Should vulnerable people who provide information on alleged abuse be entitled to public interest immunity? David Burrows investigates
In Re A (A Child) [2012] UKSC 60 (heard as Re J (A Child: Disclosure) (Rev 1) [2012] EWCA Civ 1204 in the Court of Appeal in September) the Supreme Court was called upon to balance the interests of justice against, or alongside, the welfare of a child. In so doing, the welfare of the child concerned seems to have been connoted entirely with justice (“the interests of that little girl…in having an allegation properly investigated and tested” (para [1])) rather than in the abstract: the public interest in ensuring that those with information about abuse of children come forward (per D v National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children [1978] AC 171). A chance to reassert the public interest immunity established in that case, in slightly different circumstances, not attempted by the Court of Appeal, was not taken by the Supreme Court either.
The court made relatively short work of dismissing an appeal by an allegedly abused “young person” (“X”; her
