Case Summaries

Application for a reporting restriction order in respect of a judgment handed down in public. Guidance on RRO applications given.

Child support appeal to the Upper Tribunal concerning interpretation of the Child Support Maintenance Calculation Regulations 2012 regarding information being obtained from HMRC and other sources.

Court of Appeal judgment in an appeal of a decision not to grant leave to apply for contact with the subject child in care proceedings. Appeal allowed

Judgment of Roberts J in financial remedies case where the total wealth available for distribution was in the order of between £10.5 to £11.6 million in which the husband sought a deviation from the sharing principle on the basis that his wealth had accrued before the marriage and he contended that the wife should leave the marriage with her needs met.

Applications for parental orders in respect of three children who were all born within 6 months of each other in which Ms Justice Russell considers whether the payments made to the surrogates were for expenses reasonably incurred.

Father awarded damages after Poland’s treatment of his application for contact with his daughter violated Article 8 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

Application made by the media, including the Guardian, the BBC and Sky News, for the publication of the judgment in 2014 of Eleanor King J, concerning the child, Ellie Butler. The application was dismissed by Pauffley J owing to the substantial risk of prejudice that may occur to a criminal appeal pursued by the child’s parents.

Successful appeal against the refusal of a mother’s application for permission to oppose the adoption application in relation to her eight year old son.

Application for a child arrangements order in respect of a baby boy born in England in the summer of 2015, as a result of a gestational surrogacy, where the respondent who acted as surrogate was not willing to hand the baby over to the applicants.

Judgment of Munby P concerning an application for a declaration of parentage pursuant to section 55A of the Family Law Act 1986 following an administrative mistake of an IVF clinic.

Judgment of MacDonald J concerning an application to discharge a children’s guardian on grounds of apparent bias. Notwithstanding legitimate concerns, the application would succeed only in ‘very rare’ circumstances, of which this case was not an example. A helpful summary for practitioners of the relevant principles when considering whether to make such an application.

Application to extend a reporting restriction order ‘until further order’ following the death of N, in relation to whom the court had granted permission for life-sustaining treatment to be removed.

Appeal by father against against an order requiring the return of his four-year-old son to Sweden in proceedings under the 2008 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.

Application for declarations and damages pursuant to the Human Rights Act in respect of two children who were subject to a (purported) s.20 agreement to be accommodated by a local authority for more than two years after which an interim care order was granted.

Supreme Court judgment. Held that the Court does not have jurisdiction to hear an appeal from a father who had applied for the recognition and enforcement by the English courts of a custody order in his favour made by the Romanian courts. In reaching its decision the Court concluded that appeals in England and Wales under article 34 of BIIR may be brought only by a single further appeal on a point of law to the Court of Appeal.

Application for a parental order in respect of a child born to a gestational surrogate in India in circumstances where an application for a child settlement visa had been refused by the UK authorities on the basis that there was insufficient evidence that the applicants were the parents.