R (O) v Hammersmith and Fulham LBC [2011] EWCA Civ 925; [2012] 1 WLR 1057

A child and his parents disputed the placement arrangements selected by the local authority. The authority proposed a school near the family home together with accommodation in a children's home. The parents preferred a different arrangement and relied on professional opinions supporting it. They sought judicial review and relief requiring their preferred placement. The Court of Appeal considered the legality of the authority's decision and the relevance of the Children Act's paramount-welfare provision. The issue was the court's supervisory role, rather than an unrestricted appeal to select the placement it considered best.

Whether judicial review required the child’s welfare to be the paramount consideration under section 1 of the Children Act, and whether the challenged placement decision was otherwise unlawful.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal and upheld the local authority’s choice within the statutory framework. The dispute involved competing evaluations of how the child’s needs should be met, including the importance of retaining family and local connections. Judicial review did not authorise the court to select its preferred placement merely because the parents had substantial professional support for another option. Section 1 of the Children Act did not make this supervisory proceeding a determination governed by the asserted paramountcy test. Nor did choosing one lawful way of meeting needs over another establish the alleged Convention interference on these facts. The authority still remained subject to its statutory obligations and ordinary public-law controls.

Judicial review of a local authority’s placement decision is not itself a determination of upbringing attracting section 1(1) Children Act paramountcy. The court supervises legality and relevant rights rather than substituting a free-standing best-welfare decision for the authority’s statutory assessment.

O distinguishes judicial review of a local authority’s child-care arrangements from a court itself exercising a welfare jurisdiction. The fact that a decision concerns a child does not automatically require the reviewing judge to select the arrangement they consider best. A rational and lawful assessment may differ from parental or expert preferences. The case does not make child-welfare decisions unreviewable; it identifies the relevant supervisory task and avoids importing a different statutory paramountcy test into that task without justification.