BLA -v- Shropshire Council (anonymity order)

Administrative CourtHigh CourtKing's Bench DivisionAnonymity Order

Claim number: AC-2025-BHM-000166

In the High Court of Justice
King’s Bench Division
Administrative Court

In the matter of an application for judicial review

1 September 2025

Before:

HHJ Tindal
(Sitting as a Judge of the High Court)

Between:

The King
on the application of
BLA

-v-

Shropshire Council

Order

Notification of the Judge’s decision on the application for permission

After consideration of the documents lodged by the Claimant and Defendant

ORDER by HHJ Tindal (Sitting as a Judge of the High Court)

  1. Pursuant to CPR 39.2(4)) and the Court’s inherent jurisdiction:

    a. No person shall identify the Claimant in connection with these proceedings. The Claimant shall be referred to as BLA.
    b. A non-party may not obtain or inspect a copy of any Statement of Case, or any other document filed with the Court and to which a non-party may have access pursuant to CPR 5.4A-D or otherwise, unless it has been produced or edited so as to comply with para.1 of this Order and/or any subsequent direction made by the Court.
    c. Anyone affected by the terms of this Order shall have permission to apply to vary or set aside any part of it, on 3 working days’ notice.

2. The Claimant’s application for permission for judicial review is refused.

3. The Defendant’s costs of preparing the Acknowledgement of Service are to be paid by the Claimant, summarily assessed as £250.

4. Paragraph 3 above is a final costs order unless within 14 days of the date of this Order the Claimant files with the Court and serves on the Defendant a notice of objection setting out the reasons why he should not be required to pay costs (either as required by the costs order, or at all). If the Claimant does so, the Defendant may, within 14 days of the date it is served, file and serve submissions in response. The Claimant may, within 7 days of the date on which the Defendant’s response is served, file and serve submissions in reply.

5. The direction at paragraph 4 applies whether or not the Claimant seeks reconsideration of the decision to refuse permission for judicial review.

(a) If an application for reconsideration is made, the Judge who hears that application will consider the written representations filed pursuant to paragraph 4 above together with such further oral submissions as may be permitted, and decide what costs order if any, should be made.
(b) If no application for reconsideration is made or if an application is made but withdrawn, the written representations filed pursuant to paragraph 4 above will be referred to a Judge and what order for costs if any, should be made will be decided without further hearing.  

Reasons

  1. The Claimant is the father of five children whom the Defendant placed (and who remain) on Child Protection Plans on 5th March 2025. The Claimant seeks to challenge that decision and the reports prepared for it on 28th February 2025. Accordingly, in the interests of his children, I shall grant him anonymity (as recently discussed in PMC v A Local Health Board [2025] EWCA Civ 1126.
  2. There is a trenchant evidential dispute between the Claimant and the Defendant as to the circumstances leading up to the child protection investigation under s.47 Children Act 1989 (‘CA’), the reports on 28th February 2025 and the Child Protection Conference on 5th March 2025. However, judicial review is inapt for resolution of factual disputes, even for alleged human rights breaches, as the case turns on the public authority’s factual judgment unless it is irrational or otherwise unlawful: Re McAleenon [2024] 3 WLR 803 (SC). Indeed, that is particularly apposite in a case all about a local authority’s investigation of facts. Therefore, I will not be drawn into that dispute between the parties, but reach my conclusion on what appears to be the indisputable background to the case.
  3. The Claimant’s five children are with two different mothers and all of whom are subject to Child Arrangements Orders to share time between their parents. The two eldest, C1 who was at the time 14 (now 15) and C2 who is 12, share the first mother and are subject to a Specific Issue Order in relation to their schooling. The three younger children share the second mother. On 29th January 2025, C1 was upset at school and on 5th February 2025 attended a GP who recorded that she reported emotional and psychological problems (I avoid the loaded word ‘abuse’) when in the Claimant’s care. The GP was sufficiently concerned to make on 6th February a safeguarding referral to the Defendant. This prompted the Defendant to convene a multi-agency meeting on 13th February who initiated a child protection investigation under s.47 CA and the binding guidance on local authorities ‘Working Together’ (2023 version). On 13th February, the social worker met C1 who raised concerns about herself and younger siblings (whom the social worker also met) staying with the Claimant. On 14th February, the social worker met the Claimant, who expressed strong disagreement that there had been emotional or physical harm. The Claimant contends that C1’s allegations were not squarely put to him for response.
  4. As a result, on 17th February 2025, the Claimant presented a formal complaint to the Defendant that (a) it failed to provide suitably qualified and experienced staff (in what seems to me a fairly gratuitous criticism he was unqualified to make) and (b) that the Defendant failed to undertake adequate inquiries (which was his opinion and about which he was entitled to raise a complaint if he wished). Nevertheless, on 28th February 2025, the social worker prepared her reports in relation to all the children for presentation to the Child Protection Conference (‘CPC’). As I said, that took place on 5th March 2025. The Claimant was invited, but he declined to attend because he lacked faith in the process and the reports, although one would have thought that was all the more reason for him to be present and make his representations. However, whether through pique or principle, he failed to take that opportunity. At that meeting, the CPC resolved to place all five children on Child Protection Plans (‘CPP’s) due to emotional harm.
  5. On 14th March 2025, the Defendant acknowledged the Claimant’s complaint and formally responded on 19th May 2025, determining the complaint was not upheld. The Claimant was advised that he could request a Stage 2 review. The Claimant suggests in his Reply that he was dissatisfied with the complaint response which was vitiated by errors and was unreasonable. But once again, that would be all the more reason to escalate the complaint.
     
  6. The Claimant’s failure to escalate his complaint is the focus of several legal disputes. The Claimant justifies this by criticising the Stage 1 complaint decision, the absence of an adequate remedy through a Stage 2 complaint by declaration or damages; and that if he had escalated to Stage 2, this claim would have been out of time. For its part, the Defendant contends it is already out of time, Stage 2 would have been an suitable alternative remedy; and the criticisms of the Stage 1 process are not well-founded in any event. I consider those points in turn.
  7. On time, CPR 54.5 provides that a claim for Judicial Review must be issued ‘‘promptly and in any event not later than 3 months after the grounds to make a claim first arose’, although time can be extended under CPR 3.1(2)(a). Time runs from the decision itself even if it has continuing consequences, although that may be deferred to the last of a series of decisions in a course of conduct: see R(Delve) v DWP [2021] ICR 236 (CA) at [121]-[126]. In this case, whilst the Defendant’s decision to instigate an investigation was made on 13th February, the targets of the Claimant’s challenge are the reports on 28th February and CPC decision of 5th March, which are not ‘artificial targets’ but distinct steps in the Defendant’s process. So I am satisfied the claim is within time of both decisions.
  8. However, I do agree with the Defendant that the Stage 2 complaint process was an entirely suitable alternative remedy. The leading authority is now McAleenon, where the Supreme Court explained that since Judicial Review is a remedy of last resort, permission should be refused where a claimant has or had a suitable alternative remedy, but that is to be assessed ‘by reference to the type of claim the claimant has chosen to bring and what relief they have sought’. Here, the Claimant seeks (i) a quashing order in relation to the reports and the CPC decision; (ii) a declaration that they were unlawful and/or in breach of Art.8 ECHR; and (iii) damages. However, as is also clear from McAleenon, the relevant ‘remedy’ should be considered in substance not just form. Whilst the Stage 2 complaint would not have awarded damages, s.31(4) Senior Courts Act 1981 only permits damages to be awarded in Judicial Review if the Court is satisfied they would have been awarded in a private action brought at the same time. It follows that such a civil claim (not complaint) is a suitable alternative remedy for damages from the Defendant (as opposed to the third party polluter as in McAleenon at [61]), which is why Judicial Review cannot seek damages alone: CPR 54.3(2). So, the real question is whether the Stage 2 complaint would have afforded a suitable alternative remedy to overturn the decisions under challenge (a declaration they were unlawful adds nothing substantial to that).
  9. In the similar case of R v Hampshire CC exp H [1999] 2 FLR 359 (CA), a parent judicially reviewed: (i) a decision to place children on the Child Protection Register; (ii) the internal appeal decision which criticised the original decision but did not correct it; and (iii) a fresh decision to maintain child protection registration. The Court of Appeal refused relief for (i) and (ii) because the internal appeal was an adequate remedy but granted it for (iii) as it was a new decision and the parent could not reasonably be expected to appeal once again. By contrast, in the present case, the Stage 2 complaint was a much simpler and quicker route to overturn the CPC decision and the reports which led to it, on a far wider basis than available under he narrow grounds of Judicial Review, which as stressed in exp H, would only overturn child protection decisions ‘in exceptional cases involving a point of principle’ like exp H itself. The present case is an entirely case-specific challenge to particular decisions about particular parents raising no wider issue whatsoever. A Stage 2 complaint would not just have been a ‘suitable alternative remedy’ for the Claimant, it would have been a much better remedy. That in itself justifies refusal of permission to claim Judicial Review. However, this would not stop the Claimant bringing a damages claim under s.7 Human Rights Act 1998 for breach of Art.8 ECHR if so he wished.
     
  10. However, such a claim would not get far insofar as it challenges the fairness of the Defendant’s procedures. Save for procedural dimensions of ECHR rights which rarely add to Common Law procedural fairness, with the ECHR, the Court is concerned with the outcome not the process: contrary to normal Judicial Review: R(Begum) v Denbigh High School [2007] 1 AC 100 (HL). Indeed, in this case, the Claimant’s second ground of challenge is Common Law procedural fairness, although tellingly on this Ground, the Claimant referred back to his Stage 1 complaint and essentially ‘mirrored’ it as the Defendant says. This not only once again illustrates how pursuing the Stage 2 complaint would have been a suitable alternative remedy, but also how the Stage 2 complaint process was part of the Defendant’s overall procedures to be analysed, since an effective ‘appeal’, or here complaint, about a decision which can change or reverse it, can potentially ‘cure’ any earlier unfairness: Calvin v Carr [1980] AC 574 (PC). If someone says it was unfair that a particular point was not addressed, or he had no opportunity to make representations about it, an internal complaints process gives him that opportunity and is part of the overall process to be considered. Insofar as the Claimant has procedural criticisms of the CPC decision and reports and Stage 1 process, that is precisely what the Stage 2 complaint process is for.
  11. In any event, as the Defendant says, there was nothing whatsoever unfair about its investigation process: it interviewed the children, gave the Claimant a right to make representations which he took (there was no need to ‘put to him’ every allegation – it was an investigation, not cross-examination). He also had a right to attend and make representations at the CPC meeting which he did not take and a right to a complaint appeal which he did not pursue. The Claimant’s complaints of ‘procedural unfairness’ are no more than excuses for his failure properly to participate in those processes, for which he only has himself to blame. For those reasons, the Claimant’s procedural unfairness ground is not arguable even on the low threshold set in Ramdass v Minister of Finance (2025) UKPC 4.
  12. In any event, as the Defendant says, the Claimant’s real complaints are his criticisms of the merits of the decisions under challenge: the conclusions in the reports and the subsequent decision at the CPC to place the children on CPPs. The Claimant contends that these decisions were unlawful and violates his rights to family life under Art.8 ECHR. However, once again, those inter-related substantive complaints are simply not arguable (even on the low Ramdass standard) either. To invoke child protection inquiries, s.47 CA only requires:

    “…reasonable cause to suspect that a child is suffering or is likely to suffer significant harm [requiring an authority to] consider..inquiries as they consider necessary to enable them to decide whether they should take any action to safeguard or promote the child’s welfare’.”

    Judicial Review should not be used to try to overturn child protection decisions by professionals with expertise and practical investigatory processes which Judicial Review can only scrutinise broadly. Unlike the Family Court, the Administrative Court rarely hears contested evidence (McAleenon) and cannot make child welfare-based evaluative decisions: A Father v Worcestershire CC [2025] 2 WLR 155 (SC). This is why the High Court on Judicial Review will not intervene unless it is an exceptional case involving an error of principle like in exp H. As Lady Hale said in G v Hertfordshire CC [2001] 1 FLR 280 (CA) at [50]:

    “[T]he courts should be slow indeed to hold that a local authority does not have reasonable grounds such as will justify it in making further inquiries…. Given no infringement of legal rights is generally involved.. ….to hold such an investigation would normally only be challenged through judicial review. The court would be reluctant to grant a remedy save in the most blatant case of arbitrary and unjustified inquiry.”  

13. The present case very simply does not even arguably come anywhere near that threshold. The Defendant was acting on concerns by a school, fortified by a GP. That was more than enough to justify investigation under s.47 CA. Once it started, the Defendant interviewed the children, including C1 who expressed significant concerns about her and her younger siblings’ time with the Claimant which directly fed into the reports. The fact he strongly disagreed with his own daughter’s concerns does not mean the authority’s reports were illegal or irrational or violated Art.8 ECHR. As Lady Hale again pointed out in G at [49]- [50], whilst a s.47 investigation interferes with family life under Art.8(1), that does not make it disproportionate under Art.8(2), not least as the authority must balance its duties to protect children under Art.3 ECHR. This is why the Courts decline to impose a duty of care in negligence on professionals undertaking child protection investigations, notwithstanding Art.8 ECHR: similar concerns to those of Lady Hale in G were later expressed by the majority of the House of Lords in D v East Berkshire NHS [2005] 2 WLR 993. The law’s view is that if professionals get it wrong, better they err on the side of child protection than parental rights, which is foreign to the Children Act 1989 itself (which Lady Hale co-authored). In short, the Claimant’s substantive challenges, whether framed as illegality, irrationality, or breach of Art.8, are not arguable, even on the low Ramdass test.

14. Therefore, I refuse permission to claim Judicial Review, both because a Stage 2 complaint would have been a suitable alternative remedy and even if I am wrong about that, because the grounds of challenge are simply not arguable on their merits – or lack of them. Indeed, I come close to certifying them totally without merit, but I refrain from doing so just in case the Claimant’s Counsel’s skill can dig out a good point underneath his client’s ill-focused complaints, though there is little sign of it so far. As it is, it follows the Claimant has the right to seek oral renewal of permission before a different judge. However, if he wishes to refer to Family Court Orders, he will need the permission of that Court to do so. There appears to be no claim for Interim Relief, but in any event, it would have to fail with the failure of permission. Likewise, doubtless the Defendant will have the matter under review and if the children come off their CPPs, that would render the claim academic in any event. However, that is how the matter stands for now.

15. There is no reason whatsoever why the Claimant should not pay the Defendant’s costs of the Acknowledgement of Service. Those do not appear to have been specified, but a reasonable and proportionate sum for Defendant’s Counsel’s Defence could not possibly be less than £250 and I so order on the usual terms.

Signed: HHJ Tindal