Posts
Family Court Reporting Watch Roundup: Aug-Sep 2026
Welcome to the Roundup, where we correct, clarify and comment on media reports of family law, explain and comment on published family court judgments, and highlight other transparency news. MEDIA COVERAGE OF FAMILY LAW, TRANSPARENCY etc The Times (£) had a...
Is the Child Focused Court model allowing time to really focus on children’s welfare?
An important new judgment from the Court of Appeal was published on the judiciary website this week – Re C (Child Arrangements Orders; Domestic Abuse; Child Focused Court) [2026] EWCA Civ 1216 This was a case about contact between four children and their...
A family damaged by court proceedings?
A 12 year old boy (who I’ll call ‘Jon’ – not his real name) had been subject to private law proceedings for more than three years. In a final hearing before HHJ Gibbons at Oxford Family Court this summer, the Cafcass guardian said that Jon had been failed by the...
Special guardianship orders and threshold of harm
This is a guest post by Saara Parijaat. Saara is an undergraduate law student at the London School of Economics and hopes to pursue a career at the Bar. Re E (Special Guardianship; Public Law Proceedings) [2026] EWCA Civ 1167 is a recently published Court of Appeal...
‘The use of AI by social workers may lead to injustice in family court proceedings’
The law reform and human rights charity, JUSTICE, is proposing ‘a rights- and rule of law-based framework’ for the use of AI in the justice system – Ensuring technology strengthens justice and the rule of law. We’re glad someone is! A briefing paper, Social work use...
Change of school for a child during care proceedings
This week, I attended a short hearing at Cardiff Family Court about a local authority wanting to move a child under an interim care order to a school nearer where he currently lives. His mother didn’t agree, and she applied to court to object. With only a few days...
Domestic abuse findings and a criminal trial
Can a father against whom findings of domestic abuse have been made by a family court plead 'Not Guilty' to those offences in the criminal court? Yes, if he denies the charges and rejects the family court findings. The standard of proof in the criminal court is...
Why isn’t Dr G named?
The recently published judgment in Kent County Council v M & Ors [2026] EWFC 212 (B) is very critical of a parent and baby residential assessment business, named as Savannah Lodge, and also critical of a paediatrician, who is named only as “Dr G”. In her judgment,...
‘I want the children to have a relationship with their father but he scares me’ – Part 2: the welfare decision
In Part One of this report, I described the court hearings in Cardiff Family Court that led to HHJ Paul Hopkins KC producing a 188 page fact-finding judgment of more than 700 paragraphs. The judge concluded that most of the allegations that the father, (who I’m...
Controversy over cohabitation rights
As we've mentioned in recent monthly Roundups, the government is currently consulting on three linked areas of family law under the title ‘A fairer end to relationships’. The consultation closes on 14 August. 1. Financial remedies on divorce/dissolution - Although a...