Judge allows naming of council involved in special guardianship case

A judge has allowed Gloucestershire County Council to be identified in a child guardianship case.

None of those involved were originally identified, but the child’s grandmother, in favour of whom HHJ Wildblood had made a special guardianship order, wished to make a public statement of her dissatisfaction with the local authority’s actions in the case.

The judge said there was “very real disagreement as to whether the local authority should be identified in any information that was published from the proceedings”.

He said the main arguments advanced against naming the local authority were the risk of ‘jigsaw’ identification of the family involved, the risk of one family member responding indiscreetly to press enquiries and that disclosure would force the local authority to issue a response which “would lead to 'an unseemly and unhelpful trial by media’”, while adverse publicity when no findings have been made against the local authority “would run the risk of making retention and recruitment of social workers more difficult”.

The main arguments advanced in favour of naming were that a public body can have no expectation of anonymity unless there is some special justification, that the family was known in its locality anyway and naming the local authority would add nothing to the knowledge of anyone elsewhere and that the risk of identification was outbalanced by the importance of the freedom of expression enshrined by Article 10.

Giving judgment in ABC (A child), Re [2017] EWFC B75, Wildblood HHJ said: “In my opinion the arguments in favour of naming the local authority are overwhelming. I do not think that the local authority has got anywhere near justifying the non-disclosure of its identity.”

He directed that Gloucestershire could be named in the published judgement, to which he added the grandmother’s critical statement about Gloucestershire and an agreed contextual statement.

The judge also took the unusual step of stressing that his judgment was not:

1. A determination by him of the merit of the grandmother's complaints. The question was whether the grandmother should have the right to tell her story and now, whether as part of the telling of it, the local authority should be named.
2. A means of stimulating public debate.
3. An attempt by him at setting any sort of precedent or guidance even on a local scale.
4. An attempt by him to push or contain the boundaries of transparency. “Not only do I have no interest in doing that but it is not for me to do.”

Neelam Bhardwaja, Gloucestershire’s interim improvement and operations director, said: “The council’s only motivation has been to protect this child’s right to privacy.

“Our concerns are also shared by the child’s independent representative - the voice of the child in court. We know that taking responsibility for a young child is a huge decision and can be very stressful. We acted with integrity and kindness towards everyone involved in this case, as well as providing financial support including paying for some independent legal advice.

“The council would like to go into more detail on the issues raised as we did in court, but we don’t believe this is in the best interests of the child. Also, the judge made it very clear that he was not commenting on these issues, but on what information could be reported by the media.

“We feel confident this child has the loving and committed family they need and we support the special guardianship arrangements.”

Mark Smulian