Simon Miller, Stephen Crispin and Adam Kayani in D-S (A Child: Adoption or Fostering) [2024] EWCA Civ 948
6th Sep 2024 | Cases
Simon Miller, instructed by Fort Solicitors, led Adam Kayani (acting pro bono) represented the Respondent Mother. Stephen Crispin, instructed by Griffiths Robertson Solicitors, represented the Respondent Father and was led by Janet Bazley KC. D-S (A Child: Adoption or Fostering) [2024] EWCA Civ 948 was an appeal by a local authority against refusal to make order allowing an 11-month-old child, C, to be placed for adoption.
The Court of Appeal allowed the local authority’s appeal against a judge’s decision to refuse to make an order allowing C to be placed for adoption, finding that he “did not take the correct legal approach”.
Setting out the reasons for the Court of Appeal’s decision in legal terms, Peter Jackson LJ – amongst other things – examined a note on the law regarding long-term fostering and adoption provided to the judge by Sian Cox, counsel then acting for the local authority:
‘The judge had the benefit of a note on the law regarding long term fostering and adoption from Ms Sian Cox, counsel then acting for the local authority. It also distilled the local authority’s submission on that part of the case. The note is a model of its kind, because it focused on the key legal issue that the judge had to decide. Unusually, I am going to set it out in full, because it deals with so many of the points that he should have addressed and which now arise on appeal.’
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