Court of Appeal
In re P (Children: Split hearings)
Published January 16, 2008

Care was required when addressing, in a split hearing, the threshold criteria under section 31(2) of the Children Act 1989.

The Court of Appeal (Lord Justice Wilson and Mr Justice Holman) so stated, inter alia, on November 30, 2007, when allowing the appeal of P, a father, from an order of Judge Masterman, in Cardiff County Court on March 23 and June 20, 2007, that his children were likely to suffer significant harm satisfying the threshold criteria under section 31(2) of the 1989 Act.

LORD JUSTICE WILSON said that when a split hearing was ordered, all parties and the court should expressly consider whether satisfaction of the threshold criteria would be considered and determined as part of the first, the final, or an intermediate hearing; and directions orders should identify, and clearly describe, what was to be the subject of evidence, argument and decision at each hearing.

Great care was needed when using labels like “threshold hearing” and “threshold document” and they must not be confused with “fact-finding hearing” and “schedule of proposed findings of fact”.

Further, if future risk, not past harm to a child, was said to satisfy the threshold criteria, the local authority had to provide a clear written analysis and description of the facts alleged to give rise to that future risk in relation to each child, to which all other parties had the opportunity to respond in writing.

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