Parental Responsibility for a father revoked and the child’s surname changed due to his behaviour towards the mother

Re EMP (A Child) (Re Section 8 Children Act 1989) [2024] EWFC 12

This case concerned an application made by the father to spend time with his son and the mother herself making a cross application to discharge the father’s parental responsibility and change the child’s surname. This is a case that also involved section 91 (14) orders and the wider issue of the domestic abuse perpetrated by the father towards the mother.

By way of background, the court made findings that represented a “severe and extreme failure of parenting” on behalf of the father. This included the behaviour of the father towards the child which noted “rough play.” Examples of this “rough play” included pulling the child’s leg hair and pushing him over.

There was significant emphasis placed by the court on the fathers completely abhorrent behaviour towards the mother which included controlling and coercive behaviour, pressurising her into having sex with him and a failure to acknowledge the trauma caused by him raping the mother in 2017.

The court was concerned that there was a possibility of such behaviour being repeated and potentially being witnessed by the child or indeed the child becoming aware of it. This in turn clearly posed a real risk of harm to the child. Whilst, the risk of harm to the child could be reduced by supervised or even indirect contact between the child and his father, there remained a potential for harm and therefore the court must carry out a balancing exercise.

HHJ Baker made a finding that the father’s treatment of the mother had caused her significant and long-lasting psychological harm. The father’s continual involvement in the child’s life would be affectively a “continued court sanctioned abuse” against the mother. The court could not take steps to improve the circumstances with directional orders such as family therapy, given the fathers denial of his abusive behaviour and the severity of the court’s findings in this case.

As a result, the court made a live with order in favour of the mother with the child to have no contact with his father. The court additionally made a section 91 (14) order and thereby prevented the father from making further applications without the courts permission until the child attained the age of 16. The court justified the length of the section 91 (14) on account of the fathers non acceptance of his responsibility. This was compounded with the likely negative effect on the child, and furthermore the mother, if there were to be an additional set of proceedings.

Practitioners will be acutely aware of the threshold for a section 91 (14) order and the guidance from both the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 and that of Practice Direction 12Q.

Regarding the changing of the child’s surname, the court ruled that this was in his best interest. There had been a significant change in the circumstances since the child’s name was first registered and thereby the subsequent events undermined the mother’s physiological security and created a very real indirect failure of parenting. This warranted the change of the child’s surname. It should be noted that the child himself wanted this change to take place.

Furthermore, there were real concerns of the court that if the child became aware of how his father had treated his mother there would be an understandable impact on him. There was a consideration of the fact that he would struggle to understand how retaining his surname would be in his best interest. The surname would in effect be a daily reminder to the mother of the significant harm caused by the child’s father. The court also found that it was unlikely that the child would understand how the father could make a positive contribution to his life and therefore it was proportionate to revoke the father’s parental responsibility under section 4 of the Children Act 1989.

This case addresses several issues that can be found within section 8 applications and is a timely reminder to practitioners as to the benefit of the tools available to protect both the child and victims of serious domestic abuse.

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