Latest Cases

Family proceedings – Orders in family proceedings. The mother and the father met through a website CoParentMatch.com, the mother was gay. The parties eventually conceived a child. Contact became a problem and the matter came before the court. The father sought a Parental Responsibility Order. The Family Division made the PRO on the basis that there were key features which pointed compellingly to the making of the order. 

Mental Health – Persons who lack capacity. The applicant and first respondent acted contrary to a best interests declaration made by the Court of Protection. The court held that acting contrary to a declaration could not trigger contempt proceedings. It gave guidance on the correct approach of the parties and the court to orders made under s 16 of the Mental Capacity Act 2005. 

Practice – Interim remedy. The proceedings concerned property previously owned by an individual, W, the subject of the largest ever personal bankruptcy in British legal history. While insolvent, W had sold the property to his father, who had later made it the subject of a trust. The property was seized by court enforcement officers, following an arbitration award in the defendant's favour. The claimants claimed ownership of, and sought injunctions in relation to, the property seized. The Queen's Bench Division, in dismissing the first claimant's application, held that he had not established that there was a serious issue to be tried. The alleged transaction by W to sell the chattels to his father had not been not an assignment and did not fall within the meaning of the words of s 4 of the Bills of Sale Act 1878. 

Criminal evidence – Hearsay. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, in dismissing the defendant's appeal against his conviction for murder and perverting the course of justice, held that the judge had been entitled to conclude that it was in the interests of the defendant and co-defendant that an alleged hearsay statement should be admitted in evidence, pursuant to s 114 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. 

Practice – Pre-trial or post-judgment relief. The claimants, two entrepreneurs, brought an action against the defendants a not-for-profit organisation called 'The Spamhaus Project' which tracked and reported on sources of spam on the internet. The action was in libel and was in respect of material published on the defendants website in the United Kingdom. The defendants applied to strike out the pleadings or alternatively for summary judgment. The Queen's Bench dismissed the defendants application. 

Sentence – Imprisonment. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, increased an offender's sentence for rape, where the judge had erred in giving a discount of three years to reflect the offender's courage in pleading guilty or his previous good character. The sentence of seven years' and two months' imprisonment was quashed and substituted for a sentence of ten years' imprisonment. 

Town and country planning – Permission for development. The claimant sought judicial review of the defendant local planning authority's grant of planning permission for the development of a wind farm and an access track. The Planning Court, in dismissing the application, held that the authority had had full regard to the development plan and the priority which should be given to its provisions, and had applied the two-stage analysis proposed by the claimant. Further, the conditions imposed appeared to satisfy the applicable test and no positive evidence that a condition could be met was required. 

European Union – Employment. The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled, amongst other things, that arts 2 and 6(1) of the Council Directive (EC) 2000/78, should be interpreted as precluding national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, which, to end discrimination based on age, took account of the periods of service prior to the age of 18, but which, simultaneously, included a rule, applicable in reality only to employees who were subject to that discrimination, which extended by one year the period required for advancement in each of the three first salary steps and which, in so doing, definitively maintained a difference in treatment based on age. 

Town and country planning – Permission for development. The claimant local planning authority applied for an order, quashing the decision of the inspector appointed by the first defendant Secretary of State, allowing the second defendant's appeal against its refusal of planning permission. The Planning Court, in dismissing the application, held that the inspector had properly understood para 64 of the National Planning Policy Framework and had applied it lawfully, and he had not failed to have regard to a material consideration or to give adequate reasons. Further, there was nothing procedurally unfair or contrary to natural justice about the way in which the inspector had conducted the appeal. 

Housing – Local authority. The claimant sought judicial review of the defendant local authority's decision not to consider whether her circumstances were exceptional and to treat her as eligible for housing allocation despite her not fulfilling the residency criteria in the housing allocation scheme. The Administrative Court, in dismissing the application, held that the scheme had not empowered the authority to disapply the eligibility criteria in an exceptional case. Further, the scheme had not unlawfully fettered the authority's statutory powers and there was no evidence that, in devising the scheme, the authority had failed to have regard to the ministerial guidance and such failure could not be inferred.