Social Services have been criticised by a High Court judge for offering a destitute Jamaican family a ticket home.

Mr Justice Maurice Kay said the county council had a "flimsy basis" for arguing that the mother and her two teenage daughters would be better off in their home island and had only briefly discussed the issue with the children.

Oxfordshire Social Services must reconsider the case, and, until a final decision is reached, continue to provide the family with accommodation.

The mother, who cannot be named, arrived in Britain with her daughters in December 2000, four months after marrying a British man. He abused the family so much one girl suffered a nervous breakdown.

When the marriage failed a few months later, the family applied for accommodation and financial support, but were refused. The county council said the woman's extended family in Jamaica could care for them.

At one point the council offered to fly her to the Caribbean and to house the children in the UK.

The mother is currently applying to the Home Office for permanent residence in the UK on the basis that she is the victim of domestic violence. The family's counsel, Jenni Richards, argued successfully that Oxfordshire's stance was "wholly flawed and irrational".

Mr Justice Kay agreed the views of the teenage daughters had only been agreed in passing and that the ascertainment their views at the time had probably only been cursory.

He said Oxfordshire County Council only had "a flimsy basis" for its views that the girls could be cared for in Jamaica, and he accepted that the best the family could hope for back in their homeland was a mattress on a relative's floor.