Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield Heeley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what information his Department holds on cases where domestic abuse was alleged or proven in return hearings in the family court on the proportion of cases (a) returning on safeguarding grounds and (b) judges used their powers to prevent a party bringing the case back to court to prevent abuse in the most recent period for which figures are available.
Answered by Paul Maynard
Cafcass undertakes safeguarding checks in every case where an application is made to the court for a child arrangements order and reports relevant information to the court in a safeguarding letter prior to the first hearing. As part of that process, Cafcass will attempt to contact each party separately by telephone to elicit any concerns about any risks of harm, either to the child or to an adult party. Cafcass conducts checks of police records and makes enquiries of the local authority and will include in its safeguarding letter any relevant convictions or cautions or prior local authority involvement.
Cafcass undertakes direct work with the child when directed to do so by the court, in cases that continue after the first hearing. This includes interviewing children in order to ascertain their wishes and feelings to produce a section 7 welfare report into the child’s welfare needs. Any information disclosed by the child about domestic or other abuse will be reported to the court. In 2018-19 Cafcass produced 19,236 s7 welfare reports.
Cafcass does not record data on the contents of individual safeguarding letters. However, a file analysis of 216 private law cases undertaken in 2017 found that domestic abuse was alleged in 62% of cases. Practice Direction 12J sets out the factors the court must consider when domestic abuse is raised within the proceedings, including whether a fact-finding hearing should be held. Data is not collected centrally on the number of fact finding hearings and could only be obtained through an analysis of case files at disproportionate cost. Whether or not domestic abuse is alleged or admitted by either party, Cafcass has a statutory duty to report to the court at any stage in the proceedings any concerns it has about the risk of harm to the child.
Data is not available on specific recommendations made by Cafcass to the court about child arrangements in individual cases nor on the detailed content of any child arrangements order subsequently made by the court. Such information could only be obtained from a case file analysis at disproportionate cost.
Data is not collected on the use by the court of its power under section 91(14) of the Children Act 1989 to prevent a named person from applying from a specified kind of order without its permission. Such provision may form part of a child arrangements or other order under made under the 1989 Act.
The Government is determined to improve the family justice response to vulnerable people, including victims of domestic abuse. We are committed to giving the family courts the power to stop unrepresented perpetrators of abuse from cross-examining their victims in person in family proceedings, and we have included measures to prevent this in the draft Domestic Abuse Bill.
On 21 May we also announced the establishment of a panel of experts to consider how the family courts protect children and parents in cases of domestic abuse and other serious offences.
Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield Heeley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to provide public information on the right of people to apply for a C650 Application notice to vary or set aside an order in relation to children as a result of the manipulation of forensic tests.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Individuals concerned about the potential impact of an unreliable test result in their case can make an application to the family court to change, or set aside, the final order made in their case. The Government has established a bespoke process to do so through form C650 and has waived the court fee for all applications made using this process. This was announced by the Minister for Policing in a written Ministerial statement on 21 November 2017 (HCWS265). My department then wrote to the Justice Select Committee and a number of key stakeholders to draw their attention to this process including the Law Society, the Bar Council and the Association of Lawyers for Children. Information about the court process and a link to form C650 is publicly available at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/forensic-toxicology-tests. |
Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield Heeley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps the Civil and Family Courts Service is taking to identify cases where decisions were taken on the basis of forensic testing provided by (a) Randox and (b) Trimega.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Greater Manchester Police are undertaking an ongoing, expansive criminal investigation into alleged manipulation of toxicology results now by three individuals who were employed at Trimega, and later Randox Testing Services (RTS) after Trimega’s liquidation in 2014, and this matter is being treated with the utmost seriousness.
As the police are now treating all results obtained by Trimega between 2010 and 2014 as unreliable, and because Trimega provided toxicology testing for civil and family court cases, it is possible that some civil cases may have been affected by manipulation, though this remains undetermined as the investigation is ongoing.
Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield Heeley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the (a) initial conviction and (b) sentence or penalty was in the road traffic cases overturned under Section 142 of the Magistrates Court Act 1980 as a result of manipulation of forensic testing.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
The information requested is not held centrally and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. |
Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield Heeley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many of the road traffic cases affected by manipulation of toxicology tests by Randox Testing Services resulted in a custodial sentence reduced; and by how much each such sentence was reduced by.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
The information requested is not held centrally and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. |