to wonder if people will be as outraged by this judge as by Farage

[retrorobot]

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/11583794/Surrogate-mother-launched-hate-campaign-against-babys-gay-father.html

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3068796/Deceitful-surrogate-mother-carried-baby-wealthy-gay-couple-refused-hand-desperate-child-herself.html

Genetic and birth mother has daughter taken away from her and given to a gay couple, one of whom is the father. There was no surrogacy agreement in place between the mother and the gay couple and the judge found on the balance of probabilities that the mother deliberately misled the gay couple in order to conceive a child for herself rather than changing her mind at a later date.

The mother was criticised for:

• Keeping the 15-month-old girl with her 24 hours a day, sleeping in the same bed, being carried around in a sling, and breast-fed on demand day and night. I have two daughters under three and that's only a slightly exaggerated description of their relationship with their mother for the first 15 months after birth.

• Using requests to take breaks to express milk to disrupt the other side’s evidence.

The mother was Romanian. Query whether the result would have been the same if the mother was middle class English rather than poor immigrant.

The judge involved does not have children.

retrorobot
Were you in court? Have you read all the evidence presented? Have you witnessed the behaviour of the parties? If not then how are you in a position to assess why this decision was made. The mother had breached court orders relating to contact, breached prohibited steps orders in relation to religion etc. The court reached the conclusion that she would not put the child's interests first. What is your agenda that you keep wanting to reduce it to money rather than accept that in this case, the Mother wasn't the better parent.

To the poster who referred to the judge believing that there was an informal agreement, that should not be relevant.

If you read my post you would see that i also said the surrogacy agreement had nothing with the decision, ie not relevant. It became a custody battle between 2 biological parents. The emails showing the informal agreement was used to back up that the Mother was happy to lie in court for her own ends.

ChazsBrilliantAttitude: Please don't be so aggressive in your posts. I have read the judgment. The reason that judgments are published is because we value a transparent judicial system that can be the subject of public discussion. Of course I was not in court - this is a sensitive family case - there are restrictions in such cases.

Rather than sneer at me, perhaps engage the point I make regarding the "best interests" being meaningless and giving judges unlimited discretion. Perhaps also engage with the point that the rules as applied here by the judge aren't applied in the same way when it comes to custody disputes in other cases involving straight couples.

I am not being aggressive. The point I am making is that unless we have had the same access to information as the judge then we can't really second guess their decision can we. I am not sneering so you don't need to be so defensive. Utimately all the judges can do is make a judgement call about what is in the best interest of the child following the guidelines. Each case has to be assessed on its merits looking at the specific circumstances of that child and those parents. The wealthier parent might not be the most appropriate resident parent if their job involves a substantial amount of overseas travel, the female parent might not be the better resident parent if they are a habitual drug user, sexuality shouldn't be relevant at all etc.

It was in the Childs best interests because the mothers parenting choices were based on stopping the father form seeing the child. Because she repeatedly lied in court, broke court orders and tried to ruin the fathers reputation. All in the name of stopping the child seeing its father.

It is in the Childs best interest to know its father. Since there was no safety concern around the father, the mother was not putting her Childs needs before her own. Therefore it was in the Childs best interests to be with the parent who does put the child first. Its not about income.

Am I right in thinking she has already has 2 daughters that don't live with her, due to similar circumstances.

If you read the judgment it's clear that the ruling was in the child's best interests. The test is not meaningless; it covers a range of needs, all of which are carefully set out and assessed in a very full judgment.

I BF on demand and co-sleep and I'm completely with the judge on this.

What the judge said on the best interests issue, amongst other matters, was:
"I have used the welfare checklist as the basis for my decision because I am concerned with how to best provide for M's physical, emotional and educational needs under the provision of s 1 (3) (a) CA. Although M is not yet at school it is more likely than not that the parent who can best meet all her other needs and is most likely to be able to provide her with a secure home and stable upbringing with room to grow emotionally for the remainder of her infancy is more likely to meet her educational needs fulfil her potential in the future. The latter requires that M is afforded the scope to grow up in an environment where conflict is at a minimum."

The welfare checklist requires the court to consider:

1. The ascertainable wishes and feelings of each child concerned (considered in light of their age and understanding)
2. Physical, emotional and/or educational needs now and in the future
3. The likely effect on any change in the circumstances now and in the future
4. Age, sex, background and any other characteristics the court considers relevant
5. Any harm suffered or at risk of suffering now and in the future
6. How capable each parent, and other person in relation to whom the court considers the question to be relevant, is of meeting the child's needs
7. The range of powers available to the court under the Children Act 1989 in the proceedings in question.

The judge also referred to other conduct of the mother, such as taking the child to see doctors when there was no need to do so solely in order to prevent contact visits, resulting in unnecessary and intrusive examinations. She pointed out that it is in the child's interests not to be prevented from forming a relationship with her father. There were further worries in this connection that the mother kept depicting the father as promiscuous and a drug addict solely because he was gay.

It is therefore misleading to suggest that the issue of best interests is in effect decided out of thin air.

I see that you are a commercial lawyer, OP. You must therefore be well aware that there is no such thing as complete judicial discretion: it always has to be exercised in a rational manner and on the basis of the evidence and the law. There is nothing in this judgment that suggests that this judge failed to do so.

The judgements seems sound to me though I haven't read all the detail. Usually in cases where there are dodgy decisions and biases going on its clear something doesn't add up as soon as you start digging. In this case im not seeing that.

One of the major concerns about that womans decision making is using health care to block access. This is a lot more serious than just using random appointments and meetings to block contact. Misusing medical care in this way shows serious flaws in judgement. Willingness to put her child through unnecessary Gp appointments and hospital experiences is utterly warped, and ok, the baby wasn't subjected to any unnecessary procedures on three occasions, but where does it stop? The mother shows she's willing to employ any means possible to get her own way, wasting precious NHS resources and definitely not putting her baby first. I know the judge can't think in this way, but I am not sure where the line is for this woman, how far she would go to get what she wants, and where the childs needs come in all of this.

And personally, I find it disturbing that she's subverting actions that mothers do for love and care of their child, and use them as just another weapon in her arsenal. Like pretending she can't possibly wait to express milk but only when it stops someone giving testimony that she wants to subvert. Yuck.

I guess there's something extraordinarily pathetic about a person willing to behave like this.

Someone willing to throw any accusation around, no matter the implications, and use any and every means of manipulating the people and the environment around her.

It makes it somehow more pathetic that her own ignorance had the opposite effect and showed herself up as selfish, unethical and not mature enough to be an effective parent, as the accusations she decided to throw around are completely illogical and ill founded.

I mean, addicted to antibiotics?! She could have at least chosen a substance that people can get addicted to and has some sort of ability to create a high.

I wonder why someone didn't tell her that - did she not get any legal advice?

And the stupidest thing, she rejected a better custody arrangement in favour of her attempt to cut the father out of the childs life completely.

No brakes, everything fair game to be used to get her way. In my experience this only happens in two scenarios, 1. Utterly selfish & blind to anything other than satisfying their own needs, or 2. Someone desperately fighting for their life, and the consequences would be too much to bear. Humm. She seems so disconnected from the rules and practices of authority and the law, maybe she did think she was in a life or death situation (by which I mean losing her child altogether, which would be most parents worst case scenario above anything else)... Or maybe I'm just trying to see the good in her.

Unusually, it's more excitable over in "In the News" than on AIBU.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2372404-Baby-girl-taken-from-mother-to-live-with-dad-and-his-boyfriend?

Miscellaneous, she seems to have had legal advice at some point but she was representing herself by the time of the final hearing.

Icimoi do we know why?

Icimoi - she was represented at the final hearing. She had solicitors at various points during the proceedings. At other points she represented herself. At some points she had lawyers acting for her pro bono (free).

Thanks, I went on to read the full judgement notes and then skipped to the busier thread.

I was trying to find a reason for her behaviour before I read the full thing - but having read it im afraid my sympathy has rather dried up. Still feel sorry for her as she's ended up without regular contact, but honestly, she has behaved very badly, and it's concerning that she is ready willing and able to put her child in situations that aren't good for the baby.

I can't see how such a massive miscarriage of justice could happen in this context - she's not credible as the poor little victim, now or historically. The judge noted that she comes across as 'astute', confident and assertive/ aggressive and very able to get others to buy into the poor little victim role, recruiting others to fight for her.

I think she needed legal advice to stop behaving in a way that undermines her own case, but then, the weight of the evidence suggests she's not put her child first, rather than being a victim of an unfortunate manner/ ignorance of law.

There were so many opportunities for her to agree an arrangement that allowed her to share parenthood, but she refused it all, and now has very limited access. It's a shame she didn't have a lawyer to point this out but then, I don't think she'd have listened, she seems determined not to share... Especially with gay people.

Ultimately, who knows though, am just extrapolating from what's written. Doesn't seen an obvious miscarriage of justice. And I wish a lot of other cases where the (usually male) ex uses the courts to continue abuse. I do think hounding the ex and refusing to put the child first should have consequences.