Accredited journalists and legal bloggers can now request a transparency order to allow them to report what they see in court, quote from court documents and approach families about their ongoing cases – provided they keep them anonymous.
Feature: Will family court reporting lead to better decisions for children?
Special Report: Family courts and care proceedings
The rollout follows a two-year pilot of the changes and will follow stepped arrangements, as in the pilot, starting with public law cases, then private law cases and finally magistrates.
The pilot began with three courts, increasing to 16 centres – almost half the family courts in England and Wales. Previously, hearings were held in private, until 2009 when journalists were allowed to attend but not report proceedings.
The changes mean that there is a presumption that a transparency order is granted, unless there is a legitimate reason not to.
President of the Family Division Sir Andrew McFarlane said: “The establishment of the open reporting provisions in all family courts in England and Wales is a watershed moment for family justice.
“Improving public understanding and confidence in the family court is of fundamental importance.
Over the last two years there has been a presumption that journalists and legal bloggers can report what they see and hear from pilot courts in England and Wales.
“The reporting that we have seen has been significant, and includes coverage of issues affecting some of the most vulnerable people in our society, such as: children subject to Deprivation of Liberty Orders; the need to limit parental rights for convicted paedophiles and cases of child neglect or abandonment.
“There have been no known breaches of anonymity of children, and the aims of the pilot, to increase public understanding and awareness of the Family Court, are being realised.
“I am grateful to all in the court system who have supported the pilot, but I would particularly like to thank all of the journalists and legal bloggers who have engaged with the pilot over the last two years and would like to urge them and others to continue to report on these complex and vitally important issues.”
Sector views
In a special report on family courts in June 2024, key professionals voiced their support for the transparency changes, with some caveats.
Lisa Harker, director of the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, which aims to improve outcomes for children and families by scrutinising the family justice system, and a member of the transparency implementation group advising on the pilot, said that the media’s natural attraction to the “most interesting and extreme cases” may offer only a partial view, adding that good data will be key to understanding.
“You have to be able to explain whether a case that’s being reported in the media is typical or atypical,” said Harker, adding: “It’s data that helps you put that into context.
“The family justice system is far behind other systems in having that level of data and information. It needs to catch up for that transparency to be more than anecdote.”
Somia Siddiq, family and child lawyer at ITN Solicitors, highlighted the risk of jigsaw identification (where children are indirectly identified because of the unique facts of the case) and invasion of privacy – although the pilots have not had any problems in these areas.
In addition, Siddiq did not believe the changes would lead to “defensive practice”.
“Every party in care proceedings needs to give reasons for their position, whether it’s a social worker, parents, children’s guardian, which they will need to follow the law,” said Siddiq, adding: "I haven’t seen any evidence that’s not being done. In terms of the tests for removal of children, a social worker needs to set out clearly whether that has been met. That’s always happened. If anything, it opens up the decision-making process of all professionals to the public.”
Yvonne Wilson, chair of children’s guardians body Nagalro, urged reporters to take care to consider the impact on the child concerned.
“It’s about…taking into account that when you’re reporting this a child’s life, and, and they’re going to have feelings about what is said about their family, what the outcomes are, and that they’re going to have to live with that,” said Wilson.
Judges involved in Sara Sharif family proceedings named
Meanwhile, three family judges involved in the case of 10-year-old Sara Sharif before she was murdered were named on 31 January.
This followed a successful appeal by media organisation against reporting restrictions imposed by Mr Justice Williams at the High Court.
The family court judges - Judge Alison Raeside, Judge Peter Nathan and Judge Sally Williams - argued that their naming would put them at "real risk" of harm from a "virtual lynch mob” but the Court of Appeal ruled last month that they should be named.
Finding in favour of the media, Master of the Rolls Sir Geoffrey Vos - the most senior civil judge in England and Wales - said that "the whole idea of anonymising the judge was... misguided".
Timeline of family proceedings
According to the BBC, which brought the appeal with other media organisations, the court was involved with the family before Sara was born, and on 17 January 2013, when she was six days old, Surrey County Council was seeking an interim care order to allow Sara and two of her siblings to be taken into foster care until a final decision was made.
Judge Raeside, sitting as a family judge at Guildford County Court, was told there were concerns that Sara and her siblings were "not adequately supervised", and that two of them had "unexplained injuries".
Sara's mother Olga Sharif had suffered domestic abuse at the hands of Sara's father Urfan Sharif, Judge Raeside was told.
Social workers said concerns about the family dated back to May 2010 when one of the siblings had been found alone in a local shop.
Allegations were made that from November that year, Urfan Sharif had beaten Olga Sharif and Sara's older siblings, though the mother decided not to press charges. Police had received complaints of domestic abuse and attended the home on three occasions in 2011 and 2012 amid complaints of further domestic abuse.
Judge Raeside instead made an interim supervision order saying that while further assessments were prepared, Sara and her siblings could remain with their parents, under supervision of Surrey County Council Children's Services.
On 19 September 2013 Judge Raeside again decided the children should stay with their parents under supervision and social workers had changed their recommendation to a "supervision order".
Surrey County Council made an urgent application for the children to be taken into foster care after one of Sara's siblings said Olga had bitten them - Olga had been charged with assault - and the case returned to court in November 2014.
The emergency hearing was heard by Judge Peter Nathan, but the next day the case was before Judge Raeside again and she decided that Sara and one of the siblings could return to live with Urfan Sharif. The sibling who had been bitten was placed into foster care.
Judge Raeside was told at a hearing the following year that Surrey council was still extremely concerned at the risk of harm to Sara, amid allegations from a sibling that Urfan Sharif had punched them and slapped them with a belt on the bottom.
Olga Sharif announced she was separating from Urfan Sharif because of domestic violence, saying that in the past he had poured a flammable liquid on her and tried to set it alight. Allegations made by Olga included that he had on other occasions held a knife to her throat and tried to strangle her with a belt and that living with him was like prison. The children moved with her to a women's refuge.
In July 2015, following proceedings before another judge, Judge Sally Williams, Sara and her sibling were taken into temporary foster care after reports that Urfan Sharif had been seeing them in secret while they were at the refuge.
Judge Raeside imposed an interim care order that September, resulting in Sara and her sibling going into foster care. In November, the judge ordered that the children could live with Olga Sharif, with supervised access by Urfan Sharif.
By mid 2019 Urfan Sharif had a new wife Beinash Batool and Judge Raeside had been promoted to designated family court judge for Surrey. Urfan was before her asking for Sara and her sibling to be allowed to live with them, with Olga Sharif getting some supervised contact that the court was told Olga Sharif had already agreed to. A social worker recommended this arrangement in a report prepared for the court.
Judge Raeside heard that Sara and her sibling had mistreated her and they had already started living with their father and stepmother. Sara was said to have alleged that her mother had slapped her, pulled her hair, tried to burn her with a lighter and drown her in the bath. Urfan Sharif reportedly raised the allegations first.
After more than six-and-a-half years of involvement in hearings around the family, on 9 July 2019, Judge Raeside agreed that Sara and her sibling should live with their father and stepmother.
Five years later, the Urfan Sharif and Beinash Batool murdered Sara.
High Court judge Mr Justice Williams said: "In this case the evidence suggests that social workers, guardians, lawyers and judiciary acted within the parameters that law and social work practice set for them.
"Certainly to my reasonably well-trained eye there is nothing (save the benefit of hindsight) which indicates that the decisions reached in 2013, 2015 or 2019 were unusual or unexpected.
"Based on what was known at the time and applying the law at the time I don't see the judge or anyone else having any real alternative option."
Adam Wolanski KC, the lawyer acting for newspapers and broadcasters, said judges must expect "their decision-making to be the subject of public scrutiny".
As the judges were named last week, Chief Justice Baroness Carr, the highest ranking judge in England and Wales, announced the formation of a taskforce to assess how to better protect the safety of judges, amid what she said were increasing threats made to judges on social media.
