Case No. FD21P00367

. An application for a placement order cannot properly be made by an adoption agency unless …” [emphasis added]The key point is that the error that led to the appeal being allowed in Re B was that of the recorder and not the local authority. It was the recorder who had become a ‘first actor’. The Court of Appeal’s concern was that, in so doing, the recorder had sought to by-pass or short-circuit the scheme laid down by Parliament. The reference by Wall LJ to Re P-B is also of note. In Re B the court gave reserved judgments and Wall LJ can thus be taken to be fully aware both of the obiter caveat in Arden LJ’s judgment in Re P-B and of her commentary upon it in Re B itself, both of which expressly exclude consideration of a case where the court acts in ignorance of any procedural breach by the adoption agency.