On 6th February 2025, Mark Cooper-Hall was led by Nick Goodwin KC (Harcourt Chambers) in the Court of Appeal representing the child, M, by her Children’s Guardian, supporting the mother’s appeal of a final care order made by HHJ Bugeja in the Family Court sitting at Wolverhampton. Mark also represented the child at first instance.
M’s parents had remained separated throughout the 15 months of care proceedings, during which time M had remained in the care of her mother under an ICO, supported by a s.38A requirement to prevent the father attending the home. There had been no breaches of this requirement, nor any safety plans. Despite some concerns around the mother’s attitude towards the local authority, and a concern that she harboured feelings for the father, her care of the child had been exemplary. The significant risk in the case was the father’s history of sexual offences against teenage girls, which needed to be carefully managed. Psychological assessments of both parents had led the local authority to conclude that M needed to be removed from M’s care and placed with her paternal grandparents under a care order. The guardian recommended that M remained at home under a care order. HHJ Bugeja concluded that the risk of future harm to M from her father could not be managed with M remaining in her mother’s care. The mother appealed.
In a detailed judgment allowing the appeal, the Court of Appeal found that HHJ Bugeja had been wrong to conclude that M needed to be removed from her mother’s care:
“[114.] No one can doubt the difficulty of this case, or the gravity or complexity of the issue with which the Judge had to grapple. Her assessment was undoubtedly made all the more problematic by the late-emerging evidence (from the Family Group Conference, and the father’s use of Tinder) and the changing positions of the lay and professional parties. However conscientious the endeavour in producing a judgment of this length to explain her judicial reasoning, I regret that the Judge failed sufficiently to filter the evidence adequately, she allowed the opinions of Dr Garrett to dominate her thinking, and she ultimately failed to undertake the necessary holistic review when conducting her final analysis and reaching her conclusions.”
The matter has been remitted to the Designated Family Judge for Wolverhampton for a further hearing.
