CHILDREN LOOKED AFTER BY LOCAL AUTHORITIES
Adoption
146. Children whose relationship with their birth
families is deemed to have irretrievably broken down may be placed
for permanent adoption. The most recent figures, show that 2,300
children, or 4.5% of children looked after, were placed for adoption
at 31 March 1996.[161]
Both the number and proportion of children placed for adoption
have increased in recent years; in 1991 this category accounted
for only 3% of children looked after.[162]
147. A report by the SSI in 1996 found that serious
delays frequently occur between the forming of a plan for the
adoption of a child and the making of a placement. These delays
were found to be partly attributable to the absence of a sense
of urgency on the part of the SSD, or unwillingness to commit
resources to the cost of inter-agency placement.[163]
148. Several of our witnesses claimed that SSDs and
individual social workers can display an irrational hostility
to the concept of adoption. The Adoption Forum told us that the
"presumption that all children are better off with their
birth families ... is palpably lacking in common sense when so
many children are mistreated, abused and neglected by those families".
They claimed that "linked to this presumption is the practice
of returning children time and again to their abusers, or those
who have been seen to be unable to deal with life as a parent
... functioning biology does not make a person a good enough parent".[164]
The Forum argued that a child who has been 'looked after' continuously
for six months is unlikely to be successfully reconciled with
his or her birth family in the long term, that in such cases adoption
should be considered, and that it should be a statutory requirement
for adoption to be considered in the cases of children who have
spent over 18 months in the care system.[165]
149. A group of adoptive parents gave oral evidence
to us. They claimed that many social workers were biased against
adoption, and that where mothers were unable to cope with very
young children and wished to have them adopted, undue pressure
was often brought to bear on them to change their minds.[166]
Sir William Utting said that his review team had found evidence
that "authorities are too careful and painstaking in their
regard for parental rights and are less active in protecting children
against known or suspected harm ... some children told us that
one of the worst things for them was actually being made to go
home at weekends to families where they had been abused".[167]
150. An alternative view of the prospects for increased
use of adoption was offered by an organisation called Parent to
Parent Information on Adoption Services (PPIAS). According to
PPIAS, although there were "many thousands of people who
would dearly like to adopt, ... these are mainly couples, often
young and infertile with no parenting experience, who desperately
want a healthy, young, trouble-free child".[168]
PPIAS agreed with the Adoption Forum that "delays and too
stringent criteria" within the current care system made it
unnecessarily difficult to adopt. However, they continued, "an
improved system would still not turn thousands of young, inexperienced,
infertile couples, who long for a baby, into parents immediately
able to take on board the needs and behaviours of:
(1) an 18 month old who
has been severely neglected from birth; or
(2) an eight year old who has been rejected by
his birth mother, abused by his mother's partners, and moved 26
times through the 'care' system; or
(3) a group of four brothers and sisters who
need to stay together and to recover from years of sexual abuse."
This was a point made also by BASW, which observed
that the difficulties which arose in matching looked-after children
placed for adoption with approved adopters waiting for children
came about because "the children needing placement are almost
always older children with special needs, while the prospective
adopters who wait are those who wish to adopt very young children".
However, BASW conceded that there was legitimate concern that
some placements are delayed because local authorities cannot afford
to pay inter-agency fees.[169]
151. PPIAS pointed out that many children who are
unlikely ever to return to their birth families do not wish to
be adopted or are not suitable for adoption: "some would
benefit more by living in a small group home, ... and some are
nowhere near ready for family life and may wreak havoc on an unsuspecting
and unsupported adoptive family when placed. Sadly, we have much
evidence of exactly this kind of scenario—as well as much
evidence of excellent practice in the adoption field nationwide".
PPIAS argued that adoption is always likely to be a trauma to
a child or young person, that in former years birth mothers suffered
from society's stigmatising of illegitimacy and the pressure put
on them to place their babies for adoption, and that therefore
"a return to wholesale adoption [is] not the answer".
They argued that adoption should be considered as an option in
specific circumstances when this would be in the child's best
interests, and that when a child has lived with foster parents
for over 12 months, adoption by the foster parents should be the
first option considered. Prospective foster parents should therefore
be assessed on the basis that they might, one day, become adoptive
parents.[170]
ADOPTION:
CONCLUSIONS
152. We are in no doubt that the Children Act
is correct to presume that the best possible outcome to episodes
of care is the child's successful reunion with a loving birth
family which receives appropriate support to enable it to cope
with the child. Nonetheless, in some cases there is no realistic
prospect of a child ever returning to its birth family. In these
circumstances adoption should always be considered. In our opinion
adoption can be a positive choice, but should proceed only where
(a) it is judged that there is no realistic prospect of reconciliation
with the birth family; (b) adoption is in accord with the wishes
of the child (assuming the child to be old enough to reach a decision
on these matters), and (c) the would-be adoptive parents have
been assessed as capable of coping with the demands the child
will place on them.
153. The dangers of inappropriate adoption are
all too real: the evidence we have taken in our current inquiry
into the welfare of former British child migrants has shown the
emotional damage that can be done when a child is removed unnecessarily
from his or her birth parents. Nonetheless, the recent SSI report,
together with the evidence we have taken from Sir William Utting
and others, makes clear that local authorities too often do fail
to take adoption sufficiently seriously as an option, that unnecessary
delays occur, and that insufficient support is offered to adoptive
parents. Where a looked-after child is adopted, it is important
that the decision-making process should proceed without delay,
and that appropriate support be offered to adoptive parents during
and after the process of adoption. We support the view of PPIAS
that the option of adoption by foster parents should be seriously
considered, and that the possibility of this happening should
be taken into account in the initial assessment of prospective
foster parents. We recommend that the DoH should publicly commit
itself to the principles we have set out above, and issue appropriate
guidance to local authorities on how those principles should be
implemented.
161 DoH, Children Looked After by Local Authorities:
Year Ending 31 March 1996, England (1997), Table 4. Back
162 Ibid.,
p 13. Back
163 DoH,
For Children's Sake: An SSI Inspection of Local Authority Adoption
Services (1996); see ev pp 71-72. Back
164 Ev
p 272. Back
165 Ibid.,
p 273. Back
166 Q73-32. Back
167 Q842. Back
168 CLA
32B. Back
169 Ev
p 94. Back
170 Ibid. Back
|
