Reasoning in court judgments

Claire Booth examines a Court of Appeal ruling in a case where a mother appealed foster care orders for her older children.

In Re DAM (Children) [2018] EWCA Civ 386 (CA) M, the mother of three children aged 12, 9 and 5, appealed against foster care orders relating to the two older children. She contended that the judge was wrong to find that the threshold for intervention had been crossed, that he did not carry out a proper welfare assessment, and that had he done so he could not have concluded that care orders were appropriate. She also submitted that the decision was unjust because of a serious procedural irregularity.

Lord Justice Moylan had granted permission to appeal because the structure of the judgment and the absence of any statement from the local authority (or the Guardian) in response meant that he was unable properly to assess the prospects of the proposed appeal succeeding.

The court held, dismissing the appeal, that the judge's findings of fact amply satisfied the threshold for making public law orders and adequately underpinned the welfare decision. It had not been shown that the judge was wrong to conclude that the mother's parenting fell so far short of what the children needed, and that her approach was so ingrained and unchangeable, that care orders were necessary.

However, permission to appeal had been rightly granted. Had the judgment proceeded simply and methodically through the stages of the decision-making process, this might have been avoided. There was no one correct form of judgment and different cases might call for different types of judgment.

What was necessary in every case was that the judgment should be adequately reasoned. A judgment that lacked structure or was structured in a confusing way made the judge's reasoning harder to follow and raised the possibility that the process by which the decision was reached was faulty. It should not be necessary for an appeal court to undertake a laborious explanatory exercise of the kind contained in this judgment.

Claire Booth is an associate professional support lawyer at Bevan Brittan. She can be contacted on 0370 194 1705 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..