GP (A Child)

Judgment Approved

Lord Justice Henderson:

Introduction

The issue on this appeal from Hayden J is whether the child GP, who is the 11-year-old daughter of an Italian father and a Latvian mother, should be returned to Italy (which is agreed to have been her country of habitual residence at the relevant time) following her wrongful abduction from Italy to England by her mother in February 2016.

The father’s application for GP’s return to Italy was heard by Hayden J on 26 May 2017, some 15 months after the abduction had taken place. For the reasons given in his reserved judgment handed down on 20 June 2017, and by his order of the same date, the judge ordered GP to be returned to Italy forthwith, and in any event by no later than 25 July 2017, pursuant to Article 12 of the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction 1980 (“the Hague Convention”) which was given domestic effect in English law by section 12(2) of the Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985.

In reaching this conclusion, the judge considered and rejected the mother’s case that the exception under Article 13(b) of the Hague Convention was made out, namely that she had established that there was “a grave risk that [ GP’s ] return would expose [ her ] to physical or psychological harm or otherwise place [ her ] in an intolerable situation”. The judge also declined, in the exercise of his discretion, to refuse to order GP’s return under the second limb of Article 13, having found that she objected to being returned and had attained an age and degree of maturity at which it was appropriate to take account of her views.

Permission to appeal was apparently not sought by the mother from the judge, but she requested permission in her Appellant’s Notice filed on 10 July 2017. On 20 July 2017, Black LJ (as she then was) granted the mother permission to appeal on the first two grounds in the Appellant’s Notice, which sought to challenge the judge’s conclusion on Article 13(b) and the exercise of his discretion under the second limb of that Article. Black LJ refused permission on a third ground, which related to the conduct of the meeting which took place between the judge and GP. No renewed application for permission to appeal on that ground was made before us by counsel now instructed on the mother’s behalf, Mr Vine QC leading Mr Martyn Bennett, neither of whom appeared below. The appeal to this court is therefore confined to the first and second grounds.

Black LJ also gr