Family Court Reporting Watch Roundup

• Correcting, clarifying or commenting on media reports of family court cases

• Explaining or commenting on published judgments of family court cases

• Highlighting other transparency news

MEDIA (MIS)REPORTS OF FAMILY COURT CASES

ITV This Morning and Daily Mail – In Expert evidence about unexplained injuries in child protection cases we commented on reports of parents traumatised by removal of their baby due to possible non-accidental injury. We also asked for suggestions for a guidance note on expert evidence for families. (See twitter conversations here too on language within investigation of allegations by older children):

 

The Daily Mail – Family court judge must explain why pianist jailed, says campaigner was the headline of a recent Daily Mail report.  We made enquiries and confirmed the later publication of the committal judgment. See Pianos and Prisons and Publication of Judgments. It’s hard to see how the spirit of the committal guidance on publication in the public interest has been met though. The particulars of the breaches are not appended or even summarised (since admitted), leaving the public and the media in the dark. Whatever the individual merits, this matters, including for public trust (where warranted) and accurate reporting, particularly on social media.

(We’re also keeping an eye out for the published judgment from an application for committal for breach of a reporting restriction in the Court of Protection. See the Mail headline: Man accused of revealing information aired in Court of Protection could be jailed.) 

 

The Sun, Metro, Star, Express & Mirror –  A cluster of celebrity divorce reports with no obvious public interest (as opposed to public appetite) attracted twitter comment from the legal sector last week. While Stowe Family Law blog commented on the speculation about Ant’s divorce (apparently triggering another round of tabloid speculation), in Stellar contributions: I’m a celebrity get me out of here!:

https://twitter.com/modern_divorce/status/958647292927660032?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.transparencyproject.org.uk%2Fpress%2Fwp-admin%2Fpost.php%3Fpost%3D6334%26action%3Dedit

 

Custody hits UK cinemas 13 April –  Mainstream news media outlets reported the trailer for this award winning French film about separating parents disputing child arrangements this week:

 

Linker of the week

The Guardian – We saw links here, here, here and here to the primary source material being reported in the Guardian last week. We’d love to think this will eventually be no more than routine good practice across all news media outlets:

 

NEWLY PUBLISHED CASES FOR EXPLANATION OR COMMENT

Re E [2017] EWFC 101  – In ‘All is not well with child protection in North Wales’ we explained the judgment from a Welsh court decision on an application for amendment of an earlier judgment, due to ‘reputational damage’:

 

 

Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust v Thomas and others [2018] EWHC 127 (Fam) (1) & (2) – UK Human Rights Blog explained this judgment from an application for permission to withdraw medical treatment from a child. See this post, this @Celtic Knot thread and the transcript of the recent Family Justice Council debate:

 

K (A Child) [2018] EWFC B2 – Another in a line of scathing judgments in the context of inadequate secure accommodation provision for children. Explained for the Guardian by Louise Tickle (also a Transparency Project member) here:

 

IN OTHER TRANSPARENCY NEWS

Henry Brooke – A tech visionary who championed diversity, transparency and access to justice  [The Financial Times – paywall]. Blog to follow:

https://twitter.com/moonbroth/status/958396124758446080

 

Vulnerable Clients and The Family Justice System – We wrote about Jo Delahunty QC’s lecture here. It’s also available to watch on YouTube here. (See also Justice Online: Getting Better?, a Gresham College lecture by Joshua Rozenberg on the development of the Online Court on 20 February at 6pm:

 

Hidden transparency – We commented on transparency proposals  deep within the Presidents 18th View in the context of financial remedies:

 

Care Crisis Review  – The deadline to respond to surveys for families and practitioners is 11th February:

 

Public Law Project research on accessibility of legal aid for family cases – PLP are inviting family law service providers with a legal aid contract and others to complete a questionnaire.

Legal help and advice to tell you how to get advice – David Burrows on practical barriers that risk making access to justice meaningless:

 

Transparency through publication and spread of research – @Ermintrude asked whether the current ‘system’ for informing social workers and the public about research is as open as it needs to be to serve the public interest. (We’ve had similar conversations at The Transparency Project). See this thread:

 

What we learned in 2017: The Courts – Paul McGrath and Judith Townend (of the Transparency Project) commented on the online court proposals in the Internet Newsletter for Lawyers:

 
 

Feature pic: Courtesy of Flickr Lauri Heikkinenon via Creative Commons licence – with thanks