Adoption
Next week is National Adoption Week and in advance of that solicitors from Rayden Solicitors attended the debate 'Adoption - The Next Headline!' hosted by Osbornes Solicitors LLP and Adoption UK this week. A broad range of topics were addressed and a summary of the main points of the debate is set out below:
Promoting Adoption in the UK
The UK is one of the few jurisdictions in the world that allow forced adoption. Other jurisdictions are some states in the USA and Canada. Forced adoption means that the child is removed from their birth families and placed into the care system. A care plan is then drawn up and if that recommends adoption a lengthy legal process ensues which may result in the child being adopted against the birth families wishes. The legal process carefully assesses the birth parents ability to care for the child and the ability of extended family members to care for the child. The idea of forced adoption is not an easy one but what became clear during the debate was that the children in question have either been neglected or abused and all were traumatised. Adoption is viewed as beneficial to a child from this type of background because it offers permanency and stability that the child would not otherwise experience in the care system.
There is a clear movement to try to increase the number of children being adopted in the UK from the care system. The panel discussed the need to reduce the length of time it takes the court to complete the adoption procress but still ensure that the rigorous checks and balances remain in place. One of the reasons the experts are hoping to reduce the time it takes for the adoption process to complete is because children are far more likely to be adopted under the age of three than over the age of three. The experts also called for the need for joined up thinking amongst all of the professionals involved in the adoption process to try to streamline the process. Everyone seemed to agree that whether you are a birth parent or an adoptive parent, parenting is a privilege and not a right.
Increasing numbers of potential adoptive parents
Martin Narvey, the government advisor on adoption, said that he believed more potential adoptive parents would come forward if their first introduction into the UK adoption system was handled sensitively. The problem at present is that often people make enquiries about adoption after discovering they are not able to conceive. They phone their local authority and when asked what type of child they are looking for they state a baby with as few a problems as possible to replicate the child they had hoped for. The response they get is that there are very few babies available for adoption in the UK, and those that there are usually have problems having been taken away from drug dependent mothers. More often than not potential adopters then look to adopt abroad where it is easier to adopt a baby or young child.
Members of the panel wanted investment in providing information to potential adopters at an early stage to help them shift their perception of the family life that they had hoped for to one where they felt they could love and care for a child from a difficult background and build their family life around that child.
Transcultural adoption
During the debate the issue of transcultural adoption was canvassed extensively. When trying to place a child with adoptive parents a process of matching takes place where cultural and religious backgrounds are looked at. The problem arises because fewer ethnic minority couples come forward to adopt than 'white' couples. One panel member stated that this leads to the troubling statistic that a 'black' child is three times less likely to be adopted than children from other cultural or mixed race backgrounds. Both the panel and the audience seemed to agree that to reverse this statistic then attitudes needed to be changed and local authorities need to be open to transcultural adoptions, because it is clearly better for a child to be given a loving permanent home than to remain in the care system. The panel did make clear however that if there were two possible sets of adoptive parents and one couple were a better matched in terms of ethnic and cultural background then that would be highly persuasive.
Investing in post adoption support services
The worst thing that can happen to a child that has been through the long process of being taken into care and then the long legal process of adoption is for the adoption to breakdown. Members of the panel called for greater funding for ongoing support services for adoptive parents. The children that are adopted have been traumatised and often have ongoing problems and the adoptive parents need access to advice, support and even therapy for the children. Often the children have educational difficulties and whilst in the care of the local authority they are prioritised in terms of school places and educational support services. This stops when they are adopted and this is shortsighted. The children concerned need the continuity of the services that they had benefitted from whilst in care. It is hoped that in the near future the government will find a way to release the funding to allow this to happen and to ensure that adopted children retain the right to access the facilities available to children in care.
It is hoped that many of the changes being debated will take place in the near future. There is support for adoption amongst the current government and with it being Adoption UKs 40th anniversary this would seem a fitting year for significant change to take place.