A County Borough Council v M

In care proceedings, the ordinary balance of probabilities applies. The seriousness of an allegation affects the inherent probabilities and therefore the weight of evidence required, but it does not create a heightened standard of proof. In cases involving alleged inflicted head injury, the court must assess the whole clinical picture. The presence of encephalopathy, intracranial haemorrhage and retinal haemorrhage is not, standing alone, conclusive. Each component, the proposed mechanisms, alternative medical explanations and the surrounding evidence must be examined together. Where the evidence establishes that a child suffered significant harm attributable to a parent’s care, the threshold under Children Act 1989, section 31, is met. A failure by another parent to protect the child may independently constitute the relevant lack of care.

The local authority brought proceedings under Part IV of the Children Act 1989 concerning two children. The elder child had died after collapsing while in the father’s sole care. The younger child, a non-mobile infant, was later found to have bruising to the face, leg and arm. The central issues were the cause of the elder child’s collapse and death, the causes of the younger child’s injuries, and whether the threshold criteria under section 31 were satisfied in relation to the parents.

The court found the threshold criteria under section 31 of the Children Act 1989 established.

1. Standard of proof. The judge applied the ordinary balance of probabilities. Following Re H and Others (Minors) (Sexual Abuse: Standard of Proof) [1986] AC 563, the seriousness of an allegation was relevant only through the inherent probabilities. It did not impose a different or heightened standard. The reasoning in Re Dellow’s Will Trusts [1964] 1 WLR 451 was treated as expressing the same approach.
2. Cause of C1’s collapse. The judge considered the evidence as a whole, including the imaging, pathological and ophthalmological evidence. The alternative explanations of infection, suffocation, immunisation, cardiac arrest, prolonged QT syndrome, coagulopathy and resuscitation were rejected or excluded on the evidence. The triad of encephalopathy, intracranial haemorrhage and retinal haemorrhage was not treated as automatically diagnostic. The judge adopted the cautious description of the triad in R v Harris, Rock, Cherry and Faulder [2005] EWCA Crim 1980, including the need to consider other signs and symptoms and alternative causes.
3. The medical evidence, together with the father’s unreliable and inconsistent accounts and his conduct after the collapse, established that he had shaken C1 at about 10.30 pm. The shaking caused the collapse and subsequent death. The mother was found blameless in relation to C1.
4. C2’s injuries. The explanations involving the baby gym, cot bars and car seat did not adequately account for the pattern and distribution of bruising. The father’s demonstrations and changing accounts were rejected. He was found to have caused the injuries to C2’s face, arm and leg. The mother suspected that injuries had been inflicted and failed to protect C2 from the father’s conduct.
5. The father’s shaking of C1 constituted harm resulting from a lack of care. C2 suffered harm from the injuries caused by the father, and the mother’s failure to protect him also satisfied the threshold.