Re: L (Children)

An injunction remains binding unless it is discharged or stayed. The fact that an appeal is pending does not suspend its operation. Deliberate and admitted breaches of clear protective orders may properly attract immediate imprisonment, particularly where there is a persistent history of breach and no realistic prospect of compliance. In deciding whether to extend time for an appeal, the court should consider the prospects of success. Permission serves no useful purpose where the proposed appeal is hopeless. In assessing permission in family proceedings, the court may take account of welfare evidence and the practical consequences of the orders under challenge.

Following the breakdown of the parents’ marriage, the mother and three children occupied the former matrimonial home under occupation and non-molestation orders. The father repeatedly returned to or approached the home in breach of successive orders and was committed to prison for contempt.

He appealed against the committal orders of Judge Farnworth dated 31 October 2000 and Judge Mitchell dated 31 January 2001. He also sought permission to appeal out of time against numerous earlier orders, including exclusion, non-molestation and contact orders. The central issues were whether the committal sentences were proportionate, whether the injunctions remained effective during an appeal, and whether there was any useful purpose in granting permission to appeal out of time.

1. Appeals against committal orders. The appeals against the four-month sentence imposed on 31 October 2000 and the three-month sentence imposed on 31 January 2001 were dismissed. Each breach was admitted and concerned a clear order prohibiting the father from entering or approaching the former matrimonial home. The history showed persistent breaches, a refusal to accept the orders and a real possibility of repetition. In those circumstances imprisonment was proportionate; the later three-month sentence was described as the minimum that could have been imposed.
2. Continuing effect of injunctions. An order continues to bind the parties while an appeal is pending unless the court orders a stay or otherwise discharges it. The father’s contention that his appeals automatically discharged the injunctions had no legal basis.
3. Permission out of time. The court granted the necessary extension of time for the committal appeal but refused permission to appeal out of time against the earlier orders. The relevant question was whether the proposed appeal had a real prospect of success. Where the proposed appeal was absolutely hopeless, permission would serve no useful purpose. The welfare reports and the history of the father’s conduct made the proposed challenges to the contact restrictions futile.
4. Proprietary rights. The father’s contention that an occupation order had deprived the mother of proprietary rights in the jointly owned home was untenable. His reliance on Chalmers v Johns [1999] 1 FLR 392 resulted from a complete misreading of that decision.
5. The remaining applications for permission to appeal out of time were refused with costs, subject to enforcement only by the judge hearing the ancillary relief application. Permission to appeal to the House of Lords was refused.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): appeals against the committal orders of 31 October 2000 and 31 January 2001 dismissed. Applications for permission to appeal out of time against earlier orders refused.
• High Court and county court judges: successive occupation, exclusion, non-molestation, contact and committal orders were made during 1999 and 2000. The Court of Appeal upheld the relevant committal decisions.