Shocking case — which saw vulnerable couple and their child denied legal aid — makes the blood of nation’s top family judge boil
An eye-catching judgment — embedded in full below — from the president of the High Court’s family division has been doing the rounds on Twitter today after it was brought to wider attention by journalists David Banks and David Allen Green.
The case involves a little boy whose mother has borderline learning difficulties and whose father an IQ of around 50. The court has been asked to decide whether the boy should live with his parents and wider family, or, as Swindon Borough Council argues, be adopted outside the family.
Because the father’s disposable monthly income is between £767.64 and £806.94, the parents are ineligible for legal aid. The legal aid-qualifying upper limit for disposable monthly income is £733.00.
This, as David Allen Green has summarised on his influential @JackOfKent Twitter account, has enraged family division chief Sir James Munby.
Never seen a senior English judge so livid – Munby attacks Grayling over legal aid in family cases – read in full: http://t.co/7TEdwtl6ud
— Jack of Kent (@JackofKent) October 31, 2014
Green provides a helpful translation of judicial euphemism.
Munby says MoJ policy on legal aid is "unprincipled and unconscionable".
May seem mild to layperson; but that is right up to 11 for a judge.
— Jack of Kent (@JackofKent) October 31, 2014
It’s clear who Munby expects will shoulder the burden of the legal aid cuts. In this case, Withy King’s Rebecca Stevens has so far put in 100 hours of unpaid work.
On legal aid "the State has simply washed its hands of the problem, leaving solution to the goodwill, the charity, of the legal profession."
— Jack of Kent (@JackofKent) October 31, 2014
Munby has scheduled a further hearing to decide who should pay the couple’s legal costs. Copies of his judgment, he explained, will be sent to justice secretary Chris Grayling, the Legal Aid Agency, Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service and the Association of Directors of Children’s Services “inviting each of them to intervene in the proceedings to make such submissions as they may think appropriate”.
The full judgment is below. Check out, in particular, paragraphs 18, 31, 33 and 37.