A Local Authority V X & Ors (Rev2)

(Amended, redacted and approved by Sir Andrew McFarlane P in the absence of Dame Judith Parker)

                  The case was transferred to me. In the light of allegations which it now appears that the mother has made - although she has just withdrawn them - against Judge W, it is very fortunate that they were. I believe that Judge W did not know about that assertion.

              I have no doubt that the conclusion of this part of these proceedings and the reaching of decisions is going to have an effect on her and I think it would have an effect either way I decided, or indeed if I was unable to make a decision. If I find her allegations to be true and validate what she said, if I find them to be false and if I come down somewhere in between.

              I may have to come back to individual points that I have omitted in this run-up to my decision but those are the circumstances in which I decided notwithstanding my view in December of last year, to treat this as a fact-finding hearing. I have only been able to do that because of the hard work of counsel and solicitors, I am sure, and the parties themselves in assimilating vast amounts of new material, and in attending court and assisting me in the way that has been described.

              When I first started examining this case and looking at the case which X now presents, although she is not strictly presenting it to this Court but has done so to the police, as to what she says her parents have done to her, and in the light of her history of psychological turmoil and trouble, I wondered whether there was doubt to be thrown over the accusation against her grandfather.