S-C (Children), Re

Parental consent to adoption may be dispensed with only where the child’s welfare throughout life requires adoption. A need for care, long-term removal or placement with strangers is insufficient. The court must distinguish adoption from long-term fostering and assess each child’s individual welfare, including sibling and other family relationships under the Adoption and Children Act 2002. Siblings may properly receive different care plans where their circumstances and welfare needs differ. A failure expressly to analyse the sibling relationship factor may be a technical error, but it will not invalidate the decision if the judgment as a whole shows that the relationships and contact arrangements were considered. General guidance for sibling groups is inappropriate because solutions must be bespoke.

The mother appealed against an order made by HHJ Currie in the Oxford County Court on 7 September 2012. The judge made care orders for all seven children and placement orders for the two youngest children, E and M, whose proposed care plan was adoption. The mother accepted that the threshold for the care orders was satisfied and did not appeal those orders.

The appeal challenged the realism of the adoption plan, the judge’s treatment of the children’s ability to adapt, his analysis under section 1(4)(f) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, and the different treatment of the younger children compared with their older siblings.

Appeal dismissed. Mrs Justice Baron gave the leading judgment, with Lord Justice Thorpe and Lord Justice Rimer agreeing.

1. Under section 52(1) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, parental consent may be dispensed with only where the child’s welfare throughout life requires adoption. The test requires adoption itself, rather than merely statutory intervention, long-term removal from the family or placement with strangers. The word requires has imperative force. This distinction was reflected in Re P [2008] 2 FLR.
2. The judge had applied the correct test. He recognised the importance of placing the two younger children together if possible, the prejudice caused by delay, and the possibility of separate placements if a joint adoptive placement could not be found. Parallel planning did not make the care plan unrealistic, particularly since there was no practical route back to the mother’s care.
3. The judge had adequately considered the children’s ability to adapt and the long-term consequences of adoption. His conclusion that adoption offered the best available solution was supported by the evidence and was not plainly wrong.
4. The judge was wrong to state that section 1(4)(f), concerning the child’s relationship with relatives and other persons, was not material. That was a technical error only. Reading the judgment as a whole, he had considered the children’s relationships with their siblings and relatives, and the care plans provided for inter-sibling contact to be maintained and reviewed.
5. Different outcomes for siblings were permissible. The older children had suffered more serious harm after longer exposure to the family difficulties and were less likely to be adoptable. The decision to place E and M for adoption, while leaving the older children in long-term fostering, was an exercise of child-specific welfare judgment justified on the evidence.
6. The court declined to lay down general principles for sibling groups. Each case requires a bespoke solution directed to the needs of each child. The discretionary decision was not undermined by any material error.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division): On 22 November 2012, the court dismissed the mother’s appeal.
2. Oxford County Court: On 7 September 2012, HHJ Currie made care orders for all seven children and placement orders for E and M.