Family Division
Published July 6, 2011
In re X, Y and Z (Children) (Expert witness: Identification)
Before Sir Nicholas Wall, President
Judgment May 11, 2011
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There was little reason in family proceedings for a refusal to disclose the report of an expert witness.
Sir Nicholas Wall, President of the Family Division, so stated when granting the application by Mr Brian Morgan, an investigative journalist, following the withdrawal of care proceedings brought by the respondent, Coventry City Council, in respect of three children, X, Y and Z, for permission for the media to name the medical expert witness in the case, Dr M, a paediatrician and disclose his report.
Mr Morgan in person; Mr Piers Pressdee, QC, acting pro bono, for the local authority; Mr Adam Wolanski for Dr M and the Medical Protection Society, intervening; Mr Bertie Leigh, solicitor, for the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Care, intervening; Mr Alastair MacDonald, acting pro bono, for the children and their mother.
THE PRESIDENT said that in Coventry City Council v X, Y and Z (Care proceedings: Costs) ([2011] 1 FLR 1045), the judge had been highly critical of Dr M’s report but he had not been called upon to give evidence at the hearing. On the basis of that criticism, Mr Morgan submitted that there was a public interest in knowing the doctor’s identity.
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However, simply naming the doctor would be the worst of all worlds since any real debate about the quality and content of an expert’s evidence would require the nature of the advice, the terms in which it was given and the justification for what was said, to be made available.
While acknowledging the argument that the anonymity of expert witnesses was required to protect them from vilification and to encourage them to undertake child protection work, it was also of the utmost importance that the family justice system should be as transparent as possible, consistent always with the need to protect the identities of children.
His Lordship would therefore like to see a practice develop in which expert reports would be routinely disclosed and the media able to comment both on the report and on the use to which it was put in the proceedings.
That would mean that the views of the judge on the expert evidence would also be disclosed.
It would of course be necessary in each case for an application for disclosure to be made and for every tribunal to consider whether or not there was an outstanding welfare issue that needed to be addressed by a continuing order for anonymity.
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Solicitors: Ms Christine Forde, Coventry; Berrymans Lace Mawer; Hempsons; Penmans, Coventry.