A Child (Threshold: Inflicted Injury and Domestic Abuse)

In care and placement proceedings, delay may be justified only where it is planned, purposeful and likely to promote the child’s welfare. Adoption requires the court to be satisfied that the child’s welfare requires consent to be dispensed with and that nothing else will do. The court must undertake a holistic evaluation of every realistic option, including the support available to parents, while treating the child’s lifelong welfare as paramount. A possible future improvement based on uncertain therapeutic progress will not justify delay where the child faces a grave and continuing risk of harm and needs timely permanence. Proportionality requires careful comparison of the realistic alternatives, but the benefits of family rehabilitation do not outweigh serious unaddressed protective risks merely because rehabilitation would be preferable if it were realistic.

M County Council sought final care and placement orders for two children after the court had found that the third respondent had inflicted serious injuries on A and that the mother had failed to protect him from physical and emotional harm and had delayed seeking medical treatment.

A was living with his father under an agreed child arrangements order. The principal issue concerning B was whether the final decision should be adjourned to allow the mother further domestic-abuse and psychological work, followed by an updated assessment, or whether care and placement orders should be made immediately. The court also had to determine final arrangements for A and the mother’s consent to B’s placement for adoption.

1. The mother’s application for an adjournment was refused. The court’s task was to determine B’s welfare throughout her life, with delay treated as potentially prejudicial but permissible where it was planned and purposeful and likely to promote welfare.
2. Applying Children Act 1989 s.1 and the welfare checklist in s.1(4) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, the court conducted a holistic evaluation of the realistic options. Those options were adjournment with possible rehabilitation to the mother, or care and placement for adoption.
3. The authorities established that adoption could be authorised only where the child’s overriding welfare interests made it necessary and nothing else would do. The court had to examine the advantages and disadvantages of each realistic option, including the assistance and support which public authorities could provide.
4. The mother had made some progress, but her understanding of the findings remained shallow. She remained detached from the emotional consequences of the abuse, had not developed sufficient protective insight, had maintained contact with the third respondent until June 2019, and had engaged only recently and incompletely with therapeutic work. The prognosis and timescale for meaningful change were uncertain.
5. The risk arising from the third respondent’s violence, impulsivity and disregard for the law was grave. B could not reasonably be left in foster care while the mother’s progress was tested on hope alone. Given B’s age, developing attachment to her foster carer and the diminishing prospects of a timely permanent placement, further delay was not in her welfare interests.
6. Care and placement orders for B were necessary and proportionate. The mother’s consent was dispensed with under s.52(1)(b) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002. The third respondent’s consent did not require dispensation because he lacked parental responsibility.
7. A was to live with his father under a child arrangements order, supported by a supervision order. Contact with the mother was to remain supervised or supported because of the continuing risk.

First-instance decision. No appellate history is stated in the judgment.