Charlotte has experience in Court of Protection cases involving people lacking capacity to make decisions on health and welfare issues. She welcomes instructions from local authorities, health care trusts, the Official Solicitor and other litigation friends acting for protected persons and family and friends. Cases can involve vulnerable adults, including elderly persons suffering from degenerative diseases, and young people with mental health difficulties. Charlotte’s experience also includes urgent and non-urgent medical treatment cases, and withheld consent cases.
Charlotte is an expert in all areas of family law: child abduction, children, family finance, female genital mutilation (FGM), forced marriage, honour-based violence, human rights, inheritance, and injunctions.
FGM, honour-based violence and forced marriage: Charlotte is a doctoral researcher in Sociology at the University of Cambridge researching FGM law and policy in the UK. Given her experience in FGM, she was recently instructed to write a briefing paper on FGM legislation across Commonwealth Member States for the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission.
Working for the Shadow Minister for Preventing Violence against Women and Girls, Charlotte assisted in drafting legislation for the Serious Crime Act 2015 relating to FGM. Charlotte was also instrumental in the criminalisation of forced marriage after advising Number 10 Downing Street’s Policy Unit.
As a former member of the Bar Human Rights Committee Working Group on FGM, Charlotte contributed to written evidence submitted to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in preparation for the March 2015 session of the Human Rights theme, “Towards a better investment in the rights of the child”, and she co-authored a written report to the inquiry into FGM by the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee 2014-2015. The Government introduced two of the working group’s recommendations, FGM Protection Orders, and an anti-FGM unit.
Family finance: Charlotte has extensive experience in financial relief applications following divorce and separation, pre-nuptial and post-nuptial agreements, property and financial trusts, and Islamic divorce and dowry cases.
Injunctions: Charlotte represents applicants and respondents in cases involving physical and sexual violence at complex fact finding and final hearings.
International child abduction cases: With a specialism in international child abduction cases involving both Hague and non-Hague convention countries, Charlotte provides immediate action on an emergency basis. She is able to take the case through from the first hearing to the final hearing.
Private law children: Charlotte has experience in private law children disputes representing applicants and respondents in protracted fact-finding and final hearings, often where there are multiple allegations of physical and sexual abuse, and cases with an international dimension.
Public law children: Acting for local authorities, parents, and children, Charlotte is instructed in all areas of public law childcare proceedings, as well as foreign and domestic adoptions, and cases under the Inherent Jurisdiction involving the right to life or medical treatment for children. Notable cases include non-accidental injury, sexual abuse, physical abuse, and neglect.
Charlotte has a reputation for her outstanding advocacy and written work in niche areas of immigration law notably violence against women and girls. Given Charlotte’s expertise in FGM, forced marriage, and honour-based violence, Charlotte is instructed in matters where women and girls have been subjected to such abuse, or at risk of experiencing it. A growing number of asylum claims are made on grounds of FGM by parents on behalf of daughters, by girls, and adult women. With academic, and legal knowledge of FGM, solicitors and lay clients have specifically requested Charlotte to represent vulnerable women and girls.
Charlotte’s commitment to international human rights stems from undertaking pro bono work in Pakistan where she researched transnational forced marriage at the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. She assisted in establishing the first free legal advice centre in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Having worked for the Association of Civil Rights in Israel, Charlotte specialised in strategic litigation where landmark cases are brought to courts in Israel on behalf of marginalised groups to advance human rights.
Charlotte deals with a wide range of judicial review cases involving family law, child law, and immigration law. She is an expert on family law cases in which the European Convention on Human Rights is engaged. As junior counsel, Charlotte assisted in bringing judicial review proceedings against a local authority for accommodating a child under section 20 Children Act 1989 for a disproportionate amount of time. Of recent, Charlotte was junior counsel in a case seeking urgent permission to apply for judicial review where a foreign national prisoner sought revocation of a Deportation Order.
Charlotte has a high level of expertise in housing law, commercial and residential landlord and tenant law, and commercial leases and business tenancies including but not limited to:
A Local Authority v a Mother, a Father and an Aunt [2012] EWHC 1637 (Fam). Junior counsel to leading counsel, Martha Cover. Represented maternal aunt, obtained a placement order following complex and protracted care proceedings, and an order for costs against the local authority.
During pupillage, Charlotte assisted leading and junior counsel representing the mother in LB of Islington v Al Alas and Wray [2012] EWHC 865 (Fam). Mother and father were acquitted of non-accidental death of their child whom suffered with rickets.
Briefing paper: Female genital mutilation, Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, March 2016
Nordic Model Information Network submission to the consultation on the Prostitution Law Reform (Scotland) Bill, 30 November 2015
Case summary: In the matter of B and G (Children) (No 2) [2015] EWFC 3, Family Law Week, July 2015
FGM and the Serious Crime Act 2015, Family Law Week, July 2015
FGM: prosecution and prevention, Counsel Magazine, May 2015
Written evidence about FGM submitted to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in preparation for the session of the Human Rights theme, “Towards a better investment in the rights of the child”. Co-author, Bar Human Rights Committee England and Wales, March 2015
Prostitution, sex-buyer laws and the “End Demand” campaign, Counsel Magazine, March 2015
End Demand Campaign, Family Law Journal, 2015
Update: Female Genital Mutilation and the Serious Crime Act 2005, Counsel Magazine, 2015
A tool for change: Strategic litigation in Israel, Counsel Magazine, April 2014
Written evidence about FGM submitted to The House of Commons, Home Affairs Committee on FGM. Co-author, Bar Human Rights Committee England and Wales, 12 February 2014
Changing a Child's Name, Family Law Week, September 2013
CPD Master-class on Islamic marriage, divorce and dowry, Sweet and Maxwell, April 2013
Religious marriages: Staying a decree absolute in order to increase the chances of obtaining a religious divorce, Family Law Week, January 2013
Forced Marriage: The Path to Criminalisation, Counsel Magazine, November 2012
Criminalisation of forced marriage across Europe, International Family Law, November 2012
Will the Court of Protection judgment in XCC v AA [2012] EWHC 2183 (COP) mean increased intervention in forced marriage cases? Lexis Nexis, August 2012
A Specific Criminal Offence of Forced Marriage, Criminal Law and Justice Weekly, May 2012
The Criminalisation of Forced Marriage,’ Family Law Journal, April 2012
A Practical Analysis of Islamic Marriage, Divorce and Dowry, Family Law Week, February 2012
Forced marriage rescue missions: The repatriation of victims of forced marriages from Pakistan to the UK, Counsel Magazine, March 2011
FGM: A crime performed with impunity in England and Wales, Amnesty International Cambridge City Group, 9 March 2016
Panellist at diversity in law event chaired by Baroness Hale and organised by The Times, 22 February 2016
Workshop: FGM and female genital cosmetic surgery, a double legal standard? Amnesty International Conference, Cambridge, 6 February 2016
Coercive control conference, Bury St Edmonds, 4 February 2016
A Socio-legal perspective of FGM in England and Wales, Child Advocacy Program, Harvard Law School, 4 November 2015
Zero tolerance: FGM, forced marriage and honour-based violence, Public Policy Exchange, 8 September 2015
Presented on recent legal changes to FGM legislation and policy at Women and Multiculturalism in Secular Society Conference, Coventry University, 1 July 2015
Chaired and presented at a conference, FGM Activism and the Academy, Oxford University, 7 March 2015
Skills advocacy course for FGM cases, SOAS University, 24 February 2015
Doctoral Researcher, Sociology, King’s College, University of Cambridge, 2013 to present day
Visiting Researcher, Harvard Law School, September to December 2015
M.Phil in Criminology, Queens’ College, University of Cambridge, Distinction, 2011
Bar Vocational Course, The City Law School, 2010
LL.B (Hons) Law and Sociology, Keele University, 2009
International Legal and Professional Development Grant, Bar Council, 2013
Wolfson Scholarship, Lincoln’s Inn, 2011
Continuing Education Scholarship, Lincoln’s Inn, 2010 and 2011
Human Rights Lawyers’ Association Bursary, 2010
Hardwicke Scholarship, Lincoln’s Inn, 2009
Bar Human Rights Committee England and Wales
Charlotte Proudman appeared in a reported case, representing a father in a complex child abduction matter where the location of the mother and the two children was unknown: Re: Rodwell [2016] EWHC 1731 (Fam). ...
Read MoreThe following article by Charlotte Proudman and Mary Honeyball appeared originally on The Independent. Shared parental leave, equal pay, anti-discrimination laws, special funding for women-led projects and protection ag ...
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