What also stands out is the observation that “court scrutiny goes beyond what is needed to determine whether a care order is in the best interests of the child”.

But there is much to digest in the document, so well worth a read.

Chris McWatters

Interesting article on adoption, as well as more imaginative approaches to ‘placement’.

Chris McWatters

“Facebook has changed my life – if it wasn’t for that then all this wouldn’t have happened,” said Mr Marks (the adoptee)

“I always knew I was adopted and I had real issues with feeling rejected and not knowing where I belong.

“I felt depressed when I was growing up – it was like a massive void that was never filled.”

I’m not aware of any research into the emotional well-being of adoptees in childhood and adult life, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a high statistic of depression amongst them. And if that is the case, then I think we should be thinking long and hard before hurrying along adoptions, especially where there is limited / indirect / no contact with their birth parents.

Chris McWatters

Chris McWatters

Grieve was at pains to point out that as Attorney General, he viewed himself as Leader of the Bar, and therefore was attending the meeting in order to feedback to Government what the views of the Bar was in respect of legal aid cuts. His understanding of the nature of the complaints was that it was a matter of re-adjusting the criteria of who could be eligible for legal aid, and in that respect, he felt he could return to the Ministry of Justice to present the case of the FLBA.

However he was also at pains to point out that, in his capacity as a representative for the government, we were living in a period of austerity, and that there was simply no room for manoevre in the planned 25 per cent reduction on spending in Ken Clarke MP’s department. The planned cuts were an absolute essential, from his point of view, for the country to return economic health.

Of course there is now a wealth of evidence to suggest that he, and the rest of the government are wrong about that, given the recent utterances from the IMF, and flat-lining growth figures. But far be it for me to speculate on a subject I know nothing about – economics.

However it does seem to me that economics  is the only argument that the government are willing to wrestle with in the current climate,  in spite of the prime minister’s crows about broken society. And what we family lawyers are only too aware of are the long term costs on society of children who have been badly damaged through bad parenting.

Stephen Cobb QC pointed out at the meeting that as a result of the proposed changes,  54,000 fewer people will no longer recieve representation, with 68000  children being affected. Many of their parents may well not bother going to court  due to the complexity of litigation, meaning many of their children may not get to see their parents due to the lack of a court order.

I just wonder how many of those children will add to the list of the 120 thousand problem families that David Cameron alluded to in the wake of the recent riots, whom he recently stated needed early intervention to prevent them from living wasteful lives. 

As part of this early intervention, the case for legal representation  in respect of warring families should also be made, given the extensive economic costs to society of problem children in the long term.  And these costs will be spread across many different government departments: health in respect of mental health problems, social security in respect of the unemployed, the home office in respect of the police having to deal with the inevitable criminal behaviour, and last but not least, the ministry of justice in respect of criminal courts and prisons.  So it’s not just a question of knocking on the door of Ken Clarke MP, requesting that he think in a more holistic way in respect the impact of cuts to family legal aid, but all the other government ministers who will have to pick up the bill in the future.

Chris McWatters

Can I evict my mother in law?

Possibly not, it seems, unless you have an interest in land. The issue arose in a case I was recently in. Mother alleged domestic violence against father and his family members and sought non-molestation and occupation orders limiting his and his mother’s access to the family home. By the time I had been instructed, an interim ex parte application (albeit to last only for a week) had already succeeded.

Father, a privately paying party, supported the conversion of the interim order into a final order. Mother in law objected. She was the freeholder. Suffering from long-term illness, she had spent large sums of money converting parts of the property to make them suitable for her use.

Working through the different sections of the Family Law Act 1996, it was clear that section 33 did not apply (mother had no interest in the land), nor could sections 34-38 (all of which are capable of binding only present or former spouses or cohabitants).

With some evident regret, mother withdrew her applications for an occupation order at court, when this was pointed out to her, and a complex compromise was reached on terms favourable to mother in law.

But what struck me about the case was this: before making her application, mother had not stopped to ask where it was in the power of the court; and neither indeed had the District Judge, when making his initial order.

David Renton

 However, every now and then, the hacks come flooding in, and A(A Minor) [2011] EWHC 1764 (Fam) is clearly such a case. And when they do, it’s clear from A that you need to be pretty media law savvy if you want to keep them at arms length.

 Briefly, A is a case where the mother has been arrested for the murder her two and four year old sons, although as yet to be charged. A is her newborn baby, who is now subject to an interim care order whilst the murders are investigated. The mother also suffers from serious mental health problems.

 Inevitably, the death of two small children in suspicious circumstances arose press interest, but before anything was reported, the Local Authority applied for and were granted reporting restrictions in respect of the child. The Sun subsequently published a story entitled “Mum quizzed as two sons die in a month”, and went on to name the mother as well as her two dead sons.

 A psychologist reporting on the mother expressed in very strong terms how concerned he was that prolonged media pressure would put her at risk of self harm. The mother’s legal team in turn applied for an injunction preventing the press from naming her and other members of the family, which resulted in a contested hearing in the family division front of Mr Justice Baker.

 The battle that ensued between the mother (supported by the father and the guardian) and the press was a classic article 8 (right to family life and privacy) versus article 10 (freedom of expression) contest. However the legal argument was far more akin to those used in the media courts of Mr Justice Eady and Mr Justice Tugenhat, and indeed some of their recent judgments in press injunctions are referred to.

 In his judgment, Mr Justice Baker goes through this area of law since the implementation of the Human Rights Act, making extensive references to the relevant cases (such as Campbell v MGN Ltd [2004] UKHL 22, which sets out the balancing exercise that needs to be done between articles 8 and 10) as well as to the Press Complaints Commission Editors’ Code of Practice. Did, as was the issue in Campbell, the mother “have a reasonable expectation of privacy”? Or did the importance of preventing any interference in the reporting of crimes outweigh the importance of any infringement of the article 8 rights of the mother ?

 He ultimately concluded that the mother’s article 8 rights were outweighed by the importance of the media’s freedom of expression, having listened to extensive arguments by Frances Judd QC, representing mother, and Adam Wolanski, a media specialist from 5 Raymond Buildings, representing various press organisations.

 What’s striking from reading the case is just how subtle the arguments are in respect of this balancing exercise, and just how familiar any family specialist would need to be in dealing with the kind of arguments that they are likely to face from the freedom of expression camp. So if you do find yourself having to apply for a reporting restriction order in a family case, and you find yourself up against a representative of the press, then familiarisation with A, and the extensive case-law that it refers to is, in my humble opinion, almost definitely a pre-requisite.

Chris McWatters