The High Court has allowed a mother to proceed with a judicial review challenge to a Circuit Court care order and the Child and Family Agency’s arrangements for contact with her three children. The court extended time for the application and granted leave on amended grounds, but did not decide the underlying challenges or order increased access.
The children were placed under long-term care orders by Roscommon District Court in October 2014. The Circuit Court affirmed those orders on appeal in February 2015. The orders left the level of the mother’s access to be determined by the agency. The judgment says she was receiving four hours of supervised access a year, with no telephone or correspondence contact outside those hours. The children also appeared to have no access to their older siblings.
The mother had previously sought leave to challenge the Circuit Court decision, but that application was refused as out of time. In the current proceedings, the judge accepted for the purpose of deciding the application that she had received incorrect written legal advice stating that the time limit was six months; the applicable period was three months. The judge held that this amounted to good and sufficient reason to extend time. The District Court orders themselves were not open to challenge in this application because they had been appealed; the relevant decision was the Circuit Court order.
The agency’s January 2016 letter declined the mother’s request for more access, saying the children wanted visits on birthdays, Christmas and Easter, for one hour, supervised by two staff. The judge found the challenge to that letter was within time and arguable. The agency’s barrister also relied in court on social workers’ views about the children’s best interests, but the judge noted that this reason was not stated in the letter sent to the mother. The court said the adequacy and integrity of the reasons could be examined at the substantive hearing.
The judge also permitted amended grounds concerning whether the Circuit Court had improperly left access entirely to the agency, whether the agency had implemented the court’s stated intention to develop parenting supports and increase access over time, the manner in which visits were conducted, and the absence of sibling contact. These were arguable issues at the leave stage, not findings that the allegations were proved. The judge declined leave to challenge the District Court orders directly, rely directly on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, or pursue a ground concerning fresh evidence in the Circuit Court appeal.
The court struck out the Ombudsman for Children and the two judges as respondents, granted leave on the amended grounds, and gave the mother one week to issue and serve amended documents. Costs were reserved. The judgment did not set a new access schedule; it said a judicial review court could more appropriately order reconsideration than determine the precise access arrangements, which would require evidence and cross-examination.