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Is a balanced holistic evaluation really that difficult?

© Copyright LexisNexis 2025. All rights reserved.
Date:12 JAN 2025
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Stephen Williams, St Mary’s Family Law

It is easy to lose count of the number of Court of Appeal decisions that emphasise the importance of both judges and social work professionals undertaking a balanced holistic evaluation of all the options in public law cases. Why then is it so often that even in cases proposing the most draconian of orders the heart of the welfare analysis is so limited? What even is a global holistic evaluation? Why is it so often missing from social work analysis? This article seeks to restate the points of Re B-S some 11 years after it was first handed down, together with exploring the reasons why the sage words of Sir James Munby appear to be so regularly missed.  Whilst a Re B-S analysis has become part of the lexicon of the Family Court, the detail of it has not been so easily embedded into the analysis seen within the Family Court.

 

 

 

 

 

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