Legal Update: Court Report - Challenge to care and placement orders

Judge: Mr Justice Holman

Location: High Court (Family Division)

This case concerned an application by a father to discharge care and placement orders in respect of six of his children; five aged 9 to 17 years, who were the subject of care orders made in 2011, and one child aged two, who was the subject of a placement order made in 2012. One of the father's other children had died of starvation, for which the mother was serving a term of imprisonment, and for which the father bore no responsibility.

In relation to the five eldest children, Justice Holman dismissed the application by the father, finding that there was no prospect of the care orders being discharged. The five eldest children had been in the same foster placement, together, for four years and were found to be thriving and happy in this placement. They had not had any contact with their father for the past 18 months, and all children were, to varying degrees, disinterested in their father and resistant to leaving their foster placement.