LBH (The Local Authority) v KJ (The Mother) & Ors

Under section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989, a disabled child’s needs cannot alone establish that parental care is unreasonable. The court must assess the parent’s care in context, including the demands of other children, housing, culture, disability and the support reasonably available from public authorities.

Reasonable parental care includes commitment, basic parenting skills, stimulation, compliance with medical requirements, protection from harm, and engagement with appropriate professional advice and support, including respite. A parent may reject advice, but may thereby risk a finding that the care is unreasonable. The threshold must be established by proved facts, not professional concern or suspicion.

The local authority brought proceedings under Part IV of the Children Act 1989 concerning a nine-year-old child with severe disabilities and lifelong dependence on others. The child had been accommodated after concerns about the mother’s ability to meet her needs, including stimulation, hygiene, medical care and protection from domestic violence.

The final hearing was transferred from the Family Proceedings Court to the County Court, where the court tried the threshold issues because the care plan was incomplete. The central issue was whether the child’s significant harm or likelihood of significant harm was attributable to care that it was unreasonable to expect a parent to provide.

1. The court held that the threshold criteria under section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989 were established. The child was likely to suffer significant harm in the future because of identified deficiencies in the mother’s care.
2. Applying Re H and R (Child Sexual Abuse) [1994] 1FLR 80 (HL), the court emphasised that the threshold decision must be based on proved facts assessed on a wide canvas. Professional concern, however extensive, could not be treated as fact.
3. The standard of reasonable parental care had to be applied in context. It could not mean that a single parent became subject to compulsory intervention merely because a severely disabled child’s needs exceeded the unaided capacity of one or even two parents. Nor could a local authority rely on parental shortcomings caused by its own failure to provide reasonably necessary support.
4. Reasonable care in this context required unconditional commitment, basic physical and emotional care, stimulation, compliance with medical requirements, basic protection, and appropriate engagement with expert advice and professional support, including respite. A parent remained entitled to accept or reject advice, but rejection could be unreasonable where it harmed the child’s interests.
5. The court allowed for the mother’s other children, inadequate accommodation, cultural circumstances, communication difficulties and the inadequacy of support previously offered. The failed rehabilitation week was not a fair test of her capacity to care, and the cause of the child’s hypothermia was unascertained. Nevertheless, the mother’s lack of co-operation, failure to recognise the child’s needs, inadequate stimulation, failure to appreciate domestic violence risks and insufficient attention to hygiene were likely to cause significant harm if unaddressed.
6. Future planning should adopt a whole-life perspective and provide for the fullest safe involvement of the family, particularly the child’s siblings. The mother was considered capable of change but needed to recognise that the child’s care exceeded her unaided resources and to work constructively with welfare agencies.