A mother who was found to not be credible when giving evidence cannot blame her negligent former solicitors, the Court of Appeal has ruled.
The anonymous mother had taken her five-year-old son and four-year-old daughter from their home in Nigeria to England without the father’s knowledge. Hannah Markham KC, sitting in the High Court, had ordered the children be returned to Nigeria, after finding the mother - who alleged domestic abuse against the father - was not a credible witness.
On appeal, the mother pointed out that her former solicitors, family firm Burnham Law, had been ordered to pay the wasted costs of an earlier aborted final hearing.
Burnham Law failed to instruct counsel for the final hearing scheduled for 16 December last year and notified the court of this by e-mail only a matter of minutes before the hearing was due to commence to seek an adjournment, the Court of Appeal heard.
Markham found that Burnham Law - which had the benefit of a public funding certificate - had been ‘negligent’ in its failure to instruct counsel and enquire whether counsel was available to be instructed for the three-day hearing, which the mother attended alone.
The mother argued Markham did not give appropriate weight to the disadvantages faced by her in presenting her case at trial by reason of Burnham Law’s negligent preparation of her case and that led to a flawed conclusion regarding her credibility.
Mr Justice Cobb, ruling with a unanimous Court of Appeal in O (Summary Return), dismissed the mother’s appeal. He stated: ‘In failing to secure her representation for the scheduled final hearing in December 2024, there can be no doubt that Burnham Law failed in their professional duties to the mother, which led to the wasted costs order against the firm.'
But he added: ’The numerous internal inconsistencies in the mother’s oral and written evidence, the inconsistencies between that evidence and other credible evidence, and her unfounded allegations against the paternal family, all of which were exposed through cross-examination, could not in my judgment be laid at the door of her former solicitors.’
