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England and Wales Family Court Decisions (other Judges)

You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales Family Court Decisions (other Judges) >> A B C and D (fact-finding and welfare) [2017] EWFC B33 (16 June 2017)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/OJ/2017/B33.html
Cite as: [2017] EWFC B33
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IMPORTANT NOTICE This judgment was delivered in private. The judge has given leave for this version of the judgment to be published on condition that (irrespective of what is contained in the judgment) in any published version of the judgment the anonymity of the child[ren] and members of their [or his/her] family must be strictly preserved. All persons, including representatives of the media, must ensure that this condition is strictly complied with. Failure to do so will be a contempt of court.

Case No: .…OX16C00157

 

IN THE FAMILY COURT AT OXFORD IN THE MATTER OF THE CHILDREN ACT 1989 AND THE ADOPTION AND CHILDREN ACT 2002 AND IN THE MATTER OF A, B, C AND D (CHILDREN)

Date: …..16th June 2017

Before : HHJ Vincent

Between :

OCC

Applicant –

and

(1) EF

(2) GH

(3) A, B, C and D (by their children’s guardian CH)

 

Respondents

Alison Williams (instructed by Oxfordshire County Council) for the Applicant

Andrea Watts (instructed by Johnson & Gaunt) for the First Respondent mother

Frances Harris (instructed by Reeds solicitors) for the Second Respondent father

Alex Perry (instructed by Royds Withy King) for the children’s guardian

Hearing dates: 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 13th, 16th June 2017

JUDGMENT

Introduction

 

1.      I am concerned with four sisters.  A, who had her eleventh birthday two weeks ago, B, who will be nine in two months’ time, C, who will be six in six weeks’ time, and D, who had her second birthday last Friday.

 

2.      All four children are currently in foster care having been removed from the care of their mother on 23rd November 2016 pursuant to interim care orders.  A and D are in one placement, and B and C together in another.  They have contact with their mother twice a week, one of those contacts is for all four sisters and their mother together.

 

3.      The father of A, B and D is GH.  He is currently in prison.  He has parental responsibility for A and B.

 

4.      C’s father is believed to be IJ.  He does not have parental responsibility for her, is not known by her to be her father and has had no involvement in her life.  She has always known GH to be her father and he treats her as his daughter.

 

5.      The local authority has been involved with the family since A was a baby.  The concerns have been about poor home conditions and neglect of the children’s basic needs, the mother’s difficulties in supervising and managing her children’s behaviour, poor school attendance and exposure to domestic violence, drug and alcohol abuse, and risky individuals coming to the home.  GH has spent significant periods of time in prison during this period.  Most recently he had been in prison from 22nd April 2015 until 30th August 2016.

 

6.      The trigger for proceedings was that on 22nd September 2016 B made an allegation that her father had sexually abused her.  GH was arrested that day and recalled to prison.  He was subsequently released but then breached his bail conditions and has once again been recalled.

 

Parties’ positions

 

7.      The parties have been ably represented by counsel, Miss Williams for the local authority, Miss Watts for the mother, Miss Harris for the father and Mr Perry for the children’s guardian.

 

8.      The local authority seeks final care orders for all the children and placement orders in respect of C and D.  Their care plans are for A and B to be placed separately in long-term foster care placements and for C and D to be adopted together.

 

9.      The mother loves each of her daughters dearly and they love her in return.  She seeks the return of all four of her daughters to her care.  She says the proceedings have been a ‘wake-up call’ and she has made positive changes to her life as a result.  If all four girls could not be returned, she would wish for just C and D to come back to her, as she could still see A and B regularly if they were in foster care.  If placed away from her care, she would wish to have more contact with her daughters than the local authority is proposing, she would also wish to have contact with C and D in the event that they were to be adopted.

 

10. The father strongly denies that he has sexually abused B.  He accepts that he is not in a position to care for any of the girls at this time.  He does not think they should return to their mother however, and supports the local authority’s plans, save that he believes A and B should be placed together not separately in foster care, and he would wish to have more contact with them than is proposed once he is released from prison.  If C and D were placed for adoption and the father was still in prison, he would like them to be brought to him for a single farewell contact before they move to their adoptive placement.  The father would wish for all four girls to have regular contact with one another, wherever they are placed.  The father also loves all four girls and takes this position at considerable emotional cost to himself, not just because of the loss he will experience at being parted from them, but because he spent much of his childhood in care, had a number of very difficult experiences, and is very anxious that his children should not suffer as he has.

 

11. The children’s guardian, CH, supports the local authority’s plans in respect of each of the four girls.

 

The law

 

12. In every care case the Court is concerned with two main questions.   Firstly, at the time proceedings were issued, had the children suffered harm or were they likely to suffer harm caused by the care given by their parents?  Secondly, if so, what orders should the Court make?

 

13. The first question is answered by consideration of whether the threshold for making orders is passed. 

 

14. The second question is answered by consideration of the children’s welfare, with reference to the factors set out in the welfare checklist at section 1(3) of the Children Act 1989.

 

Threshold

 

15. The local authority must not only prove on a balance of probabilities the facts on which it relies but must link the facts upon which it relies with the assertion that the children are at risk by demonstrating exactly why, on the given set of facts, the children are at risk of significant harm, within the meaning of section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989:

 

‘A court may only make a care order or supervision order if it is satisfied –

(a)                    that the child concerned is suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm; and

(b)                    that the harm, or likelihood of harm, is attributable to –

(i)          the care given to the child, or likely to be given to him if the order were not made, not being what it would be reasonable to expect a parent to give him; or

(ii)       the child’s being beyond parental control.

 

16. The relevant date for determining whether the children were suffering or were likely to suffer significant harm is 18th November 2016, the date proceedings were issued.

 

17. ‘Significant harm’ must be ‘significant enough to justify the intervention of the state and disturb the autonomy of the parents to bring up their children by themselves in the way they choose’ (Re MA (Care threshold) [2010] 1 FLR 431.  The Court must be satisfied that the harm is caused by the care given to or likely to be given to the children, not being what it would be reasonable to expect a parent to give the children.

 

18. What is significant harm?  At paragraph 27 of Re B (a child)(Care proceedings: threshold criteria) [2013] UKSC 33, Lord Wilson refers to the case of Re L (Children)(care proceedings: significant harm) [2006] EWCA Civ 1282:

 

‘….the rehearing was conducted by Hedley J and, by his judgment reported as Re L (Care: Threshold Criteria) [2007] 1 FLR 2050, he declined to hold that the threshold was crossed. He observed, at para 50, that "society must be willing to tolerate very diverse standards of parenting, including the eccentric, the barely adequate and the inconsistent"; and, at para 51, that "significant harm is fact-specific and must retain the breadth of meaning that human fallibility may require of it" but that "it is clear that it must be something unusual; at least something more than the commonplace human failure or inadequacy".

 

Findings of fact

 

19. The burden of proof is on the local authority making the allegations to substantiate them.  The parents (in this case the father) do not need to prove that they are not true.

 

20. The standard of proof is the balance of probabilities. Thus disputed allegations only become proven facts if it is more probable than not that they occurred. At paragraph 13 of his judgment in Re B [2008] UKHL 35 Lord Hoffman states that ‘the time has come to say, once and for all, that there is only one civil standard of proof and that is proof that the fact in issue more probably occurred than not’.

 

21. I must find either that a disputed event did occur or that it did not. I cannot sit on the fence. Baroness Hale said as follows at paragraph 32 of the Re B judgment: ‘In our legal system, if a judge finds it more likely than not that something did take place, then it is treated as having taken place. If he finds it more likely than not that it did not take place, then it is treated as not having taken place. He is not allowed to sit on the fence. He has to find for one side or the other. Sometimes the burden of proof will come to his rescue: the party with the burden of showing that something took place will not have satisfied him that it did. But generally speaking a judge is able to make up his mind where the truth lies without needing to rely upon the burden of proof’. Lord Hoffman put it this way in paragraph 2 of the Re B judgment: ‘If a legal rule requires a fact to be proved (a "fact in issue"), a judge or jury must decide whether or not it happened. There is no room for a finding that it might have happened. The law operates a binary system in which the only values are 0 and 1. The fact either happened or it did not’.

 

22. Findings of fact must be based on the evidence.  In Re A (a child)(fact-finding hearing: speculation) [2011] EWCA Civ 12 Munby LJ said, ‘it is an elementary proposition that findings of fact must be based on evidence, including inferences that can properly be drawn from the evidence and not on suspicion or speculation.’ 

 

23. Some of the evidence before me is relevant and some of it is not. I remind myself of the direction that a judge gives to a jury in the Crown Court that the fact finding tribunal does not need to decide every point that is raised. It is only necessary to decide those points that will assist in determining the central issues before me. 

 

24. I have to decide this case on the evidence before me at trial. Again, as in a criminal case, as the jury is directed, I may come to common sense conclusions based on the evidence that I accept. However I must not speculate about what evidence there might have been.

 

25. I must take account of all the evidence and each piece of evidence in the context of all other evidence:

 

‘Evidence cannot be evaluated and assessed in separate compartments.  A judge in these difficult cases must have regard to the relevance of each piece of evidence and exercise a totality of the evidence to come to the conclusion of whether the case put forward by the local authority has been made out to the appropriate standard of proof.’

(Re T [2003] EWCA Civ 558 at para 33, per Butler-Sloss P.)

 

‘A factual decision must be based on all available materials; i.e. be judged in the context and not just upon medical or scientific materials, no matter how cogent they may in isolation seem to be.’

(A County Council v a mother & others [2005] EWHC Fam 31 Ryder J)

 

26. Butler-Sloss LJ in Re P (child: compellability as witness) [1991] FCR 337 at 344; sub nom R v B CC, ex p P [1991] 2 All ER 65 at 72, said: ‘A court presented with hearsay evidence has to look at it anxiously and consider carefully the extent to which it can properly be relied upon’.  That careful analysis is essential if the trial is to remain fair.  When considering the evidence of the witnesses I must take care to identify those parts of their evidence which is part of their direct recollection, and those parts of their evidence where they are reporting what someone else has said, and to assess the relative weight of such evidence accordingly.

 

27. I remind myself of the direction that, in a criminal case, would be called the ‘Lucas’ direction because it is based on the case of R v Lucas [1981] QB 720. If proved that a person has lied, the Court must analyse the relevance of the lie to the issues in the case.  A lie may be in relation to an issue that has no relevance to the real issues before the court.  Lies may be told for many reasons.  A person may lie out of a sense of shame, misplaced loyalty, humiliation, embarrassment, panic, fear, confusion, emotional pressure, a desire to conceal other misconduct or for many other reasons.

 

28. The evidence of the parents is very important and the Court must be able to form a clear assessment of their credibility and reliability.  I further remind myself that credibility alone cannot decide this case and that, if a court concludes that a witness has lied about one matter, it does not follow that he or she has lied about everything. 

 

29. Any findings of fact are for the Court to make based on the evidence before it.  No weight should be given to the opinions of others about the credibility of a particular witness.  To the extent that any witness was asked about whether they believed or disbelieved B, I have disregarded their response.

 

Welfare

 

30. If the local authority establishes that threshold is crossed, the Court then goes on to consider what orders should be made, having regard to all the circumstances of the case and with particular reference to the factors set out at section 1(3) of the Children Act 1989.

 

31. Whenever a court is coming to a decision relating to the adoption of a child, the Court must also have regard to section 1 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, in particular the factors set out at the checklist at section 1(4) of that Act.  

 

32. With respect to the application for a placement order, section 21 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 states that the Court can only make a placement order against parental consent where it is satisfied that consent should be dispensed with.

 

33. In reaching my decision the welfare of all four children is paramount and their welfare has been at the forefront of my mind throughout this hearing.  I also have full regard to proportionality.  A court should not make any orders unless it is satisfied that it is both necessary and proportionate, and that no other less radical form of order will achieve the essential end of promoting the child’s welfare.  I also have regard to the principle that any delay is likely to be harmful to the child

 

34. Further I remind myself that the European Convention on Human Rights applies in every case of this nature.  Article 8 provides that ‘1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.  2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of his right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.’

 

35. In Re B [2013] UKSC 33 the justices of the Supreme Court considered the approach the Court should take where the local authority’s application is for adoption.  Lord Neuberger said at paragraph 82 of his judgment:

 

‘What the Strasbourg jurisprudence requires (and, I would have thought, what the rule of law in a modern, democratic society would require) is that no child should be adopted, particularly when it is against her parents’ wishes, without a judge deciding after a proper hearing, with the interests of the parents (where appropriate) and of the child being appropriately advanced, that it is necessary in the interests of the child that she be adopted.’

 

At paragraph 104 he said:

 

‘… adoption of a child against her parents’ wishes should only be contemplated as a last resort – when all else fails.  Although the child’s interests in an adoption case are ‘paramount’ (in the UK legislation and under article 21 of UNCRC)  a court must never lose sight of the fact that those interests include being brought up by her natural family, ideally her natural parents, or at least one of them.’

 

36. Baroness Hale said at paragraph 198 of Re B:

 

‘Nevertheless, it is quite clear that the test for severing the relationship between parent and child is very strict: only in exceptional circumstances and where motivated by overriding requirements pertaining to the child’s welfare, in short, where nothing else will do.  In many cases, and particularly where the feared harm has not yet materialised and may never do so, it will be necessary to explore and attempt alternative solutions.  As was said in Re C and B (Care Order: Future Harm) [2001] 1 FLR 611, at para 34,

 

‘Intervention in the family must be proportionate, but the aim should be to reunite the family where the circumstances enable that, and the effort should be devoted towards that end.  Cutting off all contact and ending the relationship between the child and their family is only justified by the overriding necessity of the interests of the child.’

 

37. I remind myself of the case of Re R (a child) [2014] EWCA in which the President of the Family Division said:

 

‘Where adoption is in the child’s best interests, local authorities must not shy away from seeking, nor courts from making, care orders with a plan for adoption, placement orders and adoption orders.  The fact is that there are occasions when nothing but adoption will do, and it is essential in such cases that a child’s welfare should not be compromised by keeping them within their family at all costs.’

 

38. More recently in Re W [2016] Civ 793 McFarlane LJ discusses the use of the phrase ‘nothing else will do’, by Baroness Hale at paragraph 198 (cited above) and again at paragraph 215 of Re B:

 

‘We all agree that an order compulsorily severing the ties between a child and her parents can only be made if ‘justified by an overriding requirement pertaining to the child’s best interests’.  In other words, the test is one of necessity.  Nothing else will do.’

 

39. At paragraph 68 of his judgment in Re W, McFarlane LJ writes:

 

‘The phrase is meaningless, and potentially dangerous, if it is applied as some freestanding, shortcut test divorced from, or even in place of, an overall evaluation of the child’s welfare.  Used properly, as Baroness Hale explained, the phrase ‘nothing else will do’ is no more, nor no less, than a useful distillation of the proportionality and necessity test as embodied in the ECHR and reflected in the need to afford paramount consideration to the welfare of the child throughout her lifetime (ACA 2002 s1).  The phrase ‘nothing else will do’ is not some sort of hyperlink providing a direct route to the outcome of a case so as to bypass the need to undertake a full, comprehensive welfare evaluation of all of the relevant pros and cons (see Re B-S [2013] EWCA Civ 1146, Re R [2014] EWCA Civ 715 and other cases).

 

The evidence

 

40. I have read and considered carefully the contents of the Court bundle and disclosure bundle.  I have heard evidence from a number of witnesses and I have viewed two video recorded interviews (“VRI”s) with B.  I have listened to audio recordings of two phone calls which took place between the mother and father and some short voicemails left by Mr Osborne on the mother’s mobile. 

B

 

41. No party asked for B to come to Court to be cross-examined.  As a result her evidence has not been tested through the process of cross-examination.  To avoid unfairness to her father who has not been able to challenge her evidence in Court I must examine closely for myself each of the pieces of evidence that come from her, and look at them in their context and together with all the other evidence in the case. 

 

42. A number of witnesses gave evidence about what B said to them.  I focus at this point on her direct evidence, which is in the form of a drawing made on 22nd September 2016 in a police assessment, and two formal police interviews.

 

43. The drawing is of her and her classmate R.  She has written next to it ‘I had to suck my dads willy becase if I didn’t he wad tal me of.’ (would tell me off).

 

Video Recorded Interviews

 

22nd September 2016

 

44. B was interviewed at about 6.45 p.m. on 22nd September 2016.  She had turned eight seven weeks earlier.  Around that time she was identified by her school as having some learning difficulties and was in the process of being assessed by an educational psychologist.  She does not appear however throughout the assessment to struggle to understand any of the questions put to her, and her answers are generally coherent and clear. 

 

45. What she says is compelling, consistent and at times, vivid.  She recounts that her dad made her suck his willy when she was six years old – before he went to prison.  She says that it happened lots of times, and that it took place in her parents’ bed.  She says that she would go into her parents’ bed if she had bad dreams, then in the morning her dad would wake her up and ask her to go under the duvet and suck his willy. 

 

46. There are a couple of times where what she says is reinforced by an action.  She is asked ‘where did he make you put the willy’, (this is a leading question in that it assumes she was made to put it somewhere).  She replies, ‘Em, like, in my mouth.’ …. ‘Like, in my whole … like, in my mouth.’  At this point she brings her hand up towards her mouth, opens her mouth wide, and does a very slight gagging motion.  At another part of the interview she says her dad was wearing his boxers, and she shows how they were pulled down towards his knees, she says ‘like he pulled his boxers down to there …’ …. ‘--- and, em … and em … my face was like that.’  As she says down to there, she moves both hands down her legs towards her knees as though pulling down shorts.  As she is saying ‘that’, she brings her face downwards in quite a jerky motion towards and parallel to her legs.  Both these moments were for me vivid and compelling evidence that she was re-enacting something that she had done before.

 

47. She is asked a few leading questions, and sometimes she does follow the lead, but she is not in my view suggestible – she is asked was she made upset or angry and responds that‘it made me quite upset and made me quite angry’, so modifying the question.  She is asked to try and remember specific times and is asked did it happen on Christmas and birthdays?  She answers very quickly, ‘the only thing I know it didn’t happen is on a birthday and Christmas’, again not following the lead.

 

48. She is sometimes a bit muddled about timing.  For example she says ‘I can’t remember what day it was’ …. ‘but I definitely know it was .. it was before he had been put in prison’.  She is clear that it happened in the past, when she was six.  She then says it was in the day rather than at night, and then she moves to the present tense saying she and her dad were in bed ‘because sometimes we like lay ins.’  She is asked if she sleeps in her parent’s bed often and she says ‘I sleep with them just in case I have bad dreams.’  She is asked how many times it happened and she says, ‘It’s happened every single time I slept in my dad’s bed since after he had been in prison so.’  This is a very confusing answer.  She says she doesn’t remember the first time it happened and when asked about the last time says ‘the last time it happened was, em … was after he had disappeared and after he had disappeared into the … em … thingy.’  Again, it is difficult to know what she means.  Later on again she is asked how many times it happened and says, ‘I think it happened all …. all … all the time that he had been in prison.’  She is asked how that could be and clarifies, ‘no, before he had been put in prison.’ 

 

49. This section of evidence is confusing, but at other times she is very clear about the time frame in which she says this happened, and when she is asked to clarify she does repeat a number of times that this happened when she was six, and that it happened before her father went to prison.  B turned six on 3rd August 2014.  Her father had recommenced his relationship with the mother in the summer of 2014 and was living permanently in the home from around October 2014 until he was remanded in custody at the end of April 2015. 

 

50. On a number of occasions Special Investigator (SI) Bevan is trying to direct her to talk about a particular instance of alleged abuse but when he asked when did it finish or when did it stop, she replies as if he has asked her about when the whole period of alleged abuse came to an end.  In the following exchange she is asked ‘what did you two do after it had finished?’, and replies:

 

‘Em, we just said … I said, “Dad, I really shouldn’t have done that” and then he said, “Okay, I know what you mean about.  I shouldn’t have let you do that too.”

 

Okay.  And did he say anything else to you?

 

‘No, that’s it.  Then I added a bit more to it ….

 

I said … I said, “Dad, I need to know if you’ve got the habit of me sucking your willy … willy.”

 

Okay.  And what did he say to that?

 

He said, “I ain’t got the habit.  I’m just … I’m just … I’m just liking it, that’s all.  I ain’t got the habit.”

 

Okay.  What do you mean by habit?

 

‘I mean, like I … I think … I think, like, before he had been inside I think he had liked me doing it.

 

Okay.

 

‘But I didn’t like doing it.’

 

51. This information comes freely and there is no directing or leading from the questioner.  It seems that she is talking about a time from before her father went to prison, but then she seems to go on to describe it as a conversation that happened once he was out of prison - many months later.  Again this is a bit confusing, but I am not persuaded that it shows she is an unreliable witness, just that she is not able to be precise about when particular conversations happened.  But what she is saying is consistent with the main thrust of her evidence - which is that it happened very often during the time her father was at home and before he went to prison, when she was six, but it had not happened since his return about three weeks before the time she is being interviewed. 

 

52. A theme that B returns to throughout the interview is that she didn’t want to do it but she felt if she didn’t she would be in the deepest trouble, or she would get told off:

 

‘Em, every time I had to sleep then after a minute, a bit of time when my dad was awake I was still asleep, then he had woke me up and then said, “B, can you … can you go and … B, can you go and, em … can you go under the duvet and suck my willy?  And I said, “Dad …”   I was thinking, “no”.  No, because that isn’t a thing like they should do.

 

No.  So how did that make you feel when he made you do that?

 

‘I felt … I felt like I really shouldn’t have done it.  But if he was going to shut me off, I should have done … I really shouldn’t have done it but … but I didn’t want to get told off.’

 

53. Later on she is asked how talking about it makes her feel and she says:

 

‘It makes me feel like I really shouldn’t have listened to him but as a daughter I really should’ve …. I shouldn’t but … but I should listen to my parents.’

 

54. The way B talks about these feelings of conflict to me is powerful and persuasive evidence that she is recounting the truth, and trying to describe and make sense of the feelings that she had.  It gives depth to her account and to my mind makes it all the more credible.

 

55. At another point of the interview she says:

 

‘Erm, basically when he told me to suck his willy I felt like, “No! No, we shouldn’t do that” and “No, no way.  I’m not touching that” because that’s a private, it’s a private bit, but of a man.

 

Yeah.

 

And then .. and then he said, “If you don’t do it I will … I will tell you off.”

 

56. I did not think this line rang true, and it sits out of kilter with what she says elsewhere that her dad asked her to suck her willy, and she did it because she was worried she’d be in trouble or because she felt she had to listen to him, rather than that he threatened her with a telling off or otherwise.  Where elsewhere she seems to have a good ear for dialogue, this does not sound convincing.  While children are often scared they will be told off by their parents it is I would think unusual to be threatened with a telling off, more likely a parent might say ‘if you do that I will be cross with you’, or else if you do that there will be a consequence.  It is also at odds with the ease with which she describes the friendly way in which she asked her father if this had become a habit, and the conversation she also describes when she says she said to her dad, ‘”dad, look, I don’t want to do it any more” so I said, “please can we stop it?” and she says he said, ‘”yeah, we can stop it.”’

 

57. That this line is out of step with other parts of the evidence does not make me think that she is lying about her father having threatened her with a telling off or otherwise.  I think this is all part of her exploration of the complicated and difficult feelings about whether she was ‘made’ to suck her father’s willy or whether it was something that she and he did together with her agreement but she did not like it.  It is consistent with the pervading sense she describes elsewhere that she would be told off or be in ‘deep deep trouble’ if she did not do what he asked.

 

58.  She does not give a full description of the genital area or the penis, but she does give details about her father’s boxer shorts, and when asked to describe his willy says ‘it looked hairy.  It looked … it looked … oh I really can’t describe it.  It looked that disgusting.’  She goes on to describe how sucking felt ‘funny’, ‘yeah, all the … all the hair, year, that was … that was sticking … that was on my tongue and sorts, year.  It felt … I didn’t really like it.  That’s why I had to stop.’

 

59. Again this is a vivid description that to my mind makes B’s account very credible.

 

15th December 2016

 

60. There is a marked contrast in the B we see in this second VRI.  She is reticent, looks down at the floor and generally engages less with SI Bevan who is again the questioner.  It is obvious that B is feeling very sad about being separated from her family.  As soon as she is asked to say again what happened to her, she replies, ‘I forgot’.  She is reminded that last time she told SI Bevan that her daddy makes you suck his willy and is asked did that happen?  She says, ‘basically I couldn’t have remembered because it was such a long time ago.  Then I suddenly remembered it.  I think it wasn’t him I think it was a dream or someone else.’  She is asked, so you think it was a dream or someone else and she says, ‘I remembered it was just a dream.’

 

61. She is asked when she remembered it was just a dream and says ‘I remembered it basically when my mum said “was it just a dream” and I said “yes”.  She then recounts the conversation she had with her mother, which is a bit muddled but it seems she recalls being talked to about her behaviour, being asked whether she loved her mum or dad more, and she then says her mother said to her “was it a dream or daddy actual did it” … ‘and I said it was a dream.’ 

 

62. She says again, ‘I think what happened with daddy was a dream’ and is then asked to consider whether it might have been someone else.  The dialogue goes:

 

‘I do not know.’ 

 

You do not know?  Okay.  How are you feeling about all of this now?

 

I am just missing mummy a lot.

 

Just missing mummy a lot?  Okay.  That is fine.

 

I do not know why they all tried, tried to be putting us in care.

 

Just to make sure you are safe B.

 

I was always safe at my old house.

 

63. This ‘retraction’ is to my mind evidence that B no longer wishes to implicate her dad in the abuse, but she does not say in terms that it never happened.  She says ‘what happened with my dad was a dream’ or she has forgotten or it might be someone else.  She does not give any positive indication of who that someone else might be.  It would appear her mother had offered her a possible way out with the suggestion that it might all have been a dream.  In my judgment the evidence she gives does not negate the evidence that B gave in the first VRI. 

Mrs G

 

64. Mrs G works at B’s school.  She came across as a caring and committed lady who has provided valuable support to B.  Mrs G has made notes of her conversations with B that appeared significant to her and passed them on to the leadership team.  I accept that her notes are a reliable account of what B was saying to her, but that is hearsay evidence and not evidence of the truth of B’s statements.  There was one significant moment however when Mrs G showed me how B had done a spitting action, sticking her tongue out as people do when they have tasted something disgusting.  B was at the time not talking about her father but a man called KL, saying that it was he who had made her perform oral sex.

Mrs S and Mr L

 

65. Mrs S and Mr L were the teaching assistants at the swimming pool when B told her classmates R and C that she had sucked her daddy’s willy.  Upon reflection they agreed that it had not perhaps been the best idea to say to B that she had said something inappropriate and to punish her for it by making her sit out the whole of the swimming lesson.  However, I appreciate they were relatively junior members of staff faced with a difficult and unexpected situation, away from the school premises.  Once they had returned to school they did exactly the right thing by going immediately to the senior leadership team.  

 

66. They were both asked about B’s demeanour, and their own reactions to her; whether or not they thought B was making a serious disclosure or was just pushing at boundaries by saying something outrageous.  Given they both accept they misjudged the situation somewhat, that there is no textbook which tells us that we can discover the truth of an allegation of this sort from the manner in which it is first made, and that ultimately it is for me to make findings on the evidence before me, I disregard their views in this respect.  They were in all other respects reliable and helpful witnesses trying to assist the Court to the best of their abilities. 

 

SI Bevan

 

67. SI Bevan conducted the two VRIs.  He came across to me as professional, sensitive and thoughtful.  He was ready to accept criticism that he regarded as fair, for example when the odd leading question was pointed out to him, or when I asked whether there should have been more exploration with B not just about the difference between a truth and a lie but the purpose of the interview and the need to be truthful when questioned.  However, he defended himself well against criticism he felt was unfair.  Bar a very few exceptions, his questions in the VRIs were open and guiding B’s focus, but were not suggestive or directive of her answers.  Although B did not have an intermediary with her for the first VRI and there were some muddles about timing, in my judgment the questions appear to be appropriate and sensitive to B’s age and understanding and aimed at helping her to give the best evidence to the police. 

 

68. I have read the intermediary report prepared at the end of October 2016 with a view to the approach should she have to give evidence in the Crown Court.  It appears to me that SI Bevan’s approach to questioning was in line with the recommendations within that report.

 

69. I thought SI Bevan showed particular sensitivity in the second interview and did not push B or seek to challenge her changed position.   

 

70. SI Bevan conducted the first assessment interview with B in which she was not very forthcoming but drew the picture with writing exhibited to his statement.  The picture has a stark and shocking impact. 

DC Hurley

 

71. Like his colleague, DC Hurley was ready to concede if he thought criticism was fair but he stood up for himself if not.  He had a second assessment interview with B after her mother reported that she had retracted her allegations.  The notes of the interview were taken and then typed up by DP.  There were some discrepancies between her handwritten and typed notes and a small section missing altogether, but generally there was consistency, and what B is recorded as saying then chimes with what she said in the second VRI, that she has changed her mind about it being her father, it was someone else or she can’t remember, or it was a dream.  She is noted as saying, ‘no one told me to say it wasn’t daddy … daddy’s in prison because I said it was him – he actually never.’  She is noted as saying that she feels bad because ‘I shouldn’t have told R.’

DP, social worker 

 

72. I was very impressed by DP as a witness and found her to be a helpful, insightful and reliable witness.  Her witness statement was detailed and based on a thorough review of the history but also her own direct experience of the family.  She did not need her notes to recall the times she had spent with the family and had very clear memories of her visits.  She described well not just when meetings took place or who was there and what discussed, but described the atmosphere and dynamics of the family on her visits, and seemed to have a good insight into the girls’ different personalities.  She told me that A would generally stand up and leave the room or go upstairs if she or other social work professionals visited.  She described a time when she visited and the mother sought to discuss B’s allegations and her change of position in front of the children.  DP told me she could see the alarm on B’s face and the atmosphere changed immediately.  She described another occasion when she arrived at 7.45 a.m. to find the house in darkness and B the only one up in just her knickers and walking around the living room which was visible to the street.  On another occasion DP came to the property about the same time and the mother swore at her in front of the children. 

CP, social worker

 

73. CP has provided a final statement, parenting assessments of both parents, a together and apart assessment and the care plans for all four children. 

 

74. All these documents show her to be professional, diligent and thorough in her approach.  Her analysis is supported by the evidence she has obtained from her own direct experience and from gathering information from others.  It is clear that she has spent a great deal of time anxiously considering the various realistic options for the children, and weighed them in the balance.  She has not proceeded on the basis of assumptions, but has built up a good understanding of each of the children, their particular needs and the family dynamics.  She has fairly acknowledged the positives about the parents as well as looking at the negatives.  She has considered new information as it has arisen; she is not rigid in her views.  For example, the guardian wanted her to think further about different ways in which C and D might be supported to make the transition to an adoptive placement when they have not lived together for seven months, and what impact there might be on A and B respectively to be left behind in foster care while their younger sisters moved on to a very different future.  Over the intervening weekend CP did give further thought to this and came back with some suggestions, including the possibility of a foster to adopt placement or not ruling out a bridging placement.

The father

 

75. GH has had some major difficulties arising out of his own childhood - much of it spent within the care system. He has been in and out of prison for many years and has issues to deal with around drug and alcohol misuse, and his mental health.  His relationship with his children is obviously very important and precious to him and I am in no doubt that he loves them all very much and that they love him in return.  The house seems to get tidier when he is home and he plays his part with care of the children, however, his relationship with their mother has been very volatile, there has been domestic violence and they both accept the children have seen them arguing and him losing his temper in front of them on many occasions.  So his presence in the home may have reduced some difficulties but created others.

 

76. In many respects his evidence seemed reliable and was consistent with his witness statements, and the evidence of others, in particular with respect to his evidence about the state of the mother’s home and this being a source of arguments, and the reason for reports by him to the local authority in the past.  He accepted all the doors on the house save the bathroom and shower room had been removed.  While he perhaps sought to minimise somewhat, I accepted his evidence that when he was home people often came round to the house to drink and take drugs (he said they did not take drugs in the house but out of the home then coming back to the house), that friends used the house to sofa-surf or just to stay after an evening, he said the children did sometimes get out of bed while people were there and would just be told to go back to bed.   

 

77. It is not for the father to establish that he did not sexually abuse his daughter as is alleged, but for the local authority to prove that he did, so he is not to be criticised for failing to provide an explanation or evidence that would prove he did not.  However, while the burden of proof does not rest with him, I must still assess his credibility as a witness, as I consider the allegations against him.

 

78. I have considered all the written statements he has filed.  In addition there is a note of his police interview.  Regrettably the police recording equipment was broken so there is no transcript so I must be cautious about the weight I give to the note.  However both the father, SI Bevan and DC Hurley did agree that the solicitor’s note seemed to be accurate.  In his written statements the father has said that the family lived in a busy household with four children and with no doors on any of the rooms there was no opportunity for the abuse described to have taken place.  He has more recently recalled a time when he saw his friend KL be led by B into her room and he said he was lying in his bed, went back to sleep and he noticed about five or ten minutes later them coming out and KL adjusting his flies, B’s hands near her mouth. 

 

79. This evidence came for the first time in a witness statement dated 17th March 2017, so after proceedings had been issued, and after he had heard that B had identified KL as her abuser.  If he had concerns about KL I would have expected him to raise them sooner.

 

80. He gave oral evidence to me that when he had been at home between October 2014 and April 2015 he was out at work on construction sites every week day sometimes starting as early as 5am.  The father said that B would always be the first up and would come into the bedroom in the mornings, but then he said as a rule B would not come into bed, and then he said she had never been in bed with him. 

 

81. I found his evidence about whether B and he were ever in bed together to be a bit muddled and not always consistent.  He left me with the impression that he did in fact like a lie-in of a morning, recalling for example how it was normal for him to be lying in bed and sleepily rolling over back to sleep again the time that he says he saw B and KL together.  B said he and she liked lie-ins.  He also described how B would always be the first one up and his irritation at how she might wake up the baby so as to get the adults up and out of bed.  The father volunteered that if no one was staying in the house the mother often slept on the sofa downstairs.  This is consistent with the mother’s evidence - she said that if she was sleeping downstairs and B was up the father would often say to her ‘pop her in bed with me’.  In the notes of the police interview the father says, ‘She never shared a bed with me.  She has been in the bed if she had a nightmare but that is it.  Mum is usually there … She wet the bed now and again and she would come to our bed. … I would be going off to work early and if the missus is there it leaves no room. …’

 

82. In my judgment this evidence given to the police the day the of B’s allegations is inconsistent with the father’s later oral evidence to me that B was never in his bed.  Having regard to all the evidence, I note however that it is consistent with B’s evidence that she would get into her parents’ bed if she had a nightmare.  It is consistent with the father’s later evidence to me that the mother often slept on the sofa, corroborated by the mother.  It is evidence that B did sometimes get into her parents’ bed if she had wet her own bed.  So on a balance of probabilities, I find that B did, as she says, get into her parents’ bed after she had a nightmare and that there would be times when her mother was not there and it was just her and her father in bed together.

 

83.  I would agree with Miss Harris’s interpretation of the voice mail recordings that the father is not encouraging or goading the mother into undermining or attacking B when they speak about the allegations.  I would agree that he appears to try to neutralise what she says by redirecting the mother’s focus to what she has to do. 

 

84. I was shown a number of intimate photos of the father’s genital area taken in prison.  He has a large number of tattoos both around and on the penis which he says he did himself when in prison.  I am unpersuaded that B’s failure to mention the existence of these tattoos means that she cannot have been telling the truth about having been abused or about who abused her.  That could only be the case if she had given a description of clearly seeing the genital area of her abuser and describing it in a way that made it clear there were no tattoos.  She did not. 

 

85. Similarly it is right to notice that the genital area is shaved in the photographs and if the father’s genital area was shaved like that at the time of the alleged abuse then that would appear to be inconsistent with B’s vivid description of the penis being hairy and having hair sticking to her mouth.  The mother agreed that particularly in the summer months the father tended to shave his genital area, but she said did sometimes let it grow a bit.  I cannot regard the evidence of a photograph taken in 2017 as reliable evidence as to whether it was similarly and consistently shaved in 2014 to 2015.  The father was not asked about this in his police interview, but that B had mentioned having hair in her mouth was something he was aware about when he was talking to the mother on the phone in October 2016.    He does not however mention in his first statement that his genital area would have been shaved for all the relevant period of time concerned.  B was not asked further questions about this.

 

86. I was left in no doubt that the father adores his children, that he regards C as his own, that he does have a special bond with A in particular.  With B he described their relationship as more distant, he had been in prison when she was small.  He showed some reflection in terms of her being a middle child – he said whenever he came back there was always a new baby to worry about, but he did make an effort to make special time for B.  He said she was a child who tells lies, that she would steal, lie about it, make up stories about what she had done in the day.  He said she was a child who was over-friendly with strangers and not inhibited; she would walk around the house while getting dressed. 

 

87. It would not be surprising in the circumstances if he felt at a distance from her at the moment because of the consequences for him of what she has said, particularly if not true.  Other witnesses agree with the description of B as disinhibited; her teachers said at swimming she would walk around the changing rooms with no clothes on, and she has been described as attention seeking.  Mrs G did say B would say one thing one day and something different the next.  I have to be a bit careful with this evidence because since the disclosure B has said different things at different times, but it is evident that she has been influenced to do so, and because she is aware of the consequences of what she said earlier.  In general, I have not been aware that teachers or other professionals have been concerned that B is a child who fabricates stories.  In any event, if a person is regarded as generally untruthful that does not mean they are incapable of telling the truth.

 

88. Whatever the findings of the Court the father’s position is to support the local authority in its plans to remove all four children from their mother and to place the younger two for adoption.  He does not agree that A and B should be separated.  Given his own experiences of the care system it must have been very difficult to reach a point where he considers that A and B would be better in care than at home.  It cannot have been easy for the mother to hear this, and the last few months have plainly been difficult for them both mother and father apparently have reached a point where they both feel the relationship cannot be rekindled.  

 

89. However, it was moving to see the father talk about his experience of seeing A in contact and how she looked healthy and better than he had ever seen her.  The father would be heartbroken to see the children be taken from him, but he is genuine in his wish to put the children’s welfare before his own feelings.  I do not think that he is motivated by any sort of spite towards the mother or wish to hurt her.  He did acknowledge she loves the children with all her heart and they love her.  However he supports the local authority because he genuinely thinks their plan would be best for the children. 

EF

 

90. EF loves her children and they love her.  Although she has also reached a point where she sees no future in her relationship with GH and has asserted that she believes him to have sexually abused B, she did acknowledge that all the children adored him and that he adored them.  When talking about the children and the home and her relationship with GH her evidence chimed with the weight of the evidence about the difficulties she has in keeping the home clean and tidy and to manage the needs of all four girls together, and properly to supervise them and safeguard them from harm. 

 

91. When it came to the relationships she had I think she was less clear, tended to minimise, and there were significant inconsistencies that made me doubt that she was being truthful.  I do not accept her account about MN’s presence in the home and I consider the notes made by social workers at the time, leading to her entering into a written agreement are likely to be reliable.  She actively concealed her ill-advised relationship with OP from the local authority. 

 

92. She misled the local authority about her contact with the father immediately after B made her disclosure, saying she had not been in touch with him when she had. 

 

93. She has said in her witness evidence and oral evidence to the Court that she believes B, and she did go to the police on 13th October 2016 to report what B had said to her, recorded as follows:

 

‘she told me “it all started when you used to sleep on the sofa when I was 6.  I used to get in daddy’s bed if I had a nightmare, I got in daddy’s bed, went to sleep, when I woke up in the morning daddy asked me to suck his willy.  I didn’t want to, but I done it because you should always do things your parents tell you to.”  I asked how many times has that happened?  She told me “Once”.

94. There is then a further description of a time when she and the girls were staying at her mother’s house when there as a power cut and the father came and took B and C to stay at the family home.

95. This evidence is significant and adds weight to B’s account because it is consistent with what she said in the VRI.

96. While giving this evidence to the police however, the mother appears also to have drawn to the police’s attention that her initial thoughts about B’s disclosure were that it was not true, that she has had problems in the past with B making up stories about being bullied and that on 22nd September 2016 when B got home from the interview and found her father had been arrested because of what he had done to her (as informed by her mother), the mother reports B as saying, ‘he didn’t do anything to me my friends made it up.’   When she saw the police a second time the mother remarked that B was now changing her story all the time.

 

97. Whatever her motivation the statements she made to the father on the phone and then to the police were very inconsistent and it is clear that she was wholly ill-equipped to support B emotionally following the allegations B made.  I don’t doubt she regrets saying to the father that he should get his solicitor to ‘rip the shit out of [B]’ but it is appalling and awful that she said it.  Her explanation that she said this because the father’s family was on her back is wholly unconvincing.  This statement was consistent with her having described B as a ‘fucking little liar’, and with the general tone of her conversations with the father in which she made it very clear that she did not believe B. The mother’s actions suggest she had a plan that she would make it known to the police and local authority that she supported B in order to avoid the risk of the children being removed from her care (she says as much in an email to the father, that she believes him but she has to support B to keep her kids).  In addition she would try to convince the local authority she had separated from him but was all the time reassuring the father that she believed he was innocent and that she loved him. 

 

98. It is in my judgment beyond doubt that she influenced B to say that the abuse was all a dream.  There is clear evidence that she has discussed B’s allegations with her or in her presence on a number of occasions: the conversations she reported to the police, the conversation B recounted in the second VRI, the discussion with DP who recalled the children being present, and the ‘facebook’ discussion with A.   

99. The information about going through facebook is wholly unconvincing, it had the ring of a repeated story.  I just do not understand why B would freeze in the way suggested and question who KL was when as I understand it he was known by all the family as Uncle K.  He was the father of the father’s sister’s child.  He had lived with the family for a couple of months.  It is not credible that B would need to ask who he was. 

 

100.                     Now at final hearing the mother once again says she does believe that the father abused B but she has not recalled anything specifically to mind that gave her concern.  I did not get the sense that she was trying to piece things together about this, or that there had been a particular moment when she became more certain, having previously supported the allegation against KL.  Her evidence about this was all pretty blank.  I do not criticise her for this; it is not for her to have a particular belief, but for the Court to decide on a balance of probabilities.   However, it seems pretty clear that she did not want to believe that the father had abused B or did not want the consequences of it being true to come to pass and this may have in my judgment led her to lose sight of B’s needs at a very difficult time for her.

 

101.                     EF in a very moving part of her evidence told me she struggled with friendships and she presented as somewhat lonely and someone who found it difficult to maintain the boundaries between friendships and relationships.  She seems to find it difficult to say no and seems to be persuaded that if a man has done something for her (for example LM fitting carpets, OP hanging doors) then she must give something back.   

 

102.                     She has not found it easy to work with professionals who have come to support her and while other family members or friends seem to have been around at certain points, I do not get the sense that she has any stable networks of support, for example friendships with other mothers at the school, or nursery.  When the mother described the incident when A dropped D when she was a baby, the mother being in the toilet at the time, the sense I got was that there have been times when she has been looking after her children on her own when she has felt completely alone and overwhelmed, this being just one example. 

 

JP, AC, Contact supervisors

 

103.                     JP and AC gave brief evidence which was clear, consistent with their contemporary notes and with their own memories.  I found these witnesses to be wholly reliable and I accept their evidence in full.

OP

 

104.                     Perhaps the least said about OP the better.  He entered into a relationship with the mother just before Valentine’s day. They met on a dating website.  Within a week they had met in person and within three weeks they had become engaged.  The mother said she didn’t really want to but OP said he would kill himself if she said no.  Within a further three weeks they had separated very acrimoniously and OP then made some extremely serious allegations against the mother to the police and to social services. 

 

105.                     He was then reluctant to come to Court to stand by what he had said.  The text messages he sent to the mother are pretty unedifying to read and contain clear threats to give information that would harm the mother’s chances of getting her children back.  The evidence he gave about the mother’s drug use was proved wholly wrong by the tests she did.  His evidence that he had met with A was inconsistent with the evidence of the mother and Ms Purdy and I reject it.  Even at its highest his evidence is of a conversation he says he had with the mother, not of the truth of what she is alleged to have said.  The allegations have been fully investigated and there is no evidence to support them.  Mr Osborne was excessively reluctant to come to Court to stand by what he had said.  He did eventually arrive at Court but didn’t stay to be cross-examined despite support being given to him to give his evidence from the witness suite.  I wholly reject what he said and will make no findings at all based on his evidence to the Court which would appear to have been made maliciously, cruelly and only to hurt the mother.  He has caused delay in these proceedings and a great deal of upset to the mother. 

AF

 

106.                     AF is a family finder and gave evidence that was consistent with her report about the steps she would take to identify an adoptive placement for C and D in the event that care and placement orders were made.  She considers she would be able to find a placement for both girls within six months and that she could move them there within a month or two of that.  Like CP she is instinctively against the idea of a further interim placement for the girls as a bridging placement, but would not rule it out altogether.

CH

 

107.                     CH was put under huge pressure of time because the local authority’s final evidence came in late, but she was able to meet with the girls recently and has prepared detailed and fully-considered final recommendations.  She has had positive meetings with the older three girls and was able to find out about their wishes and feelings.

 

108.                     The guardian has evidently been very concerned about the local authority’s plans which provide for the two older girls to be brought up in separate placements and for the younger two to be adopted away from the family altogether.  However, the guardian has carried out a very full analysis based on a thorough appraisal of all the relevant information and her own independent assessment.  She has in my view looked at this from all angles and considered the benefits and disadvantages of a number of different options, not just the local authority’s final plan.  She is an experienced children’s guardian and in evidence she explained the reasons for her recommendations clearly and persuasively.  I pay very close attention to her opinion.

Findings on threshold

Sexual abuse

Allegation 1

During a period of time from 2014 until July 2015, on more than one occasion, the father, GH, sexually abused B by making her perform oral sex on him.

 

109.                     In the light of all the evidence I have seen and heard, on a balance of probability I find this allegation proved.

110.                     I have come to my conclusion for the following reasons:

(i)                I consider B’s evidence as a whole to be compelling, consistent and her descriptions detailed and vivid;

(ii)             In particular she described her father’s boxer shorts, the hair in her mouth, being under the duvet and she used actions to illustrate what she meant.  In my judgment she would not have been able to describe in such vivid detail what happened if she was making it up, or if it happened with a different person;

(iii)           B clearly identifies her father as the perpetrator and in particular what she says again and again about the difficult feelings this gave rise to (I didn’t want to do it but I didn’t want him to shut me off … or tell me off … I didn’t want to do it but you should do what your parents say), make it more likely than not that he was the perpetrator rather than anyone else;

(iv)           The retraction she gave was clearly done so in the knowledge that her father had been sent to prison as a result of what she had said, and following at least one conversation with her mother in which she had been given a way out – it was a dream or it was someone else.  Even though she retracts, she does not quite go so far as to say that the abuse never happened, she says that she can’t remember it or what happened was a dream.  In my judgment this evidence does not negate the powerful effect of the VRI;

(v)              B’s time frame is consistent with the facts.  She was six when her father was living there.  The abuse stopped when he went to prison and the memory of it popped back in her head once he had returned to live in the house.  Whether the ‘habit’ conversation happened after he had come home or before, I believed B’s account and it is consistent with the weight of the rest of her evidence that this is something that happened a lot then stopped at her request;

(vi)           Before she knew her father would be sent to prison and she and her sisters removed into care, B was consistent in her allegation, notwithstanding that she was immediately punished for it by having to sit out her swimming lesson.  She repeated it to DC Hurley, going so far as to write it down in black and white, then in interview to SI Bevan and apparently then again to her mother.  The mother’s account to the police of what B told her appears to be very similar to what B told SI Bevan;

(vii)         The fact that B did not mention her father’s tattoos does not in my judgment make it any less likely that she was abused by him.  She was not asked about the tattoos, the abuse is said to have happened under a duvet.  The fact that she has not given a detailed description of her father’s penis does not mean that the detailed descriptions she gave elsewhere were wrong;

(viii)      The fact that the father’s genital area was sometimes shaved does not in my judgment make B’s account of encountering hair unbelievable;

(ix)           The father’s evidence about whether B was ever in bed with him was in my judgment muddled and inconsistent, and on a balance of probabilities, having regard to all the evidence, I find that B did come into bed with him when she had nightmares, or had wet the bed, and that if her mother was sleeping downstairs she would also sometimes slip into bed with her father early in the morning.  So I find there was the opportunity for the abuse to take place.  That the house was a busy household and there were no doors on any of the rooms except the bathrooms does not in my judgment make it less likely that sexual abuse of the sort described could occur.  What is described is a small child being asked to hide underneath a duvet in the early morning, this could happen even if others were in the household;

(x)              The mother is described as having ‘no sense of danger’ and the environment in which the children was raised appears to have been one in which boundaries of behaviour for the children were very unclear.  B is described as walking round the house half-naked.  The children have not been given clear guidance about how to protect themselves, and have been exposed to a number of risky individuals within the household.  Within this environment, it is credible that sexual abuse could have occurred;

(xi)           While I accept the father’s evidence that he was often out of the house early to work, I consider there is sufficient evidence to establish on a balance of probabilities that he would have been in bed with B early in the morning more than ten times and less than fifty times (her estimate of the number of times abuse occurred) between the time he rekindled his relationship with the mother in the summer of 2014 and the time he was remanded to custody at the end of April 2015;

(xii)         B’s suggestions about KL being the perpetrator were not backed up by any allegation to the police and were plainly influenced by a discussion with her mother.  The father’s memory of the incident he says he saw involving KL only occurred to him after the issue of proceedings;

(xiii)      The father’s account of talking to A and B about stranger danger on the morning of 22nd September 2016 would not in my judgment account for B’s detailed account, (his reported comment that it is not OK to ‘kiss dick’ may well have been the trigger for her disclosure later that day but I that is speculation on my part and not relevant to my findings);

 

(xiv)       The father said the mother let the children watch inappropriate material on TV, giving Family Guy and One Born Every Minute as examples.  I am not persuaded that this sort of programme would have given B the idea to make the allegations that she did.  On a balance of probabilities I am satisfied they are based on her actual experience and not as a result of being influenced by watching TV or the internet.

Allegation 2

In the alternative, B was sexually abused by a risky and inappropriate adult male whom the mother allowed to stay in the family home, exposing the children to risk and exposing B to sexual harm.

 

111.                     Having made findings in respect of allegation 1, no findings are made in respect of allegation 2.

 

Allegation 3, 4, and 5

The mother has pressured/influenced B to withdraw her disclosures against the father and to falsely accuse another adult male of sexual abuse, causing her emotional harm and exposing her to the risk of further sexual abuse.

The mother caused B further emotional harm in relation to the sexual abuse by:

 

a.             Showing inadequate empathy and failing to support B in relation to her disclosures and latterly, actively undermining B in relation to her disclosures;

b.             Browsing the father’s Facebook pages in front of the children and exposing B to seeing photographs of her abuser;

c.             Blaming B for the father being in prison and/or allowing others, particularly her siblings, to do so;

d.             Inciting the father to cause B emotional trauma by suggesting that he should get his legal representative to “rip the shit out of B on the stand” at the criminal trial thereby colluding with the father to undermine B.

5.             The mother caused the children emotional harm and exposed them to the risk of further harm by:

a.             Allowing A and C to victimise B and blame her for the father being in prison;

b.             Exposing all the children to the poisonous atmosphere in the family home as a result of her attitude towards B’s disclosures against the father;

c.             Discussing the sexual abuse in the presence and earshot of the children;

d.             Being dishonest and lying to social work professionals about her communications with the father;

e.             Suggesting to the children that social care would be removing them from their home;

f.              Being aggressive and using foul language to social care professionals in front of the children and failing to work with social care professionals.

112.                     I am satisfied on a balance of probabilities that the mother did put pressure or otherwise seek to influence B to withdraw her disclosures against the father.  In my judgment this would have caused B emotional harm but I would strike out the ‘and exposing her to the risk of further sexual abuse’ as the local authority has not in my judgment established that.

113.                     For reasons given below, I am not satisfied that the mother ‘colluded with the father to undermine B’ although I find that in suggesting that lawyers ‘rip the shit out of B’, her intention was that B’s allegations would be undermined.

114.                     I am satisfied that all the other allegations are made out, applying the standard of a balance of probabilities and having regard in particular to the recorded phone calls between mother and father, the local authority’s evidence (in particular the evidence of DP which I found to be reliable and persuasive), and of the mother’s evidence, in which I found a number of inconsistencies.  I prefer DP’s recollection that the mother did talk about B’s allegations in the presence of the children and did not ask them to leave the room first. 

115.                     When B voiced her concerns about social services not believing her or wanting to take her and her sisters into care, or that her father had gone to prison because of what she had said, I am satisfied having considered all the evidence, that she did so because the concerns had arisen out of conversations she had with her mother.  The mother accepted that B had seen a formal letter from the local authority setting out its intention to apply for removal.  I was not persuaded that the mother was unable to prevent B from reading it, on a balance of probabilities, I find that the mother has discussed the care proceedings with B and deliberately shared the local authority’s letter to her with B.

116.                     The chronology is not evidence in itself but the local authority’s witness evidence and the together and apart assessment sets out the difficulties between A and B, and C and B.  B is noted as having reported that both B and C attacked her, and the weight of the evidence is that B has in effect been scapegoated by other family members.  I would accept that there is evidence of difficulties in the sibling relationships in any event and that if B felt responsible for her father being in prison and all the siblings being in care that may not all have come from her sisters.  However, the mother was clear to the police that as soon as B arrived home and found her father had gone to prison her mother said it was because of what he had done, and she plainly made a connection fairly quickly thereafter that it was her disclosure that caused him to be in prison and the local authority to seek to remove the children from home.  The mother has in my judgment talked to the girls about the proceedings, she has blamed B in strong language to the father, and on a balance of probabilities I find that she did allow A and C to blame B, and that by virtue of her interventions with B, the atmosphere in the home could be described as ‘poisonous.’

Allegation 6 – neglect

 

6.                 The children have been exposed to long-term neglect by the mother. These include:

a.      Poor attendance at school

b.      Frequently attending school hungry due to not being adequately fed at home

c.      The home conditions have been frequently seen to be very poor – dirty and on occasions, with dangerous materials within the children’s reach

d.      The children have frequently been seen to be grubby, in dirty clothing and with recurrent headlice.

e.      The children have poor behavioural boundaries. A is aggressive to the mother and her siblings and has been found to have been taking photographs of her genitalia with a male at school.

These concerns have remained despite social services’ involvement with the family for many years.

 

117.                     On a balance of probabilities I am satisfied each of these allegations is made out, having regard to the local authority’s evidence, and the evidence of the father and the mother.  While I accept that B continued to ask for a second breakfast at school even when she had been given breakfast by her foster carers, and that there have been times when she has had a proper breakfast at home with her mother, there is also a significant body of evidence to suggest that this was not consistent and there were other times when the children were not fed adequately at home.  I would accept that the evidence about B’s need to eat glue, or blu-tak or other items is not to do with her being hungry but a manifestation of another issue.  I understand she now has something around her neck to chew to help her with this.

 

118.                     The second part of allegation 6(e) is withdrawn.

 

Allegation 7

 

The children have been inadequately supervised by the mother leading them to suffer physical harm and being at risk of significant harm. Examples of this include:

a.                 In September 2015, D suffered a skull fracture after being dropped by A following the children being left unsupervised by the mother.

b.                 In December 2010, B suffered a burn to her leg as a result of poor supervision by the mother. On the 2nd of September 2011, B suffered a cigarette burn to her lower neck.

c.                  On the 19th of May 2010, the police were called to attend the family home as A and B had been seen by a neighbour hanging out of an upstairs front window and throwing objects, including glass, on to the path. When the police attended, the mother had been asleep and the conditions of the house were incredibly untidy and unsuitable for the children.

119.                     The allegation in respect of an alleged burn to B’s leg is not pursued.  The remaining allegations in 7(b) and 7(c) happened over five years ago and are not in my judgment evidence of the situation that existed at the time protective measures were taken.

120.                     The mother’s explanation around the skull fracture was that she was suffering a great deal from the after-effects of D’s birth and at the time this incident happened she was trying to manage her own health needs for a brief period in the toilet, with the girls downstairs.  A picked up D, B bit A, and A then dropped D.  Plainly the girls were not being properly supervised and while it is understandable that the mother could not keep an eye out for them for every second of the day, this incident is perhaps revealing.  Firstly, that A did not know she should not have been lifting up such a small baby while her mother was not there, or she did know and did it anyway, that B saw fit to bite A while she was holding a baby, and that the mother did not seem to have any adult back-up to manage the needs of three girls and a newborn baby, when she herself was evidently in need of some help and support.

Allegation 8

 

The mother has exposed the children to inappropriate and risky adults in the family home.

a.      In 2014, the mother allowed KL, a drug user to stay overnight in the family home. The mother states it is KL who is responsible for sexually abusing B.

b.      The mother allowed MN, who is known to the authorities for drug, alcohol and mental health problems and unpredictable/violent behaviour, unsupervised access to the children.

 

121.                     On the evidence I heard it seems that KL was staying at the property at the father’s invitation for a couple of months until around November 2014 and the mother went along with it.  She did not make any independent assessment of whether he was a suitable person to be around her children, but as the father said, KL had a similar criminal history and lifestyle to the father, and to most of their social circle.  He was regarded by them all as part of the family.  I am not sure in what way the fact that the mother has alleged that KL was responsible for sexually abusing B is alleged to have caused harm to the children given that she no longer alleges that, and it is not suggested.  I don’t believe that KL should have been regarded by her as posing a risk of sexual abuse to any of the children.  So the first sentence of allegation 8a is established, but there is no evidence that the children were caused harm as a result.  There is evidence they were at risk of harm in a more general way from KL as one of a group of risky individuals who were at the house.  He said to the police he was a ‘druggie’.  He also said to police and the father and mother have accepted to a limited extent, that he was present when there were ‘sessions’ at the house involving drug and alcohol use, to which the children were exposed.

 

122.                     I prefer the local authority’s evidence from contemporaneous notes about the mother’s involvement with MN, to the mother’s later evidence which conflicts with what she apparently told social workers at the time.  I find that she did allow him to stay over at her house and to babysit for the children when she went out.  Allegation 8(b) is proved.

Allegation 9

 

The father has a history of drug and alcohol misuse and an extensive criminal history, including offences of violence involving weapons, and has been abusive towards the mother in the family home in the presence of the children. This has led to the children being at risk of physical harm by being potentially caught up in the father’s drug/alcohol misuse and violent and abusive behaviour and suffering emotional harm by being exposed to the domestic abuse between the parents and as a consequence of the father’s frequent incarceration in prison.

123.                     This is accepted by the father and was plainly made out on the evidence before me.

Allegation 10

 

The mother has prioritised her relationship with the father over the welfare of the children.

a.                  The mother and the father have had a volatile and abusive relationship. Despite this, the mother has resumed her relationship with the father repeatedly and has allowed him into the family home when there have been restrictions against this.

b.                  The mother has colluded with the father to undermine B in relation to her disclosures of sexual abuse against him

124.                     Allegation 10(a) is accepted by both parents in the evidence they gave to the Court and the chronology and social work evidence plainly sets out the history of their relationship.  This allegation is proved.

 

125.                     While I have found that the mother tried to incite the father into undermining B I am not satisfied on a balance of probabilities that there was collusion.  The father is fairly consistent in the voice calls in that he asks why B is saying what she is saying, he does discuss with the mother possible reasons for it and evidence that might counter B’s allegations, but when the mother says to him that he should get his solicitor to ‘rip the shit out’ of B on the stand he does not join in but says she won’t have to give evidence.  He reduces the temperature and he refocuses the mother on what she needs to do to keep the children.

 

126.                     Allegation 10(b) is not made out.

Further Allegations – 11, 12, 13 and 14

 

127.                     For reasons given above I reject the evidence of OP and I do not find any of the allegations against the mother based on his evidence to be established.

128.                     Given I have not made any finding that the mother knew about the father’s sexual abuse of B, the allegations that she failed to inform the police and social services of her knowledge fall away.

Allegation 15

 

The mother has intentionally kept her relationship with OP, which she has been in since around the 14th February 2017, secret from social work professionals and has therefore obstructed the Local Authority’s on-going social work assessment of her and consideration of whether it is safe for any of the children to return home in the future.  This puts the children at risk of emotional [harm] through consideration and decisions on their welfare being taken on an incorrect factual basis and the potential for OP to be introduced to the children in an inappropriate way.             

129.                     The local authority accepted this relationship has now come to an end.  The relationship with OP was very unfortunate and ill-advised and sadly it does not cast the mother in a good light.  I find the allegation to be proved on a balance of probabilities and do consider that the children were placed at risk of emotional harm as a consequence of this relationship, even though they were not in the mother’s care at the time.

Welfare

 

130.                     Having made detailed findings in respect of threshold, I now have to consider what orders the Court should make.

 

131.                     I have had regard to all the factors on the welfare checklist at section 1(3) of the Children Act 1989 and section 1(4) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002.

 

132.                     So far as the girls’ wishes and feelings are concerned, A and B miss their mother and would like to return to her care.  A did say to the guardian recently that if she couldn’t return to her mother, staying in foster care would be OK. 

 

133.                     B is missing her mother terribly and wants to go home to her and to her cat.  She said to Mrs G she wanted to have her happy family again.  She seems to have quite an idealised view of home life, having told Mrs G her parents had a good relationship. 

 

134.                     C chose remaining in her current foster placement with B as her first choice but said returning to her mother would be OK.

 

135.                     D is too young to express a view.

 

136.                     In her detailed assessment CP identifies the physical, emotional and education needs of the girls.  She says A, B and C all have high emotional needs, evident from their different behaviours.  A has been lashing out in her placement and is not responding to boundaries and routines.  She has not wanted to engage with CP or any social worker.  B has also been physically violent to C and has complex feelings around the abuse she has experienced which she will need to process.  B and C need a lot of support with their education, they are both significantly behind their peers.  C’s needs are in line with a five year old of her age and stage of development, save that she is very quiet, has not engaged with CP at all and allows B to speak for her.  She seems to hide emotions and even if she hurts herself is described as not seeking comfort from her foster carers but becomes withdrawn and isolated. 

 

137.                     D is developing beautifully in line with her age and stage of development and her needs are those of any healthy and happy two year old of her age. 

 

138.                     As CP fairly points out it is not surprising that the three older girls are displaying challenging behaviours as they have been removed from their mother’s care and they do not know what their future holds.  However CP is clear that the many years of neglectful parenting they have received and the experiences they have had in the family home have caused them to have additional and complex needs and because they have had poor role modelling, they are currently finding, and will find it increasingly difficult in the future, to manage interactions with others. 

 

139.                     The girls need stability, consistency of care, support with their education, not to feel responsible for one another in a way that A in particular has felt for her younger siblings, and to be kept safe and to feel safe, to feel loved and cared for, and to learn how to develop secure friendships and attachments to others.  There needs to be an element of re-parenting, in particular for A and B, but also for C, around their own behaviour and understanding boundaries and being able to keep themselves safe from others. 

 

140.                     So far as the likely effect of any change in circumstances is concerned, the girls will be devastated by any proposal that removes them from each other and from their mother and father.  As adoption is proposed for the two younger girls I have to have regard not just to the immediate effect of any change in circumstances but to the likely effect on the children throughout their whole lives of having ceased to be a member of the original family and becoming an adopted person.

 

141.                     If the children were returned to the care of their mother, they would be going home.  There would inevitably be some readjustment as they have been living in two separate households, and A would have another move of school, although it would be a return to her old school.  The mother and father do now appear to have permanently separated, but given that their father is now likely to be in prison until December 2017 and they have seen very little of him over the past few years because of his imprisonment, a return to their mother as a single parent would not be a huge adjustment in the first instance.

 

142.                     Both CP and the guardian have some confidence that if A were matched with the right long-term foster carer she would flourish.  Although there are some issues around her behaviour the guardian points out that she is doing well at school, is settled, and was noted by her father to be looking happy, healthy and better than he had ever seen her.  A’s foster carer is new and inexperienced and she felt if A were in a placement with a different foster carer, she is likely to continue to make good progress and the guardian does not think there is a particular risk of placement breakdown, although both she and CP acknowledge that such a risk exists with long-term foster placement.

 

143.                     Similarly, B is doing well in her current foster placement and although there have been some behavioural issues, there is reason to hope that if matched to the right carer who could meet all her needs, she too would flourish.  It is anticipated that B who has been the victim of sexual abuse will need a great deal of support, which she would receive if in foster-care.

 

144.                     There is no question that A and B would suffer grief from the bereavement of being separated from each other and from their mother and father.  They would however be able to see each other and their mother regularly, as well as their father once he was released from prison.  This would provide reassurance, the opportunity to have positive shared experiences together, and to continue to have the benefits of feeling they have a family to which they belong.

 

145.                     The local authority’s proposal to separate A from D and B from C would have life-long consequences for all the girls.  Having grown up and identified themselves as a group of four siblings, two of them would then be separated to live with a new family, a new name, a new life.  While it is proposed that sibling contact might be arranged, ultimately that is likely to be down to the adoptive parents to encourage and facilitate.  If the adopters felt unable to support this, it is not very likely to happen. 

 

146.                     A and B would I imagine, be devastated to lose their younger siblings to adoption.  They would miss them, they would worry about them and they may feel angry, upset and bereft at a decision to separate them in this way. 

 

147.                     If placed for adoption D and C would suffer the loss of their mother, father, sisters and wider maternal and paternal family.  In the first instance it is C who would find this loss much harder to bear as she has spent longer as a member of her birth family, loves her parents and her sisters, and could well feel devastated in the future to discover that her two older sisters were able to stay in contact with each other and their mother and father, and she wasn’t.  She may well blame herself or feel worried that there was something about her that meant she should have been selected for adoption when they weren’t. 

 

148.                     D is also at risk of suffering in these ways.  While adopted children have a good prospect of being provided with a loving and stable home which provides lifelong happiness and security, they are vulnerable to emotional harm of having been separated from their families, even at a young age.  Despite the work from organisations like ATTACH, there is a higher risk of placement breakdown for children of D’s and more so, C’s age, as they may not find it easy to attach to a whole new family.  The prognosis for D and C is better given they have settled so well into their foster family and their needs are not identified as complex as their older sisters, but the longer they have to wait for a family to be found for them, the harder it may be to settle when they get there.

 

149.                     There are no further relevant factors about the children’s ages, sex, backgrounds or particular characteristics that I need to take into account.

 

150.                     In respect of any harm which the children have suffered or are at risk of suffering, I have made findings that B has suffered sexual abuse while in the care of her parents.  The abuse is likely to have caused longstanding emotional harm.  It seems evident to me that B will need a great deal of support to understand what has happened to her and to be protected from carrying the blame for what has happened to her family, not as a consequence of her actions in telling, but as a consequence of what was done to her.   B is particularly vulnerable to sexual exploitation in the future as a result of her experiences. 

 

151.                     Both CP and DP before her, and the children’s guardian set out in their evidence the multiplicity of risks to the children contained within their home environment.  In her evidence CH said she was concerned that the girls’ were being raised in an environment filled with risks – no doors on their bedrooms, the parents having people over for parties who were taking drugs and alcohol, different people staying over in the house.  When the parents were together the children were exposed to domestic violence and frightening behaviour, when the father is away from the home, the mother very quickly enters into relationships with wholly unsuitable partners, which both cause emotional harm and confusion for the children who are introduced to a ‘new daddy’, and the potential risk of harm from the individuals themselves.  CH told me that she was extremely worried about what the children may have seen in the house.  The guardian agreed with the father’s description of the mother as a person who had ‘no sense of danger’ and being very vulnerable herself, was in no position to protect her children from the risks of harm within the home environment. 

 

152.                     The children have evidently suffered harm from the neglect in their basic care and the failure consistently to get them to school on time, to set appropriate boundaries for behaviour both in terms of being able to follow rules and respond to a routine but also in terms of protecting themselves from risk of physical harm or from sexual abuse.  The three oldest girls have struggled at school both in the classroom and with friendships, their relationships with each other are difficult and with authority figures who are there to support them.

 

153.                       I consider how capable the girls’ parents are of meeting their needs.  The father has accepted that he cannot physically care for the children at the moment because he is in prison, but also that he has his own issues to deal with and would not be in a position to put himself forward as a carer following his release.

 

154.                     I have had regard to the evidence of DP and CP in respect of the mother’s parenting capacity, and the more recent and thorough parenting assessment of Ms Proctor.  I agree with the assessment of Ms Proctor and the guardian that while the mother is extremely likable and very sympathetic and there is no question that she adores her children and has many very good qualities as a mother, there are also some significant problems in her parenting.

 

155.                     CP rightly and fairly acknowledges that the mother has shown her commitment to her children since they were removed from her care by attending every contact, that she is able to anticipate and meet their needs, she manages well to divide her attention between them, plans fun activities with them, and has warm, affectionate and loving interaction with them all. 

 

156.                     While the mother has the skills to provide for all the children’s basic needs, historically she has not been able to provide for these needs consistently.  There have been periods of improvement in the state of the home but these positive changes have never been sustained for very long.  When she visited the mother very recently, CH noted that she had made a good attempt to improve the home conditions but, ‘there is still a lot to be done and it is evident from the condition of the carpets and the entrenched odour within the home that the conditions have been badly neglected for many years.  Furthermore … EF was in the process of tidying when I arrived and was picking a lot of general rubbish such as food packaging, bottles and wrappers from the floor and sofas in the lounge.  There was also a large stack of dirty crockery in the kitchen which had clearly been mounting up over a number of days, given that EF currently lives there alone.’  Given the house was in this state when CH visited and the mother had only herself to care for, CH is concerned that the mother would once again struggle to keep on top of the house if she also had four children to manage.

 

157.                     Because she feels lonely and has little confidence in friendships and relationships the mother is vulnerable to being exploited by others.  She appears to have quite a strong need to be in a relationship and has in the past chosen to prioritise her relationship with the father or a new relationship, over her children’s needs, for example when she allowed the father to return to the house even though there was a court order in place to protect her and the children from the abusive relationship. 

 

158.                     Any consideration of the mother’s parenting capacity must take into account any measures of support that could be provided in order to help her.  The difficulty in this case is that the mother has already over many years received very substantial amounts of support and assistance and has never been able to maintain any improvement.  Further, she has not been able to work openly and honestly with professionals, and so there is a question over the effectiveness of any support that could be offered.  If she does not honestly share with social workers or other support workers what is going on in the home (for example if she is in a relationship and who is coming to the house) then risks cannot be assessed and proper support will not be given. 

 

159.                     CP is concerned that the mother does not have sufficient insight to understand the effect of domestic violence on the children emotionally.  Although she has recently joined the Freedom Programme for a second time and says she recognises for the first time a pattern in choosing unsuitable partners, it was made clear to her at the start of proceedings and for example in discussions around MN being around the children that this was an issue, yet she still proceeded to join a dating website and become entangled with OP.  In my judgment while it is very positive that she is now engaging with the Freedom programme, she is at a very early stage of her journey in this respect and I consider if the children were returned home to their mother it is likely that she would before long either have reunited with the father or found a new partner, and in either case the children’s needs would once again be at risk of being neglected as the mother would once again be likely to prioritise her relationship over their needs, and because the mother is so vulnerable, she cannot at the moment be trusted to choose a partner who does not pose any risk to her or to the children.

 

160.                     EF has not been able to provide B with the emotional support she needs to deal with the abuse she has suffered.  While the mother has said to professionals that she believed B, her actions suggested that she was working to try and undermine what B was saying, by reporting to the police that she had had trouble with her telling lies, and later that she was changing her story, by having the conversation with her about the ‘dream’, by discussing whether KL was the perpetrator with her instead, and most significantly by inciting the father to get his solicitor to attack her if she gave evidence in Court.  She appears to have been so focused on identifying a perpetrator, or at the least trying to get others to identify that the father was not the perpetrator, that she seems to have lost sight of her daughter’s needs. 

 

161.                      CP writes that the children ‘have been at risk from exposure to neglect, poor home conditions, domestic abuse, risky individuals being in the family home and drug abuse.  The chaos and instability that are associated with such factors has severely impacted on Ms EF’s ability to instil appropriate boundaries and guidance’.  This has had an adverse impact on the children, particularly A and B, who struggle to demonstrate appropriate social behaviour.  While sometimes the mother has been seen to implement boundaries and routines, historically she has again not maintained them, depending on what is happening in her life.  This has also impacted on her ability to supervise them and ensure they are kept safe.

 

162.                     Section 1(4)(f) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 requires me to consider with respect to the proposals for C and D, the relationship they have with their relatives, and with any other person in relation to whom the Court .. considers the relationship to be relevant, including:

(i)                The likelihood of any such relationship continuing and the value to the child of its doing so;

(ii)             The ability and willingness of the child’s relatives, or any such person, to provide the child with a secure environment in which the child can develop, and otherwise to meet the child’s needs;

(iii)           The wishes and feelings of any of the child’s relatives, or of any such person, regarding the child.

 

163.                     C and D (though less so than C) have an established relationship with their siblings, parents and wider maternal and paternal family.  Viability assessments of both maternal and paternal grandmothers were negative and no other family member has put themselves forward as a potential carer for any of the girls.  The viability assessment of maternal grandmother was a disaster, resulting in the assessor making a referral to social services about the condition of the home and the well-being of the grandmother’s teenage children.

164.                     The relationship between the mother and paternal family appears to be fragile and there have been periods where they have not seen much of one another.  They are not speaking at the moment.  Given the parents have now separated and the father is likely to be in prison for the rest of the year, it is difficult to predict how much of their paternal family the girls would see. 

165.                     Nonetheless, the wider family would of course wish for the girls to be brought up within their birth family, to know their family background and to enjoy shared experiences with wider family members. 

166.                     Finally I consider the range of powers available to the Court.  In coming to a decision relating to the adoption of a child, a court must always consider the whole range of powers available to it in the child’s case (whether under the 2002 Act or the 1989 Act) and the court must not make any order under the 2002 Act unless it considers that making the order would be better for the child than not doing so. 

167.                     The options before the Court are essentially:

(i)                Return of all four children home to their mother;

(ii)             Return of C and D to their mother and placement of A and B in foster care (either together or in separate placements);

(iii)           Placement of A and B in foster care (either together or in separate placements) and placement of C and D for adoption;

(iv)           Placement of A, B and C (B and C together) in long-term foster care and placement of D for adoption.

 

168.                     In coming to my conclusions, I have had regard to all the evidence, including the parenting assessments, CP’s together and apart assessment and the guardian’s recommendations. 

169.                     CP has in my judgment weighed up very carefully all the options and identified the potential advantages and disadvantages of each of them.  She has not made any assumptions based on the girls’ ages, or made short-term assessments based on where they are now, but has in my judgment thought very carefully about the particular needs of these particular girls throughout their whole childhoods, with reference to their lived experiences so far.  She makes particular reference to the scapegoating of B by family members and the difficult relationship she and A have.  Similarly, B and C have both been violent towards each other.  CP’s together and apart assessment is a document which has clearly been prepared with a lot of thought and considered analysis, and is based on a sound evidence base. 

170.                     CP considers that if A and B or B and C were placed together there is a significant risk that their combined needs would overwhelm the placement, or compete to the extent that either of their needs might not be met.  In either case the risk of placement breakdown is increased.

171.                     In her assessment CP considers a variety of different combinations of sibling placement, and considers the advantages and disadvantages of each of them holistically, she does not take a linear approach rejecting a number of options and then resolving on the last one left to her.

172.                     The obvious advantage to the children of being enabled to return home to their mother would be that the family would be reunited in their old house, they would have the prospect of spending the rest of their childhoods within their birth families.  There are lots of positives about the mother as their parent; she loves and adores her children and they love her, and she can be a warm, affectionate and engaging mother.  However, the negatives that have been identified by professionals are significant, long-standing and very concerning, because she has not been able to protect the children from risk and their physical, educational and emotional welfare has suffered as a result.  I accept the evidence of professionals that at the present time the mother does not have the capacity to safely parent all four of her children, or the two youngest, and that if any of them  were returned to her care they would continue to be at risk of significant harm.

173.                     The advantages of foster care are that the children can be safely parented within a family environment and have all their needs met but can still maintain links with their birth family by having regular contact.  The disadvantages are that it is not a real family; foster carers are paid to look after the children who live with them, and it carries with it a risk of placement breakdown for a number of different reasons.  A child in foster care often has to live with some stigma which attaches to children in care and has the intrusion of having a social worker (who is unlikely to remain the same social worker throughout their childhood) to visit and who has to give permission for school trips, sleepovers or other matters which would otherwise be sorted out very simply within a ‘real’ family unit.  Children in care are not guaranteed to be supported into adulthood, as teenagers they are starting to have conversations with their carers about having to make their own way in the world.  Foster care is not generally recommended for very young children, say of C’s or D’s age, as the risk that they will have a number of different placements throughout their childhood is very high. 

174.                     For the younger two children the benefits of an adoptive placement in which they are placed together are that there is a good prospect of them being raised in a safe, secure and stable environment where their carers have given a lifelong commitment to love them as their own children.  The risk of placement breakdown is much less than in foster care.  C and D would be placed together and have the benefit of growing up together.  The obvious disadvantages are that they would grow up knowing that they were adopted, that they had sisters who were growing up apart from them, that they had parents who loved them but they could not live with.  The disadvantages are exacerbated in this case because C is of an age where she will have a very clear sense of herself as a member of her birth family and one of four siblings and she loves her mother and father, and will suffer to be parted from them.  She, and D, are also likely to question why they were adopted but her older sisters (if placed into foster care) were able to continue to have a relationship with their mother, father and birth family.  There is more risk in their case of placement breakdown as they are of an age where attachments to a new family will be difficult.  However, the risk would be less than if they were placed in long-term foster care.

175.                     I have had regard to the potential benefits and disadvantages of each of the options and I have considered very carefully the together and apart assessment and the evidence of CP and the guardian about each of the children’s needs. 

176.                     I have had regard to evidence that B and C’s current foster carers have offered to care for them both long-term, but that they have not formally been approved as long-term carers for the girls and that given the outcome of the together and apart assessment, and that no application has been made, it is not certain that they would be approved as long-term carers for B and C at this stage.

Conclusions

 

177.                     I have come to the conclusion that I should approve the local authority’s care plans and make care orders in respect of all four girls.  The local authority’s plans have been reached by an experienced social worker exercising her professional judgment diligently and based on a sound evidence base, built up from her own experience of the children and the family dynamics, and from other relevant sources.  Her analysis is thorough, fair and well-balanced. 

178.                     The experienced children’s guardian has independently reviewed all the evidence and formed her own view having carried out a detailed and thoughtful analysis and there is no good reason to depart from her recommendation.

179.                     I do not consider that the mother is able to look after her children so as to consistently meet all their varying and so far as A and B in particular are concerned, complex needs.  Having regard to all the evidence I do not consider that the mother would be able to look after just C or D even if offered substantial support from the local authority and other agencies.  She has received a huge amount of support in the past but been unable to sustain any positive changes made, and there are serious questions over her ability to work openly and honestly with professionals so as to be able to benefit from the support offered.

180.                     I agree with the local authority’s assessment that A and B’s needs are such that they should be placed in separate foster placements from one another.  I have given careful thought to the father’s submissions in this respect and I acknowledge that his wish for them to be placed together is because he genuinely thinks it would be to their benefit and because of his own experiences in care he is very frightened of the impact of separation upon them.  I recognise his views to have arisen for concern for the girls and that they are not about his wishes and feelings.  However, having regard to all the evidence, I have been persuaded that the local authority’s care plan would maximise the chances for each of the girls to settle, thrive and achieve stability in their lives.

181.                     So far as C is concerned I have considered the various options against each other but having regard to her particular needs, her age and stage of development and family history, in particular the evidence about her and B’s relationship, and looking at the manifest disadvantages of foster care for a child of her age, I am satisfied that in all the circumstances of this case, her welfare needs can only be met by the making of an order authorising the local authority to place her for adoption.

182.                     So far as D is concerned, I have reached the same conclusion.  For these two younger girls, to in my judgment nothing short of adoption will do to meet their needs throughout their childhoods and for the rest of their lives.

183.                     GH does not have parental responsibility for C or D so his consent is not required for the placement applications.

184.                     I dispense with the consent of EF to the applications for placement orders because in my judgment the welfare of both C and D requires that I do so.

Transition plans and contact

 

185.                     It was agreed that I would give indications at this stage, no formal applications have been made for contact orders.

186.                     The guardian has raised an issue over the transition plan that may see C and D removed from their current placements and their sisters and then placed together in a permanent adoptive placement having not had any significant recent experience of living together.  There are obvious potential difficulties for all the girls, but most particularly B and A, who may well feel abandoned or jealous or rejected or bereaved, or any combination of those emotions and more. A’s current carers are not putting themselves forward to care for her long term so she will certainly move, it is not known whether B’s carers will wish to continue caring for her without C as their previous offer was for both sisters. 

187.                     I am satisfied that CP and her manager, and AF and her team are alive to the potential difficulties with transition and that they will be able to devise a plan that is sensitive to the needs of all four girls.  AF and her team have experience of placing children from different placements into a single adoptive placement and she was alive to the potential difficulties in this case.  I would agree that foster to adopt may be a good plan.  I can see that a bridging placement is not regarded as desirable by the family finding team because it is an additional, potentially unnecessary and possibly destabilising move for girls, however I would agree that at this stage it is better not to rule anything out.  

188.                     I consider the local authority has set the initial levels of contact for A and B appropriately.  What is proposed so far as contact with their mother is concerned is a reduction over a six week period of time to monthly until a permanent placement is found, at which point contact would reduce to every eight weeks.  At the same time they would be having contact with each other at six-weekly intervals, with indirect contact via skype and phone calls in between.  Once GH was out of prison, and depending on the children’s wishes and feelings and his fitness to attend contact, three monthly contact is proposed with him.

189.                     While I can see the mother feels contact only six times a year is painfully little, contact is for the children and not the parents.  The girls will be having a number of other contacts as well with each other and potentially their father and C and D too.  I have taken into account the evidence of the mother’s commitment to contact, that the contacts she has attended have been very positive and that she has been able to build up a good working relationship with the foster carers.  She has not sought to undermine the placements.  I have taken account of that the girls love their father and A in particular is very close to him.  However, they have in fact seen very little of him over the past few years and I consider it is right to make a distinction between their contact with him and their mother for that reason.  I consider that every two months for the mother and every three months for the father is the right level to strike a balance between allowing the girls to settle into their new placements and be reassured by seeing members of their birth family.  

190.                     I have listened and considered carefully the father’s request that A and B see each other much more frequently than six-weekly.  However, I have regard to the together and apart assessment, to the fact that the geographical location of their placements are not yet known, and to the need for each of them to settle into a new home, and again I consider that the local authority’s proposal is right as a starting point.

191.         The local authority will have an obligation to keep all contact arrangements under review and the frequency may well increase following discussions in LAC reviews. 

192.         So far as C and D are concerned the proposal in the care plan is for contact between them and their mother to reduce to monthly and then for a farewell contact once an adoptive placement is found, and thereafter for letterbox contact.  I recognise that the mother has not sought to undermine the foster placements and has got on well with the foster parents and always strived to make contact a very positive experience for her children.  However, adoption is different and in my view it is a very big ask of adoptive parents to accommodate one, let alone two visits a year to a birth parent.  I would be concerned that it would impact adversely on the ability of the local authority to find a placement for C and D and for their ability to settle into a new family once found, if they were to have direct contact with their birth mother after adoption.  In all the circumstances, my view is that letterbox contact is more appropriate.

193.         If C and D were placed with prospective adopters while their father was still in prison, CP was not convinced it would be in their best interests for the children to be brought for a prison visit to say goodbye to their father.  CH was more persuaded (though not if findings were made against the father in respect of sexual abuse of B).  She said that providing such a meeting were carefully planned, was a specially arranged visit and not an open prison visit, then she considered it could well be in the girls’ interests.  Farewell visits are incredibly difficult but can be very positive for the children, particularly in circumstances as in this case, where there is the opportunity for their father to show them that he loves them but he supports their moving to a new family.  It could potentially help enormously with their ability to settle.  Not all farewell visits take place in very inspiring environments, and I am aware of prisons which have made children’s visits a very positive experience for all concerned.  In the circumstances, I am with CH on this issue and would endorse a plan for a final prison visit – but only if the local authority felt a visit at all was appropriate in all the circumstances.

194.         I agree with the proposals for letterbox contact to the father and maternal and paternal grandparents.  I note that in the care plan C is not to have letterbox contact with paternal grandparents.  I appreciate that she is not their biological grandchild but neither is father her biological father.  If they wanted to have letterbox contact I am not sure I would discourage this, but will listen to the views of the local authority if this is an issue. 

195.         I approve in theory the plan for C and D to have contact with B and A after an adoptive placement is found, but would essentially take a pragmatic view.  I would hope and expect the adoptive parents to be helping the girls to understand their life story and the part that A and B play in it, but given that they may be in very different places physically and emotionally over the next few years, contact may not necessarily be a positive experience for all of them all of the time.  There is also the potential difficulty of the older girls having direct contact with their birth parents but the younger siblings not.  Ultimately it will be a matter to trust to the judgment of the adoptive parents.  While I would hope that sibling contact was something prospective adopters would be open to considering, I would not be supportive of making this an essential requirement of any search for adoptive parents for C and D.

196.         For the reasons given, I approve the local authority’s care plans, will make care orders in respect of all four children, and placement orders in respect of C and D. 

197.         I appreciate that this decision will come as a great blow to both the parents and to each of the four girls and that my decision will have life-long consequences for them all, and the wider family.  However, I have had the welfare of the girls as my paramount consideration throughout and after anxious consideration, I am persuaded that the conclusions I have reached are ones that are needed in order to protect and preserve their welfare.  I know that much of this judgment will have been difficult for the parents to read, but I hope that it is also clear that I recognise and acknowledge that they do have some good qualities as parents and that there is no doubt that they love their children very much and that they always will.

 

 

Joanna Vincent

16th June 2017

HHJ Vincent

Family Court, Oxford

 

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