K (Children)

Permission to appeal in child-care proceedings should be granted only where there are reasonable grounds giving a realistic prospect of success. On challenges to factual findings, appellate intervention requires the judge to have been plainly wrong. On challenges to discretion, the judge must have exceeded the generous ambit entrusted to her. Mere disagreement is insufficient. Sustainable findings that children’s evidence is reliable on crucial facts may establish the threshold under section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989. A placement order’s lifelong consequences require careful scrutiny, but do not reduce the high appellate threshold where the order rests on findings open to the judge and a welfare assessment within the proper scope of discretion.

Two parents, both serving terms of imprisonment, sought permission to appeal against Her Honour Judge Parry’s judgment and order in Swansea County Court dated 19 April 2012 concerning three children. The two older children were made subject to care orders, placed in long-term foster care, and made subject to restrictions on parental contact and future applications under sections 34(4) and 91(14) of the Children Act 1989. The youngest child was made subject to a care order and a placement order under section 22 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002.

The parents challenged the factual findings, the treatment of the children’s evidence, procedural fairness, the conduct of the proceedings, and the finding that they lacked capacity to change. They particularly challenged the placement order. The central issue was whether those complaints gave the proposed appeals a realistic prospect of success.

1. Permission refused. Permission to appeal would be granted only where there were reasonable grounds giving a realistic prospect of success. The application had to be assessed in light of the restricted role of the Court of Appeal in reviewing factual findings and judicial discretion.
2. The appellate hurdle was very high. The Court would interfere with factual findings only if the judge was plainly wrong. It would interfere with an exercise of discretion only if the judge had exceeded the generous ambit committed to her. The possibility that others might reach different conclusions was insufficient.
3. The lower judge had been entitled to conduct an independent fact-finding hearing, notwithstanding the parents’ criminal convictions for assaults upon the children. Although unusual, that course gave the parents a further opportunity to justify themselves and did not provide a basis for appeal. The judge had scrutinised the children’s evidence, identified weaknesses in the evidence and its collection, and directed herself correctly on the law.
4. The decisive findings were that the children’s evidence was reliable and accurate on crucial central facts, including repeated physical abuse and the parents’ lack of realistic prospects of change. Those findings were unassailable. Once made, the threshold criteria under section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989 were inevitably established, and the remaining issues were secondary.
5. The placement order concerning the youngest child had lifelong implications and was practically irreversible. Nevertheless, it rested on findings open to the lower judge and on a welfare assessment within the generous ambit of her discretion. There was therefore no realistic prospect of the Court of Appeal overturning it. Permission to appeal was refused.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division): On 7 November 2012, Hedley J refused permission to appeal.
2. Swansea County Court: Her Honour Judge Parry made the relevant judgment and order on 19 April 2012, including care orders, contact restrictions and a placement order concerning the youngest child.