There is no general principle that a child should be summarily returned where one parent moves them from their home to another place in England & Wales, says Claire Sanders
- In a domestic abduction case the welfare of the child is the court’s paramount consideration having regard to all the relevant features, including the matters listed in ChA 1989, s 1(3).
If, as the Court of Appeal confirmed in the 2015 decision in Re C (a child) (Internal relocation) [2015] EWCA Civ 1305, [2015] All ER (D) 211 (Dec), there is no reason to differentiate between the approach adopted in external and internal relocation cases and the authorities applicable to external relocation also apply to internal relocation how, if at all, would that decision then have an impact on cases where there has been a domestic abduction?
This question was fairly swiftly tested in Re R (a child) (domestic abduction) [2016] EWCA Civ 1016, [2016] All ER (D) 170 (Oct), in which the father argued that, in the light of Re C ,
