LADY HALE giving the judgment of the court: 1. At issue in this case are the principles which should guide the exercise of the court’s discretion in deciding whether to order a child to attend to give evidence in family proceedings. The current approach was stated by Smith LJ in LM v...

R (A Child - Care Order) [2017] EWHC 364 (Fam) Judgment in a re-hearing in care proceedings in relation to a child, whose mother accepted that she had a long, chronic history of substance misuse. The two central issues were: (i) the interpretation of hair strand test results, and (ii) resolution of...

  A father of three boys (7, 5 and 3) appealed an order refusing his application for contact. The case had involved significant domestic violence from the father to the mother, witnessed by the two elder children. The father had also had historical criminal convictions including causing...

H (Children) [2014] EWCA Civ 733 Mother’s application to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal against what she contended was a “pre-emptory” change of interim residence orders in respect of her three sons This was an application for permission to appeal with appeal to follow made by the...

Re S (Parental Alienation: Cult) [2020] EWCA Civ 568 The Court of Appeal allowed an appeal by a father against the dismissal of his application for Lara, an 9 year old girl, to live with him, in circumstances where the trial judge had found that Lara had suffered harm in the context of her mother’s...

Appeal to the Supreme Court by mother against an order for the return of children under the Hague Convention, on the grounds that the judge had failed to apply Article 13(b) of the Convention. Appeal dismissed. Background to the appeal  This case concerns two little girls whom the court refers...

Re E (A Child) [2011] EWHC 3521 (Fam) Judgment in intractable contact / parental alienation case, giving guidance on case management in such matters By the time of the final hearing the child was 8 ½ years old and had not seen the father for 3 ½ years. There was evidence that the relationship...

W-B (A Child) [2012] EWCA Civ 592 Appeal as to whether proceedings, concerning the residence of the parties’ child, should take place in Scotland, where she now lived with the mother, or England. Appeal allowed. This was an appeal by a mother in private law proceedings.  The parents were...

      In the case of  child relocation specialist Anna Worwood of Penningtons Manches LLP, acted for the appellant father (instructing Charles Hale QC). The father's appeal generated a necessary consideration of the proper principles to be applied in cases involving...

    To consider The law to be applied in an international child relocation case was set out in K v K (Children: Permanent Removal from Jurisdiction) [2011] EWCA Civ 793 A father's appeal against an order giving the mother leave to remove their 12-year-old daughter to Germany was allowed...