Mother loses bid to look after her child

A mother with severe learning difficulties has lost an appeal to
play a part in her daughter’s life.

Sheffield Council placed the child in foster care at two days old
and won a care order in May 2004 to put the child up for adoption,
despite pleas from the mother that she could cope with
motherhood.

The mother’s representative, said she continued to have “tenable
belief in her capacity to provide for her daughter” and should be
given another period of assessment or 24-hour support and
supervision to see if there was any prospect of a reunion.

But, describing the case as “very sad”, Court of Appeal judge Lord
Justice Thorpe described the mother’s appeal against the county
court ruling as “hopeless”.

In the earlier three-day hearing, social workers had given “clear
and unqualified” support to the council’s plea that adoption would
be in the child’s best interests. The mother had been allowed
contact with her daughter every day for four weeks at an assessment
centre but reports on her capabilities had come back
“negative”.

Commenting after the ruling, strategy and operations manager at
Sheffield Council, Doug Adams, said: “We worked hard with the
family to try and support the mother to care for her daughter, but
the judge was clear that this would not be in the best interest of
the child.”