Court of Appeal

Published December 5, 2007

In re C (A child)(Adoption: Local authority duty)

Before Lord Justice Thorpe, Lady Justice Arden and Lord Justice Lawrence Collins

Judgment November 23, 2007

There was no duty on a local authority to make inquiries of a child's extended family or father about the possibility of their providing long-term care where mother wished to place the child for adoption.

In the (present) case, the father did not have a right to respect for his family life with the child because he had no family life with the child. He had never lived with the mother or expressed any commitment to the child. He could not have done so because he did not know of the child's existence.

It was not a violation of a Convention right to deprive him of the possibility of obtaining a right to respect for family life with the child. The father therefore had no Convention right and accordingly it was unnecessary to ask whether article 8.2 applied.'

My own views, as someone who worked in child adoption, are that all parents should have the right to retain contact with children (where contact has been established) but, ultimately, I would concur with the judges presiding on this occasion that

' Her Ladyship did not consider that the court should require a preference to be given as a matter of policy to the natural family of a child. Section 1 did not impose any such policy.

Rather, it required the interests of the child to be considered. Lord Justice Thorpe and Lord Justice Lawrence Collins delivered concurring judgments'