LAU, R (on the application of) v The Family Court at Croydon

An application for permission to appeal concerning judicial review of court administration succeeds only if a pleaded ground is arguable with a real prospect of success. A court need address the substance of the pleaded grounds and give adequate reasons; it need not answer every submission.

While a Children Act 1989 section 91(14) order is in force, a party must obtain permission before making a substantive contact application. The court office has no duty to issue that substantive application first. Judicial review will not compel administrative progression of an application which the court has no jurisdiction to entertain or which is, in substance, an impermissible collateral challenge to final orders. A short delay explained by such a jurisdictional objection does not establish a breach of Articles 6 or 8.

The applicant sought permission to appeal from an Administrative Court order dismissing, as totally without merit, his renewed application for permission to apply for judicial review.

His judicial review claim complained that HMCTS had failed to issue and progress an application lodged in January 2026 in private-law child-arrangements proceedings. He maintained that the application should have been put before a judge. The material later provided to the Court of Appeal showed that it sought to set aside final Family Court orders, rather than permission to make a fresh contact application while a section 91(14) restriction was in force.

The central question was whether any proposed ground gave an arguable basis for challenging the Administrative Court’s refusal of permission for judicial review.

1. The application for permission to appeal was refused as totally without merit. Lady Justice Andrews, with whom Lord Justice Moylan agreed, held that none of the proposed grounds was arguable with a real prospect of success.

2. The January application was, on its face and in substance, an application to set aside final Family Court orders. It was not an application for permission under section 91(14) of the Children Act 1989. While the restriction remained in force, the applicant could not make a substantive application relating to contact unless permission had first been obtained. The court office was therefore under no obligation to issue such an application.

3. A circuit judge had also explained that the Family Court lacked jurisdiction to entertain an application to set aside another circuit judge’s final order in the circumstances asserted. The relevant provision of the FPR did not apply. The applicant could not use a set-aside application as a further appeal or collateral challenge to final orders. To the extent that matters could have been raised on appeal, the analysis in Henderson v Henderson [1843] 3 Hare 100 supported the conclusion that the proposed course was an abuse of process.

4. The Administrative Court’s supervisory jurisdiction did not alter those conclusions. Its exceptional intervention in lower-court matters may extend to a gross procedural error amounting to a denial of a fair hearing. However, the brief administrative delay was explained by the jurisdictional objection and came nowhere near that level. The Strasbourg authorities relied upon involved materially different circumstances and did not assist the applicant.

5. The judge below had engaged sufficiently with the pleaded judicial-review grounds and given clear reasons. The complaint of apparent bias did not arguably engage the test in Porter v Magill [2001] UKHL 67; [2002] 2 AC 357. Litigants in person remained subject to procedural requirements concerning concise grounds and skeleton arguments.

6. The expiry of the section 91(14) order and subsequent developments did not affect the historic judicial-review claim. They meant, independently, that the claim had been overtaken by events and that permission would serve no useful purpose. The court continued anonymity and reporting restrictions, and dismissed the applicant’s informal disclosure application.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): In [2026] EWCA Civ 1115 , the court refused permission to appeal from the Administrative Court and certified the application totally without merit.
• High Court, King’s Bench Division, Administrative Court: On 21 April 2026, Benjamin Douglas-Jones KC, sitting as a Deputy High Court judge, dismissed the renewed application for permission to apply for judicial review and certified it totally without merit. The corrected order was sealed on 26 May 2026.
• Administrative Court: On 20 February 2026, Aidan Eardley KC had refused permission on the papers. That decision was superseded by the renewed permission hearing.
• Family Court proceedings: Final child-arrangements orders were made on 25 November 2024, including a section 91(14) restriction under the Children Act 1989. Permission to appeal those orders was later refused.