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Jersey Unreported Judgments |
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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Jersey Unreported Judgments >> In the matter of Lewis Luke and Rose (Care proceedings) [2015] JRC 185 (08 September 2015) URL: http://www.bailii.org/je/cases/UR/2015/2015_185.html Cite as: [2015] JRC 185 |
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Care proceedings - application by the Minister for emergency protection order.
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Before : |
J. A. Clyde-Smith, Esq,, sitting alone. |
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Between |
Minister for Health and Social Services |
Applicant |
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And |
A (the mother) |
First Respondent |
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And |
B (the father) |
Second Respondent |
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IN THE MATTER OF LEWIS LUKE AND ROSE (EMERGENCY PROTECTION ORDER)
AND IN THE MATTER OF THE CHILDREN (JERSEY) LAW 2002
Advocate S. L. Brace for the Minister.
The First and Second Respondents appeared on their own behalf.
judgment
the commissioner:
1. On 24th August, 2015, I granted the Minister an emergency protection order, pursuant to Article 37(1)(a)(ii) of the Children (Jersey) Law 2002 ("the Children Law") in respect of three young children, namely Lewis, Luke and Rose (not their real names) and an order excluding the mother from their family home, both orders for the period ending 3rd September, 2015, when the Deputy Bailiff will sit to consider any applications for their renewal or any applications by the Minister for interim care orders.
2. The application for the emergency protection orders was made inter partes. I heard evidence from the social worker, Ms Hannah Dyke, and was addressed by B ("the father"), who supported the applications. A ("the mother") felt unable to address me in open court, but she retired to write me a letter to which I refer below.
3. The mother has a significant history with the Children's Service. There has been an allegation (in 2011) of rape by a visiting fair worker several years earlier, alleged historic sexual abuse by her step-father (who was not prosecuted) and a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder, for which she has received no treatment at her request.
4. There is evidence of police involvement in domestic incidents in what appears to have been a volatile relationship, with the father being seen as the parent acting protectively towards the children. In June 2014, the mother and father separated, with the mother looking after Luke and the father Lewis, but the father returned as the mother was unable to cope on her own.
5. During 2015, following the birth of Rose, the mother appears to have developed a "fascination" with the fair and having intimate relationships with fairground workers, causing her to leave the house from time to time with the father caring for the children. There have been reports of the mother planning to move to the UK with one or two of the children to live with one of the fairground workers.
6. On 28th July, 2015, the police were contacted by Accident and Emergency as the mother had attended the Emergency Department stating that she "had some bad shit going on in her head and didn't want to be here anymore." She then absconded from the hospital.
7. On a visit by Ms Dyke to the family home on 31st July, 2015, she found that none of the children's needs were being attended to. The father had been arrested that day in the family home for breach of the peace after threatening a fairground worker with a baseball bat. The mother appeared to have difficulty changing Luke's nappy and was vacant and unresponsive. She told Ms Dyke that she was struggling and unable to cope with the children. Her priority seemed to be getting out of the house and she spent the entire visit on her mobile phone. When she realised she could not go to town as soon as she had hoped, she lost her temper, threw her mobile phone across the room in the presence of the children and stormed out.
8. On a home visit by a social worker on 10th August, 2015, the mother locked herself in her bedroom. On a visit by another social worker on 13th August, she refused to come down from her bedroom.
9. A child protection case conference was convened on 19th August, 2015, and was attended by the mother and the father, although the mother sat outside the meeting for its duration. Each of the children was made the subject of a child protection plan under the category of neglect.
10. Matters came to a head on Thursday 20th and Friday 21st August. Quoting from Ms Dyke's report:-
"3.1.14 On 20.08.2015 [the mother] was arrested by police at Gorey Fete for being disorderly on licensed premises. [The mother] was taken to hospital after collapsing in the police car due to her alcohol consumption. [The mother] sent an intimate photo of herself and a worker from the fair to [the father]. She was discharged home in the early hours of the morning.
3.1.15 On 21.08.2015 Social Workers attended the address. [The mother] was observed by Social Workers to have bruises all down her legs and arms and what looked like 'love bites' on her shoulders. [The mother] was antagonising [the father] by stating he wasn't the father of the children and was not a good father. [The mother] sent [the father] a photograph of her with another man from the fair. [The father] was becoming increasingly agitated so the Social Worker had to step in to prevent an argument escalating in front of the children. During the Social Worker's visit 3 options were put to [the mother]. Option one was for [the mother] to stay out the property for the weekend. Option two was for [the father] to take the children to the park for the afternoon to get out of the home. [The mother] refused the above options informing she would rather the children went into foster care and that [the father] is not having the children as he is not their father. Social Worker Hannah Dyke called Team Manager Fôn Roberts as [the mother] was threatening to lock the doors and not allow [the father] to take the children. [The mother] took Rose from [the father] and refused to hand her back.
3.1.16 The police used their powers of protection to remove Rose from [the mother] and place her in the care of [the father]. [The mother] refused to leave the family home and therefore the children spent the weekend with their father and paternal uncle, paternal aunt and their three children."
11. In removing Rose from the mother's care, the police were exercising their powers under Article 41 of the Children Law. The maximum time that a child can be taken into police protection is 72 hours, hence the application by the Minister for emergency protection orders on the morning of 24th August, 2015. The position therefore at the time of the hearing was that the father was looking after all three children and living at his brother's two bedroomed flat; the brother and his wife have three children of their own.
12. Ms Dyke informed me that Rose was slightly delayed in emotional development but was physically meeting her milestones. Both Lewis and Luke have slight speech delay. She described Luke as being an unhappy child, who tended to move away from his mother. Lewis she described as chatty, comical and very watchful and aware. He had a tendency to be over familiar with people. He called his aunt "Mummy" after a short period and had called her Mummy during visits on two occasions. He became distressed when his father or Ms Dyke left the property.
13. The purpose of the application was to ensure that the children remained in the care of the father. The Minister sought the maximum duration for an emergency protection order of 28 days, so that assessments could be carried out whilst the children lived with the father.
14. Article 37(1) of the Children Law is in the following terms:-
The Minister relied on the second limb, namely that the children would be likely to suffer significant harm if they did not remain in the place in which they were then being accommodated.
15. The leading case on emergency protection orders is In the matter of B [2008] JLR N15 in which it was held:-
16. Advocate Brace referred me to the following paragraphs of the judgment of Munby J in X Council v B (Emergency Protection Orders) [2005] 1 FLR 341 at paragraph 57:-
17. Advocate Brace presented the application as being for the maintenance of the status quo, namely that the children remain with the father in his brother's accommodation and in any event, as being less draconian in that the children would be with the father. However, in so far as Rose is concerned, she had been removed forcibly from the mother by the police the previous Friday and it seemed to me that in substance, I was being asked to make an order removing her from the mother, not summarily, as the hearing was inter partes and not to strangers, but to the father, who had been primarily responsible for parenting her and who, unlike the mother, had engaged with the Children's Service. It was this latter feature, the removal to the father, that made the orders being sought less draconian and harsh than a removal to strangers.
18. The mother opposed the making of emergency protection orders. She said in her letter that she was a good mother and could care for the children. She was critical of the father's parenting skills, saying he shouted at and hit the children and only bathed them when he could be bothered. She took issue with the evidence of Ms Dyke, who she said had set out to make her look bad. She refused to leave the family home to allow the father to look after the children there on his own. The incident in Gorey had been exaggerated. She had only had a few drinks, but someone bought her a drink which had been spiked. She didn't spend all the family money on alcohol. It was her friends who bought the alcohol and she only did so occasionally and she made sure that the children had everything they needed before she purchased anything for herself. In the mother's view, the children should be placed in foster care rather than being with the father.
19. She accepted that she did not engage with the Children's Service as all they are there for, she said, was to take children away from their families.
20. Within the past few weeks there have been two anonymous calls from members of the public alleging physical and verbal aggression by the father. The mother volunteered at the hearing that these had been made by friends of hers. Ms Dyke said that the Children's Service did have concerns about the father's parenting but only when the parents were living together. He needed to be given space at the family home and support.
21. The father volunteered that the arguments between them did affect his parenting and he recognised that he needed help and support. He still loved the mother "to bits" but there had been years of "horribleness" and when things happened they were extreme. There were trust issues after years of infidelity on her part. He didn't like her drinking and the people she mixed with.
22. The guardian, Ms Elsa Fernandes, had been appointed shortly prior to the hearing. I gave her time to consult with the Children's Service over the arrangements for the father to be supported, which had initially concerned her, but after that consultation, she was satisfied that he would receive appropriate support. In her opinion, there was no option but for the emergency protection orders to be made.
23. It was inevitably a short hearing, and the evidence of Ms Dyke had not been tested. However, for the purposes of that hearing and without in any way seeking to bind any future court, I was satisfied:-
(i) That there were serious issues as to the mother's drinking and conduct which had a very detrimental effect on the home and which militated against her being emotionally and practicably available for the children.
(ii) That the mother had mental health issues which needed to be explored. Possibly as a consequence of this as she had a history of non-engagement with the Children's Service.
(iii) That the children would suffer emotional and potentially physical harm if they continued to live with both parents in the family home. That harm, in my view, would be significant.
(iv) That, notwithstanding concerns as to his parenting, the father had been the principal carer for the children and had engaged with the Children's Service. There would, therefore, be continuity of care in their lives if the emergency protection orders were granted.
24. Accordingly, I was satisfied that the threshold under Article 37(1) had been met and that emergency protection orders for all three children should be made. I was, however, concerned in particular about the effective removal of Rose, from the mother and the fact that the mother had not been legally represented at the hearing - nor indeed had the father. I was only prepared therefore to make these orders for the shortest time possible and that transpired to be to the end of 3rd September, 2015, when the Deputy Bailiff was able to sit to determine any applications for their renewal or any applications for interim care orders. The mother would have liberty to apply in the meantime.
25. I made no order as to contact, other than that it should be supervised, because the Minister proposed to allow the mother supervised contact three times a week for two hours on each occasion.
26. However, the making of the emergency protection orders left the children living with the father in what must have been very cramped accommodation, whilst the mother lived alone in the family home. The welfare of the children surely dictated that it should be the mother that moved out of the family home, leaving the father to return there with the children. She refused to do so, even though it would be much easier for her, she has family and friends, to find short term accommodation, than it would be for the father to find short term accommodation for himself and three young children. In the premises, the Minister applied for and I granted an exclusion order against the mother under Article 38 of the Children Law, excluding her from the family home, to come into effect on Friday 28th August, 2015.
27. The exclusion order was, however, lifted on 27th August, 2015, at the application of the Minister. Since the hearing, the father had allowed unsupervised contact between the mother and the children contrary to the direction given on 24th August, 2015. Additionally, the father reported having received death threats from friends and family of the mother which resulted in his brother removing his children from his residence due to fears for their safety and withdrawing his consent for the father and his children to remain in the brother's home. For these reasons, the Minister had placed the children in foster placement with the agreement of the guardian and the mother.
