Generate a structured brief — facts, issues, held, reasoning, and significance — for this case in seconds. Or browse the verbatim judgment via the source links below.
I am asked to determine an application to be appointed as guardian, made jointly by the brother and half-sister of a young girl, (the "Child"), whose mother died unexpectedly two years ago. The Child is a teenager and lives with her brother, ("K"), spending time regularly with her half-sister, ("L") and her family.
There are no respondents, or opposition, to this application. The Child's father was not named on her birth certificate and although, as I understand it, he has been made aware of the application, he does not oppose the application made by K and L that they should be jointly appointed as guardians for the Child. He does not live in Jersey and does not put himself forward as a carer for the Child. He does not have parental responsibility for her and, accordingly, is not a party to the application.
The court was therefore concerned, when being seized of the application, to learn that no-one had been able to exercise parental responsibility for the Child since she was [ ] years old.
Given the importance to the Child of ensuring that the appointment of a Guardian was appropriate and that the applicants were fit and proper persons to be so appointed, the court requested that JFCAS make inquiries as to the background, which was set out, in brief, in JFCAS' safeguarding letter. At an early hearing, the court suggested that JFCAS should consider whether the outcome sought by the applicants could be better or more easily achieved by the court making a joint residence order in the applicants' favour.
The issue for the court to decide today in the absence of opposition to the application is whether it is appropriate to make an order under article 7 or article 10 of the Law. I am not being asked to weigh up the merits of such an order being made in favour of one or the other of the applicants as I am invited to make it in favour of them both. The court does, however, need to have regard to the paramountcy principle enshrined in article 2 of the Law. Is the Child's welfare best served by making an order and, if so, what order should the court make?
Auto-extracted from BAILII. Full structured brief in progress — the source links below give you the verbatim judgment in the meantime.
Multiple official and mirror sources — pick whichever loads cleanly on your network.
Common Room
0 comments · About the Common Room →
No comments yet — start the discussion.
Voted-best comments help future students and feed Caselaw's AI study tools.