BOR, R (on the application of) v Family Court at Cardiff [2026] EWHC 960 (Admin)

[2026] EWHC 960 (Admin)Case No AC-2025-CDF-000060
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
KING'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Venue Cardiff Civil and Family Justice Centre, 2 Park Street, Cardiff, CF10 1ETDate 23 April 2026
Before
HIS HONOUR JUDGE JARMAN KCSitting as a judge of the High Court
Between
THE KINGClaimantFAMILY COURT AT CARDIFFDefendant(1) VALE OF GLAMORGAN COUNCILInterested Parties(2) BGSInterested Party
Mr Joseph Edwards (instructed by Vale of Glamorgan Council, Legal Services) for First Interested PartyThe Claimant in person for in personNo other party appeared or was representedHearing Hearing dates: 20 April 2026
Approved JudgmentThis judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 24 April 2026 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives..............................HIS HONOUR JUDGE JARMAN KC

HHJ JARMAN KC:

[1]The First Interested Party, Vale of Glamorgan Council (the Council) applies for an extended civil restraint order (ERCO) under CPR 3.11 and Practice Direction 3C (PD) against the Claimant (the Respondent to the application and referred to as such in this judgment) on the basis that she has persistently made claims or applications which are totally without merit.[2]The Respondent issued the present claim on 25 April 2025 and gave details of the decision being challenged as follows:
“The decision being challenged is the care order made by Judge Mererid Edwards at Cardiff Family Court on 2nd March 2020, which removed the Claimant’s daughter from her care, based on unverified and demonstrably false information. The evidence against the decision has never been reviewed, despite repeated applications to present evidence refuting the original findings.”
[3]At the same time, she made an application for urgent consideration. That was refused by HHJ Harrison on consideration of the papers, in accordance with standard procedure, for reasons which included this:
“Even the most recent appellate decision was apparently given some 4 months ago. The passage of time since the judicial decision has been considerable (more than 5 years) and the Applicant has seemingly been denied contact for a period of nearly 3 years already. Against such background arguments associated with escalating harm and the like are limited and weakened.”
[4]The Respondent renewed her application at an oral hearing before Eyre J, when she represented herself and the Council was represented by counsel. The application was refused.[5]Eyre J then considered whether permission to continue these proceedings should be given. He did so on consideration of the papers, again following standard procedure. He issued a written order dated 26 June 2025. He assessed the claim against well established principles, which he set out as follows: “The claim is to be assessed against the background of a number of principles. 4) The first is that judicial review claims must be brought expeditiously and in any event within 3 months of the decision under challenge. Time for applying for judicial review is only to be extended if a good reason for extending time is shown. 5) Judicial review is a remedy of last resort. The court will not normally grant relief by way of judicial review where the party seeking judicial review had an adequate alternative remedy. 6) The opportunity to apply for permission to appeal from a care order and/or to apply to discharge the care order is to be taken as being an adequate alternative remedy for public law failings in the conduct of the proceedings leading to that[6]He refused permission on the ground that the claim was substantially out of time and there was no good reason for the delay. He went on to determine that even if it had been in time, there was no sufficient prospect of success, because of adequate remedies in the Family Courts and because the Respondent’s criticisms of the judgement of HHJ Edwards had been considered by Peter Jackson LJ who had refused the Respondent permission to appeal that decision. Eyre J certified the present claim as totally without merit and added:
“In light of that certification I have considered whether a Civil Restraint Order should be made. I have concluded that it is not appropriate to do so at this stage principally because the Claimant does not appear previously to have sought relief by way of judicial review. However, the Claimant should note that I have made that decision in circumstances where no application has been made by the First Interested Party for a civil restraint order. Any such application if made would have to be determined on its merits. In addition, the Claimant should note that further totally without merit applications in any form of proceedings may well result in the making of a civil restraint order.”
[7]The Respondent sought permission to appeal the decision of Eyre J, which was considered on the papers by Baker LJ, again in accordance with standard practice. He issued a written order dated 3 November 2025. Permission was refused and the application was again certified as totally without merit. The reasons given for refusal include the following:
“6. The applicant’s aim in bringing her application for judicial review was to overturn HHJ Edwards’ finding and decision in the 2020 care proceedings. Any challenge to those findings and decision had to be by way of an appeal. Permission to appeal having been refused, it would be an “abuse of the judicial review process to seek to use it to re-open a matter which has been decided in this way” (per Lord Stephens and Lord Sales in The Father v Worcestershire County Council [2025] UKSC 1 at para 90). In such cases, it is established practice for judges to dismiss applications for judicial review summarily because “Parliament has put in place an adequate system for the reviewing the merits of decisions … and it is not appropriate that there should be further review of these by the High Court” (R (Sivasubramaniam) v Wandsworth County Court & Ors [2002] EWCA Civ 1738 at para 54). As the judge explained in para 7 of his reasons, it is only in very narrow circumstances that the High Court may entertain an application for judicial review of a decision by a lower court. The present case plainly did not fall into that category. 7. In that context, the judge was entitled to hold that the applicant had had an adequate alternative remedy. He was equally entitled to rely on the dismissal of the applicant’s earlier applications for permission to appeal against the care order and against the dismissal of her application to discharge the care order when dismissing her application summarily without further consideration of the evidence which she wished to adduce. He was justified in dismissing her application as totally without merit and, given the lack of any merit in her application, was entitled to do so without an oral hearing. 8. In those circumstances, the judge’s conclusion that there was no reason for extending time for bringing the claim was plainly justified, as was his order for costs. It was also entirely appropriate for the judge to give the applicant a warning about the possibility that she might be made subject to a civil restraint order.”
[8]By a further claim for judicial review dated 6 October 2025, so that is after the Respondent had been issued with the order of Eyre J with the warning about the possibility of a civil restraint order, she sought to challenge a decision of the Cardiff Magistrates Court as follows:
“The decision of Cardiff Magistrates Court dated 30th September 2025 refusing my application for a stay of proceedings in my appeal against the revocation of my chaperone license by the Vale of Glamorgan Council.”
[9]She also sought urgent consideration and interim relief in those proceedings. HHJ Keyser KC granted expedition but refused permission on consideration of the papers, according to standard procedure, and certified the claim as totally without merit. His written order dated 17 October 2025 included this:
“The decision whether to stay the appeal proceedings was one for the District Judge (MC). Only if that decision was manifestly wrong or was not an exercise of his discretion in a manner properly open to him could this court intervene. The only note that has been produced of the judge’s ruling is counsel’s note, set out in paragraph 16 of the Council’s summary grounds. Although succinct, the ruling is perfectly cogent: it is the claimant who has brought the appeal; it is for her to adduce evidence in support of it, and she knew what evidence was available to her; she seeks a stay on the basis of an entirely speculative appeal; it is in the Council’s interest and in the public interest for the appeal to be determined without further delay. I regard it as quite impossible that judicial review of that decision should be granted. That is the more so, given the history both of the Family Court proceedings (which have been appealed up hill and down dale) and of the appeal proceedings.”
Legal principles[10]Paragraph 3.1 of the PD provides that an ECRO may be made by a judge of the Court of Appeal, a judge of the High Court, or a Designated Civil Judge or their deputy in the County Court, where a party has persistently issued claims or made applications which are totally without merit.[11]Paragraph 3.2 provides that an ECRO will restrain its subject from issuing claims or making applications concerning any matter involving or relating to or touching upon or leading to the proceedings in which the ECRO is made, without first obtaining the permission of the judge identified in the order. Paragraph 3.9 provides that an ECRO will be made for a specified period not exceeding three years.[12]“Persistently” within the meaning of the PD requires three such applications certified as totally without merit, and this involves an evaluation of the litigant’s overall conduct, see Sartipy v Tigris Industries [2019] EWCA Civ 225, [2019] 1 WLR 5892 at [28-29]. In this context the absence of such merit means that the claim is bound to fail and there is no rational argument for its success. It is not necessary for it to be vexatious or an abuse of process, see R (Wasif) v SSHD [2016] EWCA Civ 82 at [15]-[17].[13]If that requirement is made out, it does not necessarily mean that an ECRO should be made. The court retains a discretion. That must involve having regard to the purpose underlying the making of civil restraint orders which should be made only if they are necessary to protect the administration of justice from abuse, and an assessment of the risk that the litigant will, unless restrained, make further totally without merit claims or applications which will waste the time and resources of the courts. Any such order should be proportionate response to the level of risk of future, unmeritorious proceedings, see Society of Lloyds v Noel [2015] EWHC 734 (QB), [2015] 1 WLR 4393 at [47].[14]In Nowak v Nursing and Midwifery Council [2013] EWHC 1932 (QB) Leggatt J, as he then was, noted at [59] that the purpose of a civil restraint order is to protect the court's process from abuse, and not to shut out claims or applications which are properly arguable. Accordingly, the ECRO regime is compatible with Article 6 ECHR, see [60]-[62]. At [69] he said this:
“The fact that the litigant has repeatedly issued claims or made applications which are totally without merit will itself almost inevitably demonstrate the existence of such a risk. But in considering the extent of the risk it may also be relevant to consider other factors, such as any statements of the litigant’s future intentions, other aspects of the litigant’s conduct and whether the circumstances which have generated the hopeless claims or applications are continuing or likely to continue.”
[15]In my judgment the threshold is clearly made out in this case. There was another application in the Family Courts which Morgan J, the Family Presiding Judge for Wales, similarly certified in 2025, but the certificates in the judicial review proceedings are sufficient to establish the threshold. Discussion[16]It is clear that the Respondent is unable to accept the judgment of HHJ Edwards, made some six years ago. Her focus in her written and oral submissions before me was that that decision is wrong, was made without relevant evidence, was based on wrong information and lies by Council’s staff and an independent social worker and a misdiagnosis by a struck off doctor, and after a procedurally flawed hearing. She does not accept that any of the claims relied on by the Council were without merit.[17]She informed me that she had been granted a legal aid certificate to bring a second appeal against that judgment in the Family Courts. At the moment she is the subject of an order dated 28 March 2023 by HHJ Edwards made under section 91(14) Children Act 1989 preventing her from issuing applications in the Family Court until August 2029 without permission of the Family Court. The Respondent made an application to discharge that order, but that application was refused by Morgan J.[18]The Respondent gave some examples of the procedural flaws she alleges in the hearing before HHJ Edwards, emphasising that these are only examples and that she has a “huge” amount of evidence to disprove all that the Council relied upon in the case, and that the Council does not want this to come out, which is why it is making this application. She says that HHJ Edwards too does not want to draw attention to what she has ignored. During the hearing before that judge, the Respondent wanted a screen to protect her from her child’s father and his family, but this were removed in a deliberate attempt to cause her stress. The judge also called security to remove a birthday badge she was wearing even though his had passed security. The judge would not hear evidence from her adult son. She was harassed in hospital after the birth of her child, but the judge treated this as support. The judge would not give permission for an independent resolutions social worker to report and would not give permission for the Respondent to call evidence to contradict the report of the independent social worker who was appointed.[19]All of this, in my judgment, goes to underline how incapable the Respondent is of accepting the judgements of the Family Courts. The present application does not seek to limit the Respondent’s access to those courts, which is a matter for them. The present application seeks to limit the Respondents access to the Civil Courts on any matter relating to the exercise of the functions of the Family Courts under the Children Act 1989 or Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 in relation to the Claimant’s child without first obtaining the permission of a judge. Permission will be given if the claim has merit, but not if it is totally without merit.[20]It is telling in the present case that the Respondent does not accept any of the judicial certificates that her claims or applications are totally without merit. It is also telling that the Respondent issued her second judicial review claim, which was then so certified, about three months or so after the warning about doing so given by Eyre J.[21]The Respondent complains that the judicial review claims have been dealt with on paper or without hearing evidence, but that complaint demonstrates a misunderstanding of the nature of such claims. They are not concerned with outcomes, unlike the Family Courts in this case, but with whether the decision-making process was flawed in a public law sense. It is very rare that judicial review cases involve the giving of evidence or resolving disputes of fact. As indicated by Baker LJ, Parliament has passed legislation so that such outcomes are dealt with in the Family Courts, with adequate appeal processes. In those circumstances it is not appropriate that there should be a further review by the Civil Courts. Conclusion[22]In my judgment, it follows from what I have set out above, that the risk of the Respondent commencing further claims in the Civil Courts which are totally without merit is high, leading to further abuse of the justice system and further waste of scarce court resources. It my judgment it is necessary and proportionate to make the ECRO applied for, for a period of three years.[23]Mr Edwards, for the Council, further relied on the conduct of the Respondent in the Family Court proceedings, including conduct which HHJ Edwards found unacceptable, abusive behaviour to other parties in the proceedings and abusive emails to Council staff, and misleading disclosure and evidence. The Respondent says that the context was that she was facing losing her care of her newborn baby. I take this conduct into account, but without in any way condoning such conduct, I have not found it necessary to rely on that in exercising my discretion to grant an ECRO in the Civil Courts. In my judgment, the findings which I have made in the preceding paragraphs are sufficient to justify making the ECRO.[24]This judgment will be handed down remotely. The Council has filed a draft order. Any comments on the same and any consequential matters which cannot be agreed should be dealt with in written submissions. The Council should file and serve theirs within 7 days of hand down, and the Respondent should file hers 7 days thereafter. These will then be dealt with on the basis of such submissions.

order

see The Father v Worcestershire CC [2025] UKSC 1 at [82] – [92]. 7) The court does have jurisdiction judicially to review the decisions of the Family Court. However, that review jurisdiction is a highly attenuated one. It will only be exercised if there has been a failing in the Family Court amounting to a complete abrogation of the judicial process in the context of a right to a fair trial.”