B e f o r e :
HIS HONOUR JUDGE JARMAN KC Sitting as a judge of the High Court ____________________
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Mr Joseph Edwards (instructed by Vale of Glamorgan Council, Legal Services) for the First Interested Party The Claimant in person No other party appeared or was represented Hearing dates: 20 April 2026 ____________________
HTML VERSION OF APPROVED JUDGMENT ____________________
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HHJ JARMAN KC:
Introduction
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.
The Respondent issued the present claim on 25 April 2025 and gave details of the decision being challenged as follows:
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:
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.
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:
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:
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:
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:
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:
Legal principles
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.
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.
"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].
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].
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:
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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
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.
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.
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.