R & Anor v Shropshire Council & Anor

This is yet another judgment in the case of H, a girl, now aged four years and four months. The Applicants in these proceedings are H’s mother and father, R and S. The Local Authority, Shropshire Council (“LA”), is the First Respondent, and H acting through her Guardian is the Second Respondent. The intervenor T was discharged as a party at the conclusion of the first day of this hearing.

At the hearing of 10 June 2025 the parents were represented by Ms Lorraine Cavanagh KC and Ms Kathryn Anslow, the LA were represented by Mr Nick Goodwin KC and Ms Louise Higgins, and the Guardian was represented by Ms Kirsty Gallacher.

This is the fourth reported judgment concerning H. The previous judgments have been:

H has been subject to proceedings since the day of her birth. The full history is set out in the [2024] EWHC 344 judgment. I do not intend to set out a full history here. However, in my view, and that of Ms Cavanagh, it is important that I summarise the litigation history in this matter to ensure that, if there is any further litigation, any future judge and the parties have a document setting out the recent course of events concerning H.

In the briefest of summaries, the mother has a learning disability and the father has learning difficulties. H has four older siblings, three brothers and a sister, all of whom have been subject to social care intervention on the basis of risk of sexual harm. There is no issue that the three boys, who are now aged 26, 22 and 18 pose a sexual risk, and potentially pose a risk to H.

On 11 February 2021 very shortly after H was born the court made an Interim Care Order (“ICO”). The Local Authority sought removal of H from the parents’ care. However the District Judge determined that H should remain in her parents’ care subject to an ICO.

The matter came before HHJ Lopez who heard evidence over 11 days in June and July 2022. On 8 September 2022 he made care and placement orders in respect of H. The parents then appealed and on 2 February 2023 the Court of Appeal overturned HHJ Lopez’s decision and remitted the matter to myself as the Family Presiding Judge for the Midlands.

After further assessment and consideration, the LA agreed on 24 July 2023 for H to remain at home with her parents subject to a care order. I made that order.

On 9 November 2023 the LA gave notice of removal of H from her parents’ care because of an incident that had taken place at her grandmother’s house. The parents then applied for an injunction under the Human Rights Act 1998 to prevent separation.

On 6 December 2023 I made an interim injunction preventing removal of H from her parents’ care, subject to a detailed Safety Plan agreed by all parties. In July 2023 a Safety Plan had been agreed by all parties, which was in reality unworkable. These are parents who need very clear parameters set and then a high level of support to achieve an acceptable level of safety for H.

On 19 February 2024 I gave a detailed judgment refusing to allow removal of H from her parents’ care. I balanced the fact that I had found that there had been some kind of incident at the grandmother’s house with her brother T, however H was thriving in her parents’ care and was doing well developmentally, see [104]. At [105] I said:

“105.

In my view the LA and Guardian failed to balance the risks to H of removing her from her parents’ care and very possibly thereby leading to a childhood in long-term foster care. As the Guardian said, the LA might make a placement application and it is possible that would be granted, although I am sure it would be very strongly resisted. But H is now of an age where she will probably remember her birth family, so none of the future options are risk-free. It is a common mantra that long-term foster care is not a good outcome, albeit in many cases the may be little or no choice.

…

107.

In my view, the balance of risk and long-term harm vitiates in favour of H remaining with her parents.”

The matter returned to court on 17 May 2024 when the LA applied for an injunction to prevent the parents from taking H on a planned holiday to Spain. On 17 May I gave a judgment allowing the parents to go to Spain with H and criticising the LA for their unfocused approach to risk in respect of the trip, see [39]-[46] of that judgment.

The LA chose to appeal that judgment even though by the time that they did so the holiday had taken place and the appeal was academic. The Court of Appeal granted permission to appeal because there was an important issue of law in respect of the use of the inherent jurisdiction. The appeal was listed on 19 February 2025. The fact of the appeal led to the need for the parents to have yet more legal advice and involvement in litigation. The parents’ difficulties mean that litigation is even more stressful for them than for many other parents. Although the appeal was undoubtedly academic, it will undoubtedly have placed even more strain especially on the Mother. On 12 February 2025, apparently after the involvement of new leading counsel, the appeal was withdrawn and the hearing vacated.

On 11 October 2024 the LA applied, yet again, to remove H from her parents’ care. The LA alleged, on the basis of one witness account, that her brother E had been seen coming out of the parents’ house contrary to the terms of the safety plan that had been agreed. The parents strongly denied that E had been in the house.

The matter came before me, again, on 24 October 2024 when it was listed to hear oral evidence. The LA’s witness started to give oral evidence and within a very short period of time it became apparent that she could not have seen E coming out of the house because, from the place where she had alleged to have seen him from her car, there was a very large caravan between her and the parents’ house. On brief perusal of the photographs and a map it was immediately apparent that she could not have seen E coming out of the parents’ house. When she was asked about this, she immediately conceded that she had not seen E come out of the house, she had only seen him walk along the road. It needs to be understood that the parents and E stay close to one another and there was no order that prevented E from walking past the parents’ house. The LA was well aware of the fact that E stayed literally round the corner and could and did walk past the house.

I was extremely critical on 24 October 2024 of the LA’s conduct. They put two highly vulnerable parents through the immense stress of further litigation without carrying out the most basic of forensic checks as to whether their evidential case was sustainable. I would have had no hesitation in making a wasted costs order against the LA in respect of that part of the proceedings, save for the fact that throughout these proceedings the parents’ legal representatives have acted pro bono.

Whilst all of this was going on, the parents were subject to further assessment by an independent social work expert in the field, Tracey Carboni. This was to inform the LA’s continuing case that H should be removed from her parents’ care. On 9 January 2025 the LA filed its final care plan seeking separation of H from her parents’ care and her placement in long-term foster care.

A final hearing was listed for four days commencing on 15 May 2025. In the period between the filing of the final care plan and the hearing a new Guardian was appointed, Miss Yvonne Hill. The previous Guardian had supported separation. However, Ms Hill did not support the LA plan for separation and considered that H could remain at home with her parents with a proper support package and safety plan.

Shortly before the hearing, culminating on 7 May 2025, the LA carried out a full care planning and risk assessment exercise. In the light of that assessment, the LA changed their final care plan and decided that they would support H remaining at home. In the light of that very late change of position, the substantive hearing on 15 May was adjourned, with a short case management and updating hearing only, so that the details of a final care plan could be drawn up.

The final hearing in this matter took place on 10 June 2025 with a very largely agreed care plan with extensive support for the parents and H, with the intention of helping the parents to meet H’s needs, and to keep her safe.

I am delighted that the end of this very long history is that H is to remain at home with her parents. In my view the most important matter throughout this litigation has been that H has thrived in the care of her parents, and has a close, warm and loving relationship with her mother. There is plentiful evidence that the mother meets H’s needs and is a loving and supportive parent.

I understand that the LA has taken many of its actions in the belief that it is acting to protect H. The only exception to this is the academic appeal, which I have to say appeared to me to be misconceived even if legally justified. The pursuit of that appeal, which would have had no impact on H’s care but did cause the parents (and indirectly H) further distress, was not in my view a child-focused decision. The application in October 2024 provides some evidence of a LA that would pursue its wish to remove H from her parents’ care, without properly thinking through both the issues of risk and whether its evidence would stand up. The application to prevent the parents and H going on holiday was a clear example of failing to properly analyse risk. The application for removal based on clearly flawed evidence (for which a brief judicial scrutiny of the photographs exposed the error in a remarkably short time) is an example of the failure to properly consider the evidence.

I hope that the order I now make will start a new chapter in the relationship between the LA and the parents. The LA have to understand that these are parents who have learning difficulties, and who are perhaps for understandable reasons, very mistrustful of the LA. As I said in the [2024] EWHC 1191 judgment at paragraph 45: “the local authority need to take the parents as they find them” and work with them in a meaningful way. I hope this will now be the case.

Finally, I would like to pay tribute to the work of the parents’ legal team as well as to the parents’ lay advocate. The legal team have acted pro bono throughout and the level of their commitment and professionalism has been exceptional. In particular, I would wish to commend Ms Anslow who I know has worked exceptionally hard on this case and who has throughout produced material of the highest quality, and always very well balanced and fair in its approach.