XYM, R (on the application of) v Kingston Family Court & Anor

Judicial review is not a means of rerunning arguments about family-court orders after the available appeal process has been exhausted. Where the statutory scheme provides no further appeal to the High Court, the supervisory jurisdiction is especially limited. Permission should be refused unless an arguable public-law error is identified, such as a complete disregard of duty, an important point of principle or practice, or another compelling reason. Fact-specific disagreement, alleged errors in findings or case management, and broad criticisms of the family-justice system do not ordinarily satisfy that threshold.

The claimant challenged the refusal by HHJ Willans, on 7 September 2022, of permission to appeal three orders made in family proceedings: case-management and financial orders in the Kingston Family Court, and findings of fact in Children Act proceedings in the West London Family Court.

The claimant sought judicial review of HHJ Willans’s refusals of permission to appeal. Permission for that judicial review had previously been refused on the papers, but the renewed application was adjourned so that the claimant could obtain HHJ Willans’s judgment. The central issue was whether the claimant had identified any viable public-law error warranting the High Court’s supervisory intervention.

1. Application refused. The renewed application for permission for judicial review was refused.
2. The court could not identify any arguable error of law, unreasonableness or procedural unfairness in HHJ Willans’s reasoned judgment. There was no realistic prospect that a substantive hearing would grant judicial review and overturn any of the three refusals of permission to appeal.
3. The principles in Sivasubramaniam v Wandsworth County Court [2002] EWHC 1738 (Admin) and Cart v Upper Tribunal [2012] 1 AC 663 reinforce the limited scope of judicial review where a claimant has exhausted the appeal rights available within the family-court process and the statutory scheme deliberately provides no further appeal to the High Court. Judicial review is a supervisory and secondary jurisdiction, rather than a mechanism for rerunning arguments about findings, directions or conclusions.
4. There was no jurisdictional bar to the financial proceedings continuing while the children proceedings remained unresolved. The relevant question was whether the family court had properly exercised its judgment and discretion in the circumstances. HHJ Willans had addressed that question and had found it open to the judges concerned to proceed.
5. The claimant’s reliance on Articles 6 and 3 of the ECHR, criminal standards of proof, the presumption of innocence, alleged defects in the handling of parental allegations, and wider system-based criticisms disclosed no arguable public-law issue. The family judges had addressed the relevant allegations and the reasons for the decisions were adequately explained.
6. An alleged break in contact between a parent and children did not require a later hearing to begin with an adverse finding or predisposition against the other parent. Fairness required the allegations to be ventilated and considered, as they had been.

• High Court (Administrative Court): The renewed application for permission for judicial review was refused on 17 September 2024.
• HHJ Willans: On 7 September 2022, refused permission to appeal against three family-court orders, giving an oral judgment.
• Family courts: Orders were made by DDJ Waschkuhn on 20 April 2022, DJ Saunders on 11 May 2022, and DJ Armstrong on 6 July 2022.