Tickle v Council of the Borough of North Tyneside & Ors

In applications concerning reporting of care proceedings, the court must balance the public interest in media reporting and greater transparency against the privacy interests of children and others involved. That requires an intense focus on the competing rights under Articles 8 and 10. A practical order may permit reporting while preventing identification through names, locations, images or family details. Parties, local authorities, the media and the Children’s Guardian should engage in sensible dialogue at an early stage to narrow issues and seek a workable balance.

A freelance journalist sought permission to report aspects of care proceedings involving a mother and her children. The local authority sought a reporting restriction order. The mother supported publication, and the parties agreed a draft order containing anonymisation provisions, permitted disclosures and limited permission to publish information about the proceedings. The judge was asked to approve that order and also heard criticism of the local authority’s handling of the matter. The central issues were whether the agreed restrictions appropriately balanced media reporting and transparency against the privacy and welfare interests of those involved, and whether any costs or adverse findings were appropriate.

1. The agreed reporting restriction order was approved. It balanced the public interest in media reporting of care proceedings against the privacy interests of the children, their parents and other persons whose lives were intimately involved.

2. The relevant approach required the court to carry out the Article 8 and Article 10 intense-focus and balancing exercise referred to in RE S [2004] UKHL 47. Had the application required an adversarial determination, the judge considered that the agreed order would have been broadly the order he would have made.

3. The order prohibited publication likely to identify the children or their adult sibling as current or former subjects of proceedings under the Children Act 1989, while permitting specified reporting of current and past proceedings. It also permitted disclosure of documents to the journalist for the specific purpose of informing journalism, subject to restrictions on publication and distribution.

4. The order was not a consent order because it was a contra-mundum injunction. The court nevertheless had no hesitation in approving it.

5. No judicial determination was made on the allegations that the local authority had acted unreasonably or too slowly, because it had not had an adequate opportunity to respond. No order for costs was sought.

6. Applications of this kind are time-consuming and costly satellite issues. Local authorities, the media and other parties should engage in sensible and responsible dialogue as soon as an issue arises. Early collaboration, involving the Children’s Guardian where appropriate, should help produce a workable balance between transparency and privacy and considerably narrow any remaining dispute.