[2025] EWHC 1064 (Fam)

Against all of the matters set out above, and to his enduring credit in the context of the ordeal he has endured as a result of the mother’s conduct, it is recognised by the father that Adam needs to maintain contact with his mother, provided contact can be effected in a safe way having regard to the extant and serious risk of abduction. In Adam’s best interests, this requires that any contact not expose Adam to a risk of a further abduction and be capable of careful monitoring. Within this context the father proposes, and the Children’s Guardian recommends, that Adam have indirect contact with his mother by way of a specialist family communication platform, through which Adam the mother could share messages and pictures with the father’s oversight with a view to indirect contact progressing to video calls once a week for ten minutes in duration. Whilst the Children’s Guardian is prepared to contemplate contact moving to direct supervised contact at a Contact Centre after three months, she emphasises the need for it to be the father who judges whether such a move would be in Adam’s best interests having regard to the risks that pertain in this case.

At the present time, absent the significant shift in the mother’s thinking and approach called for by Dr Derry and having regard to the matters set out in this judgment, I am satisfied that it is in Adam’s best interests for him to have only indirect contact with his mother at this point in time. Whether contact can safely progress beyond that point given what I am satisfied remains the high risk of child abduction and the mother’s manifest failure to acknowledge the need for change, is a question that cannot be answered at this point in time. Whether that question can be answered in three months’ time or longer will depend on the progress of indirect contact and, vitally, on the conduct of the mother. I am satisfied that it should be for the father to decide in the exercise of his parental responsibility, in the first instance, whether contact can safely progress beyond the point ordered at this hearing.

As I have noted above, I am satisfied that the provisions for indirect contact should include a provision requiring the father to provide to the mother periodically appropriately anonymised general updates on Adam’s educational and social progress and to notify the mother in the event that Adam suffers a serious illness or accident.