number of reports on D. Put together and placed in chronological order, they fill a ring folder. Some of them are long and detailed. For example, Dr. Knight-Jones, consultant paediatrician’s report is fifty-two pages long. Together they give an evolving overview of D’s growing up from November 2010 through to the hearing in December 2012, after which there are two further reports. As is to be expected, there is no absolutely consistent pattern since the different observers come from different disciplines and would have seen D at different stages in her life, in different moods and in different circumstances. It would also make a big difference as to what earlier documentation was in front of each expert and by whom D’s progress was being reported to the expert.

The short point is that Local Authority A say D now has clear learning difficulties with very poor emotional and self-regulation, which require calm and consistent parenting: such should be by carers who will support multi-disciplinary involvement from health, education and social care. The parents and grandparents on the other hand believe that there was nothing at all wrong with D when she was removed into care on 13^th December 2012. They say that any concerns about her now, which they barely if at all acknowledge, have been caused by the way she has been treated in care since December 2012.

It is impossible to do justice in this judgment to the expert reports before me about D including the historical ground covered in them. The reports would simply have to be read in full by anyone with a due interest in this matter. In as brief a summary as possible, Dr. Knight-Jones, consultant paediatrician, saw D with the parents on 9^th November 2010, when she was one year and nine and a half months and living at home with her parents. This was on an instruction from D’s then children’s guardian and must, I think, have been regarding the supervision order application heard in February 2011. He found her neurodevelopmental progress to be mildly, but not severely delayed. He felt she was more like a child of eighteen or nineteen months rather than her actual age of twenty-one or twenty-two months. Her expressive language was more delayed, being at around one year, i.e. about nine and a half months behind; but her understanding was better, being about one year six months, only three and a half months behind her chronological age. Dr. Knight-Jones said he was not too worried about this. He thought that D at that age appeared to be within normal social limits and that the parents were very caring, speaking to her and playing with her. He explained to them that normally such a child is referred (i) for speech and language therapy and (ii) to an audiologist and (iii) to a local paediatrician. In his opinion, the delay was likely to be intrinsic rather than environmental and he recommended that D be referred (iv) to the genetic service to see if there was any medical diagnosis to account for her delay. He did not, however, mention this last possibility to the parents, as he felt that they already seemed worried enough by the other referrals he was advising. He said that even if they refused the recommended referrals he would not be thinking in terms of informing the Social Services, although he would want to continue monitoring D, probably three-monthly, in the anticipation that her speech would start to develop. In the body of his report he spoke of repeated concerns at that time, (November 2010) from the health visitor and Social Services that the father appeared very much in control and that the mother deferred to him before speaking, practically never attempting to insist that D did something.

The services which Dr. Knight-Jones described as ‘required now’ (November 2010) were (i) long term assessment and follow-up by a local paediatrician with expertise in neurodevelopment and neurodisability; (ii) referral to the clinical genetic service (this not being mentioned to the parents); (iii) referral to the local speech and language therapy service and (iv) assessment of her hearing by an audiologist. He considered that there was a risk that the father might frighten D when in the grip of anger, even if it were not directed against her, and that therefore it seemed reasonable for the family to be the subject of social work and health visitor monitoring. He did not think there was any sign then that D had suffered any mental or physical harm and he did not consider her delayed development to be the result of defective parenting. He noted that the parents did not seem to have any insight into the concerns about C’s [sic] educational delay and difficult behaviour. He said he could not see the needs of the family fitting into a model in which there would be a brief period of Social Services’ intervention. Rather he thought they would need long-term surveillance, in case the mental health of either parent should deteriorate, together with long-term support from the extended family and from the statutory services, including health, education and social care. He recorded a hundred per cent attendance by the family at health visitor appointments.

Ruth Monks became D’s health visitor when the family moved into Local Authority A’s area in June 2011. She had by then been practising as a health visitor for some twenty years since 1992 and she told me that seeing the development of children is the core of her daily work. Her assessment tools identified a need for referral to ‘speech and language’; but the parents refused. At nearly two and a half years of age in June 2011 Mrs. Monks says she did not observe D using any of the two hundred words which would be expected of a child that age. According to Mrs Monks, D was not observed chattering to herself during play and only copied back words spoken to her. She performed such tasks as ‘making dolly wave’ only after being shown. In D’s presence the parents reported back to Mrs. Monks that C [sic] had been illegally stolen and physically and sexually abused whilst in the care of Local Authority B. Despite explanation and the sharing of literature with them, Mrs Monks says they consistently refused consent for a referral for further assessments by speech and language and audiology. This was notwithstanding the contract of expectations signed by both parties in February 2011 that they would consult with their GP to discuss Dr. Knight-Jones’s report at paragraphs 99 and 100 above (with its recommendations for assessments by a community paediatrician, a speech and language therapist, an audiologist and a geneticist). Mrs. Monks says that as at 9^th February 2012 ‘... none of these referrals had been made due to parental non-engagement.’ She noted that three letters of complaint had been received from them regarding the health visiting service.

The parents’ explanation for not agreeing with those recommended referrals was that Mrs. Monks had agreed to defer consideration of them. It is right to say that on 5^th September 2011 Mrs. Monks did record, ‘I negotiated with the parents that I would review D’s development and assessment within three months,’ i.e. expiring in about December 2011. At that time, (September 2011) her opinion was that D presented ‘... with very significant expressive language delay, appearing a very passive, expressionless child and no spontaneous play seen.’ She recorded the father stating that social workers no longer needed to be involved with the family and his talking about the Parliamentary Ombudsman.

On 19^th December 2011 Mrs. Monks’ next assessment further identified the need for a referral to speech and language for an assessment; but she noted that the parents continued to refuse. She showed them a book detailing the normal parameters of child development from one to five. She recorded the father telling her that he was aware of a school in Local Authority B’s area being closed down due to him; that he was in the process of getting C’s placement, Unit H, closed down; and that he had requested the removal of a local head teacher.

On 6^th January 2012 the health visiting service received a letter of complaint from the father withdrawing his earlier consent for Mrs. Monks to visit the E Nursery where D had started in September 2011. Arrangements were made in the event for D to see a paediatrician, Dr. Gondwe, who saw her on 27^th February 2012 for a medical assessment at the request of Miss Chafer. She was by now aged three years one month and still living at home with the mother and father. Dr Gondwe recorded hearing mainly single words with a few two-word phrases. She was physically well. He concluded that she had delay in her speech and language development, for which referrals would be required for speech and language therapy and for audiology. A heart murmur was also noted, for which the parents did agree to an assessment in cardiology and it turned out to be benign.

By February 2012, Mrs Monks says she had seen D three times and that each time she had been concerned about her development, particularly speech and language, play and social skills. On 9^th March 2012 She (Mrs Monks) attended for three hours at the E Nursery to observe D in many situations. She recorded noticing no spontaneous interaction or communication from D, with D not demonstrating any exploration of her environment, nor interacting with any other children. D’s play was repetitive, allowing adults to provide a verbal commentary. According to Mrs Monks, she showed no awareness of the nursery’s routines, being unable to wash her hands without support. At outdoor times, she did not make choices as to which toys or equipment to play with: she appeared to withdraw into herself and just stood in the middle of the playground. When given one to one attention by nursery staff she would copy, but always needed adult prompting to bring her out of her ‘own little world.’ Mrs. Monks recommended one to one full-time support to encourage D’s self-help skills, language and social skills in preparation for full-time education. When Mrs. Monks shared with the parents her report of these observations of D, the father said that it was the ‘biggest load of rubbish’ he had ever read.

Three days later, on 12^th March 2012, D was seen by speech and language therapists at the [local] Children’s Centre. The parents reported to the therapists that they had no concerns regarding D’s play skills, understanding of language, expressive language or speech sounds. In brief, the therapists reported that they found D to have ‘a delayed and disordered pattern of language development.’

Also on 12^th March 2012, the father wrote a ‘To Whom it May Concern’ letter saying that he had been seen to see his GP, Dr. Chisabingo. He stated that the doctor had said there were no grounds for a geneticist assessment and had agreed with ‘... the family plan to return C home and to the [named] School.’ The father also wrote that Dr. Chisabingo had said that bereavement counselling over the loss of C was not appropriate. This letter must have gone to Kerry Chafer. She referred back to Dr. Chisabingo, who sent her an undated letter in which he denied telling the father that a geneticist assessment was not needed; rather that he had told the father he would need more detail from the health visitor as to why she was suggesting it. He said he had told the father he had no idea as to the effectiveness of grieving therapy and that: ‘... I did not agree with family plans to return C home (I had no idea of any plans!) to [named] School, as I was not aware at the time that the child was even at this school.’ He described the father as having misrepresented their consultation and it looks as though he probably did.

On 14^th March 2012 the father paid a visit to the E Nursery with complaints that D could not find her peg (which turned out to be because staff had not yet put her photograph beside it) and also that D had seen the other children using the toilet. When Mrs. Hunter and Miss Gains were trying to deal with these issues with him, he became irate and said he would be taking his complaints to Ofsted. He kept saying, ‘What are you going to do about this?’ and would not listen to Miss Gains, keeping talking over her. He said he was not going to leave and wanted something done about his complaints or he would go to the press. In due course he calmed down and left.

On 14^th May 2012 Dr. Gondwe saw D again, this time accompanied only by the parents. By now D had been at the grandparents’ home with the mother for about two months. They reported no concerns and told Dr. Gondwe that D was able to speak in sentences. They spoke of normal interaction with other children. Dr. Gondwe referred to getting an assessment through from speech and language and of seeing D again in six months’ time in November 2012.

On 19^th May 2012 Dr. Peter Ehrhardt, consultant paediatrician, signed off a report on D, which I think was a paper report. He concluded that D ‘... clearly has significant speech delay,’ and that she appeared to have ‘delay in her social skills.’ He said that over a period of a few weeks she needed (i) a comprehensive assessment of her development strength and weaknesses carried out by a multidisciplinary team led by a developmental paediatrician and (ii) therapy from a speech and language therapist, which would need to go on for many months and possibly years. He felt that with active cooperation D might well function within the mainstream, but that ‘... barriers external to D are represented by the inability or unwillingness of carers actively to cooperate with advice.’ For D to flourish he advised that she must be cared for by carers who ‘... clearly will consistently cooperate with all advice given by therapists and other professionals regarding mechanisms to nurture her development.’

On 22^nd June 2012 the proprietor of the E Nursery sent the father a letter regarding his having attended nursery on Saturday, 16^th June 2012 to hand deliver a letter at a time when the nursery was closed. She wrote, ‘Your presence was very intimidating and we are therefore informing you with immediate effect that you are no longer allowed to enter the property of the nursery.’ In his evidence the father denied ever being aggressive or domineering, but it is hard to imagine the proprietor of the nursery going to the lengths of excluding a parent from the premises without justification.

On 16^th August 2012 Dr. Gondwe saw D again. By this time she was three years and seven months and had been with the mother and the grandparents for five months. He could hear three-word sentences in clinic. Her understanding of spoken language was described to him by the parents and the grandparents as normal. He advised that she would need continued follow-up (i) in the child development clinic and (ii) speech and language therapy.

On 13^th September 2012 Carol Hunter of the E Nursery made a statement. She reported having told a professionals’ meeting on 11^th January 2012 that D was then working at the level of twenty months in all areas of development. At that time D had been thirty-six months of chronological age, so a delay of some sixteen months. Mrs. Hunter had then begun to work as an extra staff member in D’s room, specifically so as to support D’s development one to one. In that way progress was made. Mrs. Hunter says the speech and language therapist gave her a package with which to support D. Following the interim care order on 27^th July 2012 when Local Authority A could organise SEN funding (consistently rejected by the parents) resources came through for a further six hours per week one to one help. Throughout the summer of 2012 D continued to make progress in her development such that by September 2012 she was working at the level of twenty-two to thirty-six months on the nursery’s monitoring sheets. In evidence Carol Hunter told me it would be fair to say at about thirty-four months. This was at a time, September 2012, when D was about forty-five months of chronological age, thus now only about eleven months behind. So she was showing catch-up.

On 15^th November 2012 D was seen by a registrar in paediatrics, Dr. Motaleb, together with the parents. They told him they felt D’s speech was coming along nicely and that there had been no concerns from the E Nursery. Dr. Motaleb found D to be a polite and bright little girl who had good conversation with reasonably clear speech. He spoke of her doing well from her speech point of view and said she would be reviewed again in six months.

On 27^th November 2012, very shortly before the hearing before Judge R, Libby Brankin, senior lead teacher LDD, signed off a report. She had observed D at the E Nursery on four occasions for about an hour accompanied on one occasion by Jenny Kernan, the speech and language therapist. She noted that D appeared to have limited curiosity and limited motivation to explore, requiring an adult prompt to experiment or try new activities. She concluded that D had an erratic attainment profile due to gaps/disorders in language and social development. She considered D to present as a child with subtle but significant processing difficulties heightened when anxious and distressed. She thought that D had learned formulaic verbal responses. She regarded her as ‘highly dependent on adults’ and considered her social presentation to be a cause for concern, because she (D) seemed to have learned mostly from adult modelling rather than from childlike interaction with peers. She (Miss Brankin) noted that D had made at least sixteen months of progress during the previous twelve to fourteen-month period.

On 11^th December 2012, the day before the hearing before Judge R, geneticist Dr. Dobbie made a genetic report on D. This had been strongly opposed by the grandparents and parents, none of whom could see any need for it, as they saw D’s development as normal. Therefore, it had been necessary, as I understand it, to get a court order for a genetic report, although I cannot find it in the bundle of orders. Prior to the appointment Dr. Dobbie had received a letter from the father that he did not wish the consultation to go ahead and at the beginning of the appointment both the father and mother said the same. However, when Dr. Dobbie had explained what the review would consist of, and that it would be valuable to know if D did have a genetic condition, the mother and father and grandparents cooperated fully. The father told Dr. Dobbie that he himself was well and had no problems that would have affected D. That was his perception. Both parents told him that C was well and that they were happy with her development. Dr. Dobbie found D able to speak sentences, as he would have expected at her age and to be able to name colours. He considered that she was mildly delayed in at least one developmental axis. He saw some indications that might suggest a genetic causation, but also that some areas of her development had been improving, which is not, he says, a feature of genetic disorders or syndromes. His conclusion was that D does not have a genetic syndrome. It was at this point in the sequence that Judge R gave his decision on 13th December 2012 and D was removed into care.

A year later, on 13^th December 2013, Suzie Maleham, speech and language therapist, saw D in school for a review of her speech, language and communication skills. D had thus been in care now for one year. Her foster carer was present. D appeared ‘... happy, relaxed and confident throughout the session and making continued progress in all areas of her speech and language.’ D’s foster carer reported that D was enjoying her time at school and the schoolteacher reported that she had settled in well. D’s use of language appeared to Miss Maleham well structured and appropriate for her age and stage of development. The following strategies were suggested by Miss Maleham, namely: to address D at eye level, so that she could see mouth, lip and tongue positions to help her with her speech production; to use short, clear sentences; to reduce language and to ‘chunk’ larger pieces of information into sections; and to check that D had understood things. D was then discharged from the speech and language service with an open twelve months’ referral.

On 14^th October 2014, Dr. Yvonne Melia, clinical psychologist, reported on D. This was brought about by an original referral from CAMHS in February 2014 on the basis of some concerning behaviours, including D’s flapping her hands, repeating phrases and being unsettled in unfamiliar situations. The foster carers and the school had expressed concerns about D’s refusal to eat; her difficulties with large class sizes; her struggling on occasions with even simple instructions and her not liking busy or noisy environments. The foster carer was asking for help as to how to respond to these behaviours without making D feel uncomfortable. Dr. Melia reviewed all the files on D, undertook three assessments with her and interviewed her at school. In her report she summarises the whole of the background, which I need not repeat. D’s carer reported to Dr. Melia various behavioural oddities, including screaming if there was too much going on around her, or too much noise. The foster carer reported to Dr Melia that she found D to be tentative in play and perceived that she, D, would do things repetitively and quite obsessively. She, the carer, told Dr. Melia that D was saying such things as, ‘Did I come out of your tummy?’; ‘Am I your Mummy?’; ‘When I get a new family ...’; and, ‘Why don’t I live with my Mummy and Daddy?’ The schoolteacher reported to Dr. Melia that D functions well on a one to one basis and will work well when she has an adult with her. She had been noted at school to be about two years behind her peers in terms of emotional feelings and behaviour and about a year behind in terms of making relationships. The teacher said to Dr. Melia that D manages ‘... quite well in the school context once routines are established.’ She reported that her main concerns about D were in respect of her not understanding simple instructions, seeming forgetful, having obsessions and not being able to soothe herself after becoming upset or frustrated over seemingly minor triggers. During the assessment, with the use of ‘feeling cards’, D showed missing her old family, mentioning her father and her grandparents. She then added her mother. She referred to them by first names and noted sometimes feeling cross with [the foster carers], because she was not with her old family. Dr. Melia recorded the results of her WPPSI-III testing of D’s IQ as follows: verbal IQ low average; performance IQ extremely low; full scale IQ (67) extremely low.

In Dr. Melia’s ‘Conclusions and Recommendations’, she stated, ‘... the assessment identified that D has clear learning difficulties.’ She said that historically and in her current behaviour D shows features that are clearly consistent with an autistic spectrum disorder, there being longstanding concerns in terms of her social skill, development, play and social language, poor eye contact and behaviours such as echolalia [the automatic repetition of things said by another person] and flapping. Dr. Melia’s observations of D clearly indicated D as being rigid and concrete in her thinking, and as being one who tries to make sense of the world in black and white terms. Dr. Melia’s opinion is that D has a poor understanding of social context and how to behave in particular settings. Although she is still very little, her communication shows poor understanding of how she needs to adjust what she is saying so that another person can understand her perspective. She struggles to understand the intentions, beliefs or feelings of others and to use their ‘cues’ to inform her own social behaviour. She has some clearly preoccupied interests and anxieties at times with very poor emotional and self-regulation. Dr. Melia goes on, ‘... I would suggest the most important need right now is for D to receive a package of support to meet her general learning, emotional and social needs.’ She recommends that a formal diagnosis of D be made only when D has achieved some stability, because it is as yet ‘…unclear what contribution her parents’ mental health difficulties, emotion regulation deficits and distorted thinking and perceptions may have made to D’s presentation.’ Dr. Melia describes D (as at October 2014) as well accepted and supported both at home and school. She recommends considering an application for a Statement of Educational Needs to help D engage more effectively in learning with one to one support. She made various other recommendations which I need not set out.

That is an overview of the expert evidence before me relating to D. She has not seen the parents nor her grandparents since August 2013. It seems that the intention of Local Authority A at that time was to set up a final contact for her with her family members pursuant to the care plan then approved by Judge R in December 2012 (although subject to the father’s still pending application to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal that decision). Neither the parents nor the grandparents were responsive to the efforts of Local Authority A to arrange final contact sessions, nor again did the parents attend an appointment offered them on 13^th May 2014 to assess the management of their proposed indirect contact with D. D’s life has now been on hold, as I have said, for two years and three months and she clearly needs to know her long term plans. Rachel Payne reported in October 2014 just after the father’s appeal over D was allowed, that D had asked her foster parents when she would be getting a new Mummy and Daddy and whether she would be staying with them (the foster parents) until she became an adult.

Where there are allegations or assertions made and it is intended to make any finding the burden is on the party making the assertion. The standard of proof is the balance of probabilities. I need to be cautious about information deriving from persons I have not seen or heard. In respect specifically of the application for a discharge of the care order regarding C it is for the parents to show that such discharge would be in her best interests, her welfare being paramount in taking that decision. It is very rare to go back to revisit the circumstances in which a child was taken into care and, for good reasons, I have not been asked to do so. I would not have done so because, to state the obvious, we are where we are regarding C, whether one likes it or not. In respect of her, I have to bear in mind the Section 1(3) checklist in the Children Act 1989, which I will run through later. As regards the continued suspension of contact, contact is the norm under the Children Act 1989 and it is for the Local Authority to show why it is in the best interests of C for it to remain suspended and not be restored.

As regards D, I must first be satisfied that Local Authority A has proved the threshold is met for state intervention in her life and in the family’s life. Thus under Section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989 I may only make a care order in respect of her if satisfied that she ‘is suffering’ (which no-one suggests) or ‘is likely to suffer’ significant harm and that the likelihood of such harm is attributable to the care likely to be given to her if the order were not made, not being what it would be reasonable to expect a parent to give her. Harm is defined to include the impairment of health or development. Development means physical, intellectual, emotional, social or behavioural development; and health means physical or mental health.

In her threshold statement dated 29^th May 2015, since amended, Miss Thomas has taken the threshold date as 23^rd February 2012, around the time that Local Authority A took over from Local Authority B as the designated Local Authority. There is no dissent to or disagreement about that and (although in fact protective measures have been in place almost all D’s life) the precise date selected is of no consequence, because the case is based on alleged future likelihood of harm, not past actual harm. So I am content with February 2012 as being the date for the threshold to have to be met.

If I am satisfied that the threshold is met, then I have to consider D’s welfare as paramount when applying the twin checklists (i) under section 1(3) of the Children Act 1989 when deciding whether to make a care or supervision order and (ii) under section 1(2)(4) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 when deciding whether to make a placement order. Section 1(2) of the latter Act provides that the paramount consideration of the court must be D’s welfare throughout her life. I shall run through the welfare checklists regarding D shortly. Before a placement order can be made a child has to be the subject of a care order (or certain other conditions have to be met) and the court may only make such an order if, in the case of each parent, it is satisfied either that the parent has consented to the child being placed for adoption or that the parents’ consent should be dispensed with (section 21 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002). The court cannot dispense with the consent of any parent to the child being placed for adoption unless it is satisfied that ‘... the welfare of the child requires the consent to be dispensed with’ (section 52(1)(b) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002).

The law in respect of placement for adoption has been definitively stated in Re B (A Child) [2013] 2 FLR 1075 where Baroness Hale of Richmond stated that:

After considering everything I have read, heard and seen during this hearing I make the following findings. They are additional to the findings that I have already made whilst going through some of the issues above.

I have already referred to the section 1(3) checklist to be performed against the underlying principle of C’s welfare being paramount. As to her ascertainable wishes and feelings, I frankly do not think that at the present time these are actually ascertainable. In 2014 she veered between enjoying her parents’ company and lashing out at them (as I find) both physically and by the things she said. The preponderance of her utterances since the distressing contact occasion on 4^th September 2014 have been negative about even seeing them, let alone moving to live with them. On the other hand, she might prefer home to the thought of continuing in a residential unit. I just do not think we can discern at the present time what outcome she would most like to see in her life. As to C’s physical, emotional and educational needs, she has expressed satisfaction with the school, which must have been selected with special attention to her particular needs. Her emotional needs need to be met by patient, consistent and very firm but fair boundaries and routines skilfully enforced (extremely difficult although this is now going to be). As to the likely effect of any change in her circumstances, one can only say that she has moved about so much in the past that a period of time in the kind of very small unit specifically advised by Dr. Eke would appear to be the best plan, in circumstances which no-one would have chosen in the first place. A change in her circumstances to living with her parents or grandparents, with all the difficulties already discussed, would be highly likely to create further anxieties for her. There would be all sorts of conflicting and quite probably overwhelming emotions. If as seems probable it broke down, then she would be faced with yet another ‘failure’ in her short life, with consequential trauma and a yet further period of re-adjustment to some other form of state-organised care.

As to C’s age, sex, background and any special characteristics of her’s, these are apparent from what has gone before and by reading the F Unit’s records. She has the characteristics of being extremely troubled, confused and unhappy arising from all aspects of her upbringing, with the consequence that she shows hugely challenging and disruptive behaviours on an almost daily basis. As to any harm which C has suffered or is at the risk of suffering, it is abundantly clear from her present sad circumstances that she has suffered great harm from her life’s experiences. Understandably, the family put this down to her time in care, believing her to have been perfectly alright until she went into care. This is not however borne out by an open-minded and objective review of all the records relating to the entirety of her life; nor by the previous findings of the court in the person of Her Honour Judge P QC. The finding in 2007 was that C had suffered and was likely to suffer significant harm with her parents; and, in 2009, Her Honour Judge P attributed the responsibility for C’s difficulties at that time largely if not entirely, to them.

As for the capability of the parents and grandparents of meeting C’s needs, I have effectively covered this consideration above. As Local Authority A have said, with the endorsement of the Children’s Guardian who independently represents the children, the family cannot meet C’s needs, because they cannot see further than the belief that all her problems have been caused by her treatment in care and that all would be well if she were back within the family. It is easy to conclude that care has not served C well, in that she is now the unhappy and distressed teenager she clearly is. That is not, however, to say that those caring for C have not done their best for her and in what they have seen as being her best interests. Nor is it to say that she would have been any better if left within the family, faced with the deficiencies of parental care identified by Her Honour Judge P QC. It is not to say that a discharge of the care order would be in her interests and I am not persuaded that it would be.

As to contact to C, Local Authority B have evolved a contact plan whereby following this hearing they will offer to work with the grandparents in helping them to gain an understanding of this judgment and of the father’s communications in Supplemental Bundles 1, 2 and 3. If some insight is gained into C’s needs at contact, and if the grandparents show themselves able to accept advice as to how to deal with the sort of things she might say and do, then contact to the grandparents would be re-introduced to see how it went. For the time being Local Authority B do not propose to include the parents in this, on the basis that it would or could be overwhelming for C whilst re-introduction of contact with the grandparents was being attempted. If such a re-introduction to the grandparents succeeded, and if the parents could show some insight into C’s needs following this judgment and could show themselves able to accept advice as to how to deal with the things she might say and do, then there could be a possibility of a further attempt to re-introduce contact between C and the parents in due course. That is not, however, intended to be in any way imminent; nor is grandparental contact, if it restarts, necessarily to act as a conduit to parental contact. These plans about contact to C seem to the Children’s Guardian and to me to be reasonable and proportionate and in C’s best interests. I therefore approve them. They will require a continued section 34(4) direction permitting Local Authority B to continue to refuse the parents contact, but against the backdrop of the plan just mentioned. I will make such a direction and I ask that there be a preamble referring to the plan.

The first question is whether the threshold for state intervention in the life of D and of the family is met. In this context I need to bear particularly in mind the President’s second fundamental point in the Darlington case above. He stressed at paragraph 12 the need to demonstrate why ‘... facts A plus B plus C justify the conclusion that the child has suffered or is at risk of suffering significant harm of types X, Y or Z.’ He continues that:

Therefore, I have to evaluate D’s future on the basis that the paramount consideration is her welfare throughout her life. It is necessary since the care plan is one of adoption that the checklist in the Children Act 1989 and the checklist in the Adoption and Children Act 2002 are both considered. In short I adopt the welfare checklist analysis set out by the Children’s Guardian in her report for a placement order dated 16^th February 2015 at internal page 7, page 728 of the main bundle. As to D’s wishes and feelings I agree with the Children’s Guardian that D is not of a sufficient age to express an informed view regarding such a difficult question. Clearly, she would wish to be within a safe, loving, secure environment where her needs were consistently met. She is clearly already aware (see above) that this may be with a new ‘forever’ family, not her own family, whom she has not (for whatever reason) seen for nineteen months. As to D’s particular needs, she has all the needs of any child as just mentioned, but also the additional needs identified by Dr. Melia, whose evidence I accept, as arising from her learning difficulties. She needs consistent care from carers who can acknowledge those needs and meet them with support willingly received from relevant agencies. D needs permanence and a sense of belonging.

As to the likely effect on D of having ceased to be a member of her birth family and becoming adopted, all the usual considerations apply to D as apply to any child. She would have the detriment of losing her birth family, and of losing her immediate and direct contact with her roots through the society of her parents, her grandparents and other relatives, including C. She might as she becomes more mature come to regret and resent this loss. She has a right to respect to her right for a life within her birth family, unless overriding considerations relating to her welfare make this impossible because it would be seriously detrimental to her. On the other hand, by way of adoption D would be brought up by a new family which would have been matched with her specifically in mind and having regard to her particular needs; a family who would have made an investment in looking after her for her childhood and beyond. If as I have found, D would be likely to suffer significant emotional harm within her natural family and this is unlikely to change and would significantly impede her healthy emotional and social development, then an upbringing elsewhere is effectively what it has to be.

As between adoption and long-term fostering I agree with the tabulation of the advantages and disadvantages of each as laid out by the Children’s Guardian at page 729 of the main bundle. As in every case, adoption would provide permanency, security, stability, consistency and a sense of belonging; but it would sever her relationship with her natural family, having an irreversible impact on her sense of heritage and identity. Long-term fostering conversely would not sever the natural family relationship and would not therefore impact on her sense of identity and roots, at least not in theory. The mystery of adoption and the risk of subsequent regret and resentment of it would not arise. On the other hand, the status of long-term fostering would confer no sense of permanence and would leave D at risk of being the subject of future legal proceedings. Foster placements can be more easily terminated, whether by the foster carers themselves, by the local authority, by the natural parents or even by the child. If continued involvement with the parents were attempted, as it might be, there would be the real risk of the foster placement being undermined, as has been seen with C (through the things said to her about coming home). Further, in long-term foster care, D would remain the subject of the involvement of Children Services, with ongoing meetings, reviews and appraisals. She would have an allocated social worker or consecutive workers and would be subject to regulations. As to D’s age, sex, background and characteristics, I consider these have been sufficiently covered, as indeed has the harm which D is at risk of suffering. As to the relationship which D has with her relatives and the other considerations in section 1(4)(f) of the 2002 Act, clearly D’s close relatives are more than willing to provide for her. Their wishes are for her to be returned home and with no further social work involvement. However, if this cannot happen for all the reasons set out above, then (although taken into account) the wishes and feelings of D’s relatives cannot weigh decisively in the evaluation exercise. The family would still have much to offer her (if they are willing) by consistent compliance with the plans for indirect contact. The Children’s Guardian is satisfied, and I agree, that all possible placements within the extended family have been investigated by Local Authority A; but without success. The remaining sections of section 1(3) of the 1989 Act have already been sufficiently covered, save perhaps for (g) (the range of powers available to the court) which I have well in mind.

I need to consider all the options for D holistically, not picking the possibilities off one by one and becoming left with the ‘last option standing.’ I am satisfied, reviewing the pros and cons of every option available to me and weighing them against each other, that there is no combination of living within the family (mother and father; mother alone; mother with the grandparents; or grandparents alone) which would sufficiently diminish the risks of significant emotional harm to D within the family, due essentially to the father’s mental ill-health. This is not a matter of blame or culpability. In reaching that conclusion I have set against an upbringing within the family all the disadvantages of adoption or long-term fostering.

I conclude that the realistic choice comes down to one of fostering or adoption. Neither is a panacea. Neither is guaranteed success. One can only do one’s best. On careful consideration, I have come to the conclusion that the advantages of adoption for D outweigh its possible disadvantages. Conversely, I consider that the disadvantages of long-term fostering for her outweigh its advantages. In the result I accept the opinion of Local Authority A supported by the Children’s Guardian on behalf of D herself that the outcome which would be most likely to serve her best interests throughout her life is that of adoption.

As I have said, for a placement for adoption order to be made, the consent of each parent needs to be dispensed with on the basis that the welfare of the child requires it to be. For all the reasons already discussed, D’s most potent need at this time in her life is for permanency. It is not in her interests to be, as C has been (and one sees many repetitions as between C’s life and D’s life) in a situation of long-term fostering, with the disadvantage of the continuing legal ties to a natural family dissatisfied with the arrangements, unable to see why she should not be living at home and determined to have her home if possible. I do conclude therefore that it is necessary in D’s interests to dispense with the consent of the mother and the father to a placement order, subject to one point referred to in a moment. Such an order will therefore be made for a second time. I am only sorry that the family have had to go through such a stressful and sad process twice. Before actually making a placement order I do have to invite any party to comment on the proposed contact arrangements which Local Authority A have in mind, which is annual letterbox contact. Does anybody wish to comment on that?

As I have said, I have listened to this case with the greatest of sympathy, but the reasons in the Judgment still pertain and I will not repeat them. If I could have made an order which would have kept the children in your family, Mr. [grandfather], I would have done so, believe me. I have to consider the question of contact before making a placement order in accordance with the welfare checklist in the 2002 Act. I conclude, having done so, that actual face to face contact to D at this stage would be contrary to her best interests. She would not know if she were coming or going frankly, having not seen the family since August 2013 and being told that she is on the point of being placed for adoption. Any meeting or meetings would be highly emotional for the natural family and I am not at all sure that they would be able to contain their emotions or keep them from D. I would be very concerned that they would feel they were just giving D hope by saying things that would confuse her and make the transition which she now has to make greatly more difficult. I can see no realistic way that any contact directly could be in D’s interests, painful though this is for the family members. Mr. [grandfather] and Mrs. [grandmother] have just addressed me movingly on this point, but there has to be a placement order and there has to be no order for direct contact; but rather approval of the care plan, which is for annual letterbox contact between D and the parents and grandparents.

The father’s three Supplemental Bundles of evidence (about 1,400 pages in three lever-arch files) require at least 2 very full days of reading, if done thoroughly and thoughtfully. As this amount of time is not generally realistic, and as the three files concerned cannot be annexed to the Judgment, I have attempted a digest of their contents in this Annex.

The father’s idiosyncratic writing style and his use of numbers for people and events makes précising difficult, if it is to put over how he thinks without doing him an injustice by failing to show the basis for his perceived grievances or the links which he makes between different people and organisations. The only real solution is to defer to the original bundles.

The selection of extracts in the Appendix is not intended to imply that there are not also communications by the father in his three Supplemental Bundles which are in reasonable terms and which express clearly enough his views, wishes and complaints. That there are such letters is demonstrated by a full reading of the bundles.

I have noted in this Appendix the page numbers of the extracted material. Where the dates of communications are not clearly stated, I have on occasions taken the date shown at the bottom right hand side of the page. This may only be the date of downloading, not the date of actual sending.

Where comments are necessary in an attempt to explain or clarify, I have generally used italics. I have tried to follow the father’s particular use of punctuation and of upper and lower case.

The communications in the three lever arch files are not all in chronological order and some documents are repetitive. In particular, bundles 2 and 3 as presented to me were reversed. I have purposely not rearranged the order here (to avoid confusion); but to read the material in chronological order, read Suppl. Bundle 3 before Supplemental Bundle 2.

I reiterate that this Appendix is only ever going to be second-best and that the only real way to get a feel for the father’s highly unusual communications and his thinking behind the links which he makes, is by reading his three lever-arch files in full.]

F’s Supplemental Bundle 1: from 25.07.05 to 14.12.13:

Page 2: illegal unsigned - undated draft received via (2) on 02.12.13.

Page 3: undated Royal Mail envelope.

(1) is unsigned and illegal withheld from the underwriter exceeding receipt date.

The contents of (1) are viewed as prior and current links completely fraudulent.

(2) is the undated Royal Mail envelope used to illegal deliver (1) linked to (3) (4).

It is viewed that Royal Mail are sending out thousands of such letters every day.

I remind that Local Authority A and Royal Mail are prior served court notice linked to (1) (2).

I remind Royal Mail that undated and unsealed envelopes of this description are illegal and cannot rely on the sender letters-drafts being legal signed and dated.

(8) is the case at (1) (2) which shall now be brought before the courts at (7)”.

F’s Supplemental Bundle 2: from 22.10.14 to 14.02.15:

page 2: PRISONERS IN CAGES can be found at (2) NOTA web link. [The ‘page 2’ is a photograph off the internet of a court room setting, or similar, with two men seated in two cages.]

(1) is web linked to HS [named] University and None Executive Director of [named] Children’s Services Trust.

(2) of (1) is also a illegal CONFLICT OF INTEREST trustee to DFT ADOPTIONS.

It is also proven and reported that [named] Children’s Service Trust is sending out unsolicited MALICIOUS and fraudulent copycat chronology material from Local Authority B.” [1509].

F’s Supplemental Bundle 3: from 29.12.13 to 01.10.14:

Page 1 [not attached].

Page 3 [not attached].

Please place (1) and (2) in front of your Directors

If (3) have a binding agreement to buy or have bought shares at (1) and or do not publicly confirm withdraw from (1) and (2) to me in writing by urgency (sic);

Proxy court notice shall also be served to (3) later this week.

If you wish to make a out of court settlement and stay with (1) let me know prior to and or after (5) which shall be publicly declared via press and media. I await your reply of communication in the near future”. There is a PS: “NB breach of communities (human right) pledge.” [1394].