Neutral Citation Number: [2010] EWCC 18 (Fam)

In the County Court

Before:
HHJ X
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Between:

	A Local Authority	Applicant	
	and		
	P Mother	1st Respondent	
	And		
	Q Father	2nd Respondent	

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Hearing dates: 20th April 2010

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

WRITTEN REASONS

The written reasons are being distributed on the strict understanding that in any report, no person may be identified by name or location (Other than a person identified by name in the reasons themselves) and that in particular the anonymity of the children and the adult members of their family must be strictly preserved

Judgement

1.	This is a final order in a public law care case and will therefore be posted in anonymised form on the BAILII website as part of the information pilot scheme, hence I shall not refer in this oral judgment to any person or place by name.  

2.	This is an application by a local authority for a care order in respect of a female child now aged 16 months who has been in foster care since October of last year.  The mother has an elder daughter who is now 16 who has returned to live with her mother.  

3.	The father of the younger child is the second respondent in this case but he is not the father of the older child.  

4.	I shall call the younger child Y and the older child O, which of course are not their real initials.  

5.	The mother is in her early forties.  The father is some 20 years younger.  They started their relationship about three years ago when he was only 19.  Regrettably the father then embarked on a sexual relationship with O, who was then 13, and that continued until she was nearly 15.  The mother failed to acknowledge what was apparently obvious to others with the result that she did nothing to prevent this relationship and therefore failed to protect O who, it must be said, seems to have been a willing participant.  What makes it worse is that the mother was aware that her previous partner was also suspected of sexually abusing O so the mother should have been alert to the danger.  

6.	When the father’s sexual abuse of O came to light he was prosecuted by the Crown Prosecution Service, pleaded guilty some seven months ago to six sample offences and was sentenced to four and a half years’ imprisonment.  

7.	The local authority applied for an interim care order at the end of December 2008 as soon as Y was born.  The reasoning behind this was that the mother and the father were friendly with people known to have convictions for child sexual abuse and furthermore the mother had demonstrated an inability to protect O from sexual abuse and therefore Y would also be at risk.  Additionally there was a significant degree of domestic violence to which Y would have been exposed.  

8.	The threshold facts relied on by the local authority were therefore as just summarised and these have eventually been accepted by the father and almost entirely accepted by the mother.  This case is one therefore which can move on to the appropriate outcome for Y.  

9.	The father is unable to put himself forward as a carer.  Firstly he will be in prison for another 20 months or so and secondly his convictions preclude him having any unsupervised contact with a female child under 16.  

10.	The mother was offered the chance to prove that she could care adequately for Y by being placed in a mother and baby foster placement but she was unable to sustain this and it came to an end in late September of 2009, since when she has had supervised contact twice per week, but I believe has not always attended.  

11.	The mother and the father’s stated position a short while ago was that they did not seek to challenge the expert evidence and consequently the length of this final hearing was reduced to two days, and that so that any issue of contact could have been resolved.  Today however both parents have indicated that neither of them will either consent to or oppose the local authority’s applications and nor do they want any oral evidence called.  I recognise how difficult this decision must have been, especially for the mother.  

12.	The local authority has very recently issued a care plan which is for adoption and a placement order application has also been issued.  Of course for a placement order to be made the consents of both parents would have to be obtained, both because the father also has parental responsibility or their individual consents would have to be dispensed with if Y’s welfare requires it.  

13.	The relevant panel has recommended adoption on the 12th April which of course opened the door to this placement order application being made and this course has been ratified by the authorised officer of the local authority.  Entirely understandably neither parent can bring himself or herself to consent to such an order.  

14.	At a late stage an application was made by Y’s parental grandparents for permission to apply for a residence order but after careful investigation both by the local authority and by the court the conclusion was reached for reasons then given, which do not need to be repeated here, that their application must fail.  

15.	The expert evidence about the mother and her capabilities has come from a consultant psychiatrist, a consultant psychologist and an independent social worker who prepared a parenting assessment. 
 
16.	The consultant psychiatrist concluded that the mother suffers from dysthymia, which means persistent mild depression, and has done so since 1992.  I quote from his report where he says:  “In my view in her present state the mother would not be able to adequately care for the child,” and he goes on to explain how long it would take for any treatment to occur, which would be at least a year.  He goes on:  “Because of the chronicity of her problems the mother would require 15 to 20 sessions of cognitive behavioural therapy which may take up to six months.  Subsequently she would require a period of rehabilitation and in all her therapy should last for at least a year.”  It has to be said of course that there is no guarantee at the end of that that the mother’s position would be one in which she could care for a young child.  That was the first report which was received.  

17.	There is also a report from a consultant psychologist and his view is expressed in perhaps these passages.  He says:  “The mother is functioning in the above average range of adult intellectual ability and has no significant cognitive difficulties although she does present as an individual who has experienced dyslexia as is described in the papers.  In my view,” he says, “the mother has a number of significant personality difficulties including a fundamentally conflicted personality style which leads to some degree of chronic stress within both close interpersonal relationships where she will find the intimacy engendered extremely difficult to deal with and outside of a close interpersonal relationship her dependent traits will mean she finds it very difficult to function without the presence of a partner.”  

18.	He goes on to deal with her most recent relationship with the father and says:  “I asked the mother directly on three occasions during the assessment whether she was aware of sexual abuse on O from the father.  However she failed to answer the question at any point, immediately speaking once again about the physical threats, for example mentioning on two occasions about the death of her cats.  I would also point out that only when speaking of the death of her cats did she show any negative affect, becoming tearful at this point.”  And then he says:  “In my opinion the mother appears to have very significant difficulty accepting responsibility for her failure to protect children in her care from the risks posed by others.”  And then a little further on he says:  “There is significant evidence in the papers and from the mother’s clinical presentation to me that she appears to present a somewhat inconsistent account which has direct implication as to how open and honest she would be with professionals in the future.”  A little further down:  “In my view very considerable caution is required in terms of any assertions made by the mother.”  And he says also that the mother’s presentation does appear somewhat incongruous with the subject matter the topic under discussion, and a little later again expresses his view that the mother will have very little emotional availability for a child in her care, which raises the possibility of a significant risk of emotional harm.  And then finally he says:  “Due to the difficulties I have described extensively above in my opinion the mother poses a high risk of emotional harm to a child in her care due both to her egocentricity and her inconsistency.  Additionally she would not be able to protect a child in her care from the risk that any partner may pose.  In my view these difficulties stem mainly from her personality presentation and as I have described above in my view it is extremely unlikely therefore that any treatment intervention could be offered to improve the mother’s ability to offer a good enough standard of care.”  Further again he says:  “The mother will not be able to protect Y or any other child from the risks a partner may pose and she is more vulnerable than her peers to form inappropriate relationships in future.”  

19.	Finally there was the parenting assessment and again I select one or two passages from the summary of that assessment in which this is said:  “It is surprising that she [that is the mother] seemed at such a loss in providing basic care to Y as reported by the foster carers who are experienced.  Even taking into account personality and perhaps cultural differences the mother, whilst showing Y plenty of emotional warmth, struggled to properly feed, supervise and stimulate her at the placement and this did not improve during the whole nine months they were there.  My view is that her preoccupation with the father distracted her from her care of Y to such an extent that her parenting capacity was seriously impaired.”  Then towards the end of her summary she says:  “She [that is the mother] continues to downplay her failure to protect O and I am not confident that she has the understanding or motivation to ensure such a situation does not arise again in the future.  She is of above average intelligence but seems naïve and childlike.  She strikes me as a highly vulnerable individual whose intense need for love and validation will lead her into situations in which she cannot protect herself, let alone her children.  I am also concerned that O would find herself in the position of caring for both her mother and Y.  I feel unable to recommend any intervention that would make a difference at this stage because the problems are so entrenched and fundamental to the mother’s personality as identified by the psychiatrist and psychologist.”  

20.	The guardian’s view as set out in his report and based on his observations, and of course the advice of the experts to which I have just referred, coincides with that of the local authority and he too recommends to the court that the orders sought should be granted.  

21.	To save time I will adopt the analysis of the checklist which appears in the guardian’s report and indeed in the local authority’s evidence so that in coming to decide what is the appropriate order in this case it seems to me that there is really overwhelming evidence that the appropriate answer for Y is adoption.  There is now no other family member who can care for her and for a child so young adoption must be the pre-eminent result.  

22.	It means therefore that I must dispense with the consent of the parents to this placement order which is sought because Y’s welfare against this background plainly requires it.  

23.	I shall therefore make a care order and a placement order in respect of this child and I shall also make the usual orders for costs in respect of those parties who are publicly funded.