M (A Child), Re

Lord Justice Thorpe:

On 10 October 2008 HHJ Hughes QC refused applications for the instruction of Dr Shaw to make a general assessment and report in an issue joined between the appellant, M, and the local authority, Kensington and Chelsea, and M’s child, S, represented in the public law proceedings by her guardian. The judge also refused the application for the papers to be referred to Crown Lodge to assess whether this was a case suitable for residential assessment.

Now, a point of great importance is that M is an extremely damaged mother. She is still herself a minor and she is, as it were, a client of the local authority as a minor who has been in care for the majority of her life. She is represented by the Official Solicitor because she is not only a minor but a minor lacking capacity to instruct solicitors and a legal team in these care proceedings.

The judge’s refusal of these applications would have, and was seen to have, devastating consequences, because there were already on the file the reports of a failed residential assessment at Beacon Lodge and a very stark report from a consultant psychologist, Dr Bichard, to the effect that M had really zero chance of providing adequate parenting for S without two years of intensive psychotherapy, an uncertain process for the outcome of which, obviously, S could not wait.

So it is perhaps not surprising that on 30 October an Appellant’s Notice was filed with this court, and it is unfortunate that the papers were not referred to the single Lord Justice until 1 December, which was the date on which the trial judge was due to sit again to progress the care application. It was Ward LJ who on 1 December directed an oral hearing on notice with appeal to follow, and he did note that it was desirable for the hearing to take place as soon as possible. It seems to me that it is regrettable that it is only today on 28 January that we consider the oral submissions of Ms Monroe, for the appellant, and Ms Ford, for the local authority.

The Guardian ad Litem, S’s guardian, is not represented by counsel for the excellent reasons that the guardian adopts the submission of the local authority and is concerned to avoid waste of public money. She has very helpfully submitted a short position statement in which she expresses those considerations.

The rival submissions have been very skilfully put by Ms Monroe and Ms Ford, and I have great sympathy for the forensic position adopted by the local authority. They -- quite und