Adoption – Dispensing of consent of parent or guardian. The applicant local authority successfully applied for a declaration that it would be permissible and lawful for it to make arrangements for the adoption of a child (A) without seeking to notify the putative father, paternal or maternal family members, or to assess them as carers for A. The Family Division held that, considered with the mother's clear wish that A be adopted, the risk of threats and violence from the father meant that the local authority had made good its case for the declaration sought.