House of Lords - Adoption: Post-Legislative Scrutiny - Select Committee on Adoption Legislation

Adoption: Post-Legislative Scrutiny - Select Committee on Adoption Legislation Contents

Chapter 4: Speeding Up Adoption For The Benefit Of The Child

41. The Government's Action Plan for Adoption said that "delays in the adoption system cause lasting harm for vulnerable children, and may rob them of their best chance of the love and stability of a new family."[37] Delay in adoption services was one of the key concerns emerging from the evidence we received. This chapter considers the impact of delay on children, and the sources of delay in a child's journey from being removed from their birth family to moving in with an adoptive family.

BOX 3

How the adoption process works

The journey from social services receiving notification of potential harm to a child to an adoption order and a new life with an adoptive family is a long and complicated one. On average, a period of two years and seven months elapses between a child being taken into care and being placed with an adoptive family.[38] A number of different organisations are involved, including the local authority, the courts, the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (CAFCASS) and, sometimes, voluntary adoption agencies.

Having initiated proceedings to take a child into care, the local authority will produce a care plan. An interim care order is usually secured first; this places the child in care on a temporary basis, whilst the family is assessed and until the court can make a final decision about what is best for the child. A CAFCASS guardian is appointed to represent the child in any court proceedings.

By the time a final care order is secured, the local authority should already have considered a future plan for the child, which sets out the best means of achieving 'permanence', via a long-term, stable placement. If adoption is to be the preferred route for a child, a placement order is usually secured soon after the care order is granted. A placement order allows the local authority to place a child with a potential adoptive family; it also allows the local authority to conduct a search for such a family outside the potentially limited stock of adopters within its own administrative boundary.

The process of looking for an adoptive family is usually known as 'matching'. When a potential match is identified, the local authority must convene an adoption panel, which recommends whether the match should proceed. The 'agency decision-maker'—a designated person within the local authority—makes the ultimate decision as to whether to approve the placement.

Once placed with an adoptive family, it is up to the adopters to decide whether to proceed with an adoption order. This is the final step in the process, which severs existing links with the birth family and creates a new family. The adopters must wait at least 10 weeks, post placement, before applying for an adoption order.

Impact of delay

42. The reason for the concern over delay in getting children into adoptive placements is the "unequivocal evidence about the importance of early relationships".[39] The effects of emotional abuse and neglect are understood to be cumulative, pervasive and far-reaching. These effects can be particularly severe in very young children, because it can prevent them from developing the ability to form an attachment with an adult care giver, to trust others, and to develop a sense of self-worth.[40]

43. This disruption of early relationships in infancy has a significant effect on a child's later development, with increased vulnerability to a range of psychological, emotional and physical health problems throughout the child's lifespan. Recent research has shown that both structural and functional abnormalities are detected in the brains of children who have experienced neglect, and this is thought to be an adaptation in response to the extreme stress of maltreatment, which enables the child to cope to some degree with the parenting environment.[41]

44. However, there is evidence that some of the effects of neglect can be modified if the child's care-taking environment improves. [42] The NSPCC supported that finding, saying that "a maltreated child can make a remarkable and really rapid recovery, if they do get the right care."[43]

45. The damage that is done to a child's development through early mistreatment or neglect can be exacerbated further by frequent moves between temporary care placements. We referred to the risk of harm caused by moving a child from one foster placement to another in our earlier report Adoption: Pre-Legislative Scrutiny[44], with one study finding that "instability in care often leads to a downward spiral: worsening emotional and behavioural difficulties, further instability, poor educational results, unemployment and a lifetime of poverty."[45] Barnardo's underlined this point by arguing that "stability needs to be seen as a safeguarding issue."[46] The importance of timeliness in decision-making, and of respecting the child's need for stability and permanence, especially in the very early years of a child's life, were raised again and again by witnesses[47].

46. In light of the latest research about the impact of abuse and neglect on a child's physical, emotional, intellectual development and wellbeing, it is imperative to enable all children for whom adoption is the plan to join their new families as soon as possible. We note especially the very significant and sometimes life-long impact which abuse and neglect has on the very young. We recommend that Directors of Children's Services should ensure that social workers in safeguarding and adoption teams are kept aware of relevant research findings as part of their continuing professional development.

47. We commend the Government's aim to reduce delay in placing children with their new adoptive families and to minimise the risk of harm caused by moving children between foster placements.

Delays caused by care proceedings

48. The length of care proceedings was cited by many of our witnesses as a significant source of delay in adoption.[48] The Family Justice Review found that care proceedings took on average over 60 weeks, "an age in the life of a child."[49] The latest judicial statistics for September to December 2012 show an average of 47.7 weeks.[50] This is a marked improvement but still constitutes a significant delay, especially since the use of averages conceals the fact that in some cases proceedings will take much longer, as our evidence indicated.[51]

49. The judiciary, while accepting the need for reform, pointed to the steep increase in the number of care applications made since the death of baby Peter Connelly: from 20,000 per year in 2008 to 30,000 in 2012.[52] Additional resources had been allocated to the Family Division to deal with the rise in applications; Mr Justice Ryder told us 8,000 additional judicial sitting days had been scheduled.[53]

50. The findings of the Family Justice Review were unequivocal about the current system: "a system that is not a system, characterised by mutual distrust and a lack of leadership...The consequence for children is unconscionable delay."[54] The evidence we received supports those conclusions—mutual distrust between local authorities and the courts, the poor quality of reports submitted by social workers, and the consequent over-reliance by the courts on expert witnesses; were all cited as causes of delay.[55]

51. The Government has accepted the majority of the recommendations of the Family Justice Review and brought forward legislation to implement them. The Children and Families Bill makes provision for limiting the use of expert evidence by introducing an additional test; introduces a twenty-six week time limit in care proceedings; and limits judicial scrutiny of care plans. We do not propose to comment in detail on the clauses dealing with care proceedings.[56]

52. The shortening of time-scales for care proceedings is to be welcomed but it will place a greater burden on the quality of assessments presented to the courts by the social workers which, the evidence suggests, are routinely not of sufficient quality to allow the court to rely on them in forming a judgment: "If rigorous, analytic and patently trustworthy local authority assessments were consistently available to the courts at the start of cases court timescales would be significantly reduced..[but] too often the initial work is not found to be of sufficient quality and has to be redone."[57] The problem is wide-spread: "about 40% of cases are still being brought to the courts for applications for care orders with no up-to-date core assessment of the child and his family. Therefore, a great deal of the work has to be done within the proceedings."[58]

53. The quality of the reports presented to court is crucial in delivering the desired reduction in delay, and this depends of course on the quality of work that takes place pre-proceedings. This view was supported by the House of Commons Justice Committee in their report on the draft Children and Families Bill: "all our witnesses agreed that accurate, comprehensive and detailed pre-proceedings work was vital to reducing delay with the care proceedings process."[59] Unfortunately, our evidence indicated that in many cases social workers were not able to meet this challenge.[60]

54. There is evidence that concerted effort in pre-proceedings work can lead to an improvement in quality, which then translates into a reduction in delay during the care proceedings. Mr Justice Ryder referred to the success of the Tri-Borough Project in London in completing the majority of their care proceedings in under 26 weeks as a result of improved "quality assurance of the evidential material"[61] presented by social workers; this quality assurance had involved managers and consultants who had been brought in specifically to achieve this.[62]

55. We welcome the Government's plans to reduce the time taken by care proceedings but we are deeply concerned that achieving the Government's new time limit of 26 weeks will depend heavily on the quality of assessments submitted by social workers. Poor quality assessments may need to be repeated and can lead to an over-reliance on outside experts, increasing delay for the child. Unless the quality of social worker assessments is urgently and comprehensively addressed there is little hope of the new time limit being met. This has resource implications both centrally and locally.

Delays in bringing children into care

56. Another significant source of delay in adoption was identified as delay in bringing children into care. Much of the evidence suggested that many children "remain in abusive situations for far too long."[63] There were many factors contributing to this: "lack of evidence to bring proceedings, parents going missing, social workers being too optimistic about parental capacity to change, and lack of understanding about the serious impact on children's development of neglect."[64] This was supported by the fact that "the great majority of children who come into care proceedings have been "known" to the local authority for a very long time."[65]

57. We were told that much of the recent increase in care applications following the death of baby Peter Connelly involved cases of neglect, rather than abuse.[66] Lord Justice McFarlane explained that such cases were "much harder for the courts to digest because there will be reams of paperwork, none of them having single points that will decide the case but all a picture of neglect and poor parenting." [67] The difficulty in assessing and providing sufficient evidence of neglect was also cited as a cause of delay in taking children into care by BASW[68] and the NSPCC.[69]

58. Over-estimating parental capacity to change "where there is considerable evidence that the birth parents will not be able to achieve the progress necessary, and within a realistic timeframe"[70] was cited by many witnesses as being at the root of much of the delay in bringing children into care.[71] In some cases, we were told, decisions to delay entry into care were compounded by a failure to provide targeted and properly resourced early intervention to tackle the family's problems.[72]

59. The timeliness of decision-making about whether or not to remove a child from home is crucial. This is especially the case for the very young. Where there is no capacity for parental change robust decision-making is needed to ensure that other permanency options, including adoption, are pursued.

60. Decisions to delay entry into care need to be accompanied by targeted intervention to address a family's problems, with a timetable for review which takes into account the child's need for stability.

Early intervention

61. The benefit of early intervention in families experiencing difficulties, in order to enable them to raise their children safely at home, was raised by many witnesses: "There is no doubt that intensive support at the earliest possible point is necessary if we are going to deal with the issues that these families have. That is the point at which we should be investing considerably more in the way of resources."[73] Where there is capacity for parental change early intervention "can enable children to remain within their birth families."[74]

62. The Family Nurse Partnership programme is funded by the Department of Health, and offers intensive and structured home visiting, delivered by specially trained nurses, from early pregnancy until the child is two.[75] The programme was developed in the United States (where it is known as the Nurse Family Partnership). Although only established in England from 2007, three decades of experience in the United States have demonstrated significant improvements in outcomes for children, including language development, school readiness and academic achievement, as well as improved parenting behaviour and reductions in abuse and neglect.[76]

63. The work of the Family Drug and Alcohol Court (FDAC), currently being piloted at the Inner London Family Proceedings Court in Wells Street, was praised for its proactive and interventionist approach in cases where parental substance misuse was a key reason for the local authority to bring proceedings.[77] An evaluation of FDAC's cases during its first 18 months was conducted by Brunel University. The rate of return to the birth family was found to be higher than in conventional proceedings. In addition, fewer of the cases became contested hearings and in those cases where parents could not control their substance misuse, children were placed in a permanent alternative family sooner.[78]

64. Professor Thoburn suggested that intensive services to address parental problems can lead to speedier outcomes in general, whether it is for rehabilitation with the birth family or for adoption.[79] Professor Eileen Munro, of the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics, supported that analysis: "with good practice and trying to help families you can reach a quicker decision about whether they can use help, whereas if you are not actively trying to engage them in change, then you cannot work out whether they can change or not."[80]

65. One of the benefits of intensive work to address parental problems was that it reduced significantly the likelihood of more children being born to families that were not able to parent them safely, and subsequently being taken into care.[81] This was supported by evidence from the NSPCC, who were piloting a support programme adapted from the United States, entitled the New Orleans Intervention Model. The programme works intensively with the birth family while the child is placed with foster carers who may go on to adopt the child if a return to the birth parents is not possible. Outcomes from the United States demonstrated that "even when the birth family did not get [their] child home, when they had subsequent children those subsequent siblings were less likely to be abused."[82]

66. Given the important preventative benefits of early intensive work with birth parents, we were disappointed to see that additional funding provided to local authorities in the form of the Adoption Reform Grant was resourced from the £150 million taken away from the Early Intervention Grant, which the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government confirmed in announcing the local government settlement for 2013-14.[83]

67. Where there is parental capacity to change, the arguments in favour of early and intensive intervention to address the parents' problems are compelling: enabling children to live safely within their birth families reduces the number of children in care and the numbers waiting for an alternative permanent placement. We are concerned therefore, that adoption reform is being funded by taking money from the Early Intervention Grant. We urge the Government not to undermine further the importance of preventative programmes by focusing on adoption at the expense of early intervention.

68. There is of course a tension between the time spent on intensive intervention to enable parents to address their problems on the one hand, and the impact of delay on the child on the other hand, especially in light of the latest research on brain development and a child's need for stability and security:

69. So while there was support for early intervention in families to address problems, this should not be delivered at the expense of the child's best interests: Adoption Focus urged those working with children to "accept that small children cannot wait forever for their parents to change."[85]

70. In order to balance the needs of the parents and of the child, therefore, early intervention needed to be targeted at those parents with the greatest capacity for change. Judge Crichton identified "young, drug-addicted mums, who are perhaps on their first or second pregnancy" as the cases for which there was a real chance of change in the FDAC programme.[86] Working with young mothers during the last months of pregnancy was considered an important target because it enabled changes to be made before the child was born, effectively "stealing time for the child."[87]

71. A balance needs to be struck between giving parents time to address their problems and respecting the child's need for a secure and loving attachment. Robust assessment of parental capacity to change, by social workers and their managers, is essential to ensure that early intervention programmes are appropriately targeted. It is imperative to ensure that a child's need for secure attachment, especially when very young, is not compromised by prolonged attempts to rehabilitate the family.

Delays after entering care

72. The removal of a child from home, however neglectful or abusive, will have a traumatic effect on the child. On entering care what children need is "the best, most skilled but most committed and nurturing care from the day that they leave their family. What actually happens is that all too often they get temporary foster care, while we think about what to do next and formulate a plan."[88]

73. In order for the harmful effects of abuse or neglect to begin to be addressed, a decision about a child's future needs to be taken as soon as possible after entering care, and with a view to minimising the number of care placements that are experienced. However, it appears that "there has been too much focus on finding a 'placement' rather than in focusing on permanency for a child."[89] In our earlier report we recommended a review of the current Statutory Guidance on Adoption to emphasise the need to begin formulating permanency plans at the first statutory review, one month after entry into care, and that the second review, at four months after entry into care, should be the very latest point at which a decision on permanency is made.

74. We reiterate the support we gave in our previous report for early decision-making after children enter care, and for permanency planning to be prioritised one month after entry into care. To support this we reiterate the recommendation in our earlier report to review the Statutory Guidance on Adoption.

75. We were surprised to discover from Professor Munro that in her review of the child protection system she did "not remember anyone mentioning adoption."[90] We have also heard that a "lack of involvement of the adoption teams in child care planning"[91] led to delays in reaching permanency decisions, especially for children for whom adoption was appropriate. Ofsted argued that "adoption should be considered as an integral part of the whole 'looked-after children' system, not as an isolated and discrete function or service."[92] Changes proposed to the Ofsted inspection regime, to be implemented from April 2013, will replace the separate inspections of adoption, fostering and child protection services with "a new framework for the inspection of services and outcomes for looked-after children."[93] It is hoped that this "will promote more integrated working between different elements of the local authority's service, in particular between children's social care teams and the adoption team."[94]

76. We urge Directors of Children's Services to ensure that adoption is integrated fully into child protection: good communication between adoption and safeguarding teams is essential to reduce the delay for those children who are not able to return to their birth families. We support the revised Ofsted reporting regime in its aim to promote more integrated working between local authority teams providing services for all looked-after children.

Early placement

77. For those children for whom a decision has been made that adoption is in their best interests, there are opportunities to reduce the time that children have to wait for an adoptive placement and to limit the damage caused by movement between temporary placements.

78. In our earlier report, we set out our support for concurrent planning, whereby a child is moved to a foster placement with carers who are also approved prospective adopters before a decision on whether the child should be adopted has been made.[95] The local authority continues to work towards rehabilitation with the birth family. If it is decided that the child should be adopted there will be no need for the child to be moved again.

79. Concurrent planning provides significant benefits in terms of enabling early attachments, minimising disruption, and reducing delay. We support its widest possible application

80. In our last report we also set out our support for the Government's proposal, as outlined in the draft clauses published on 7 November, to encourage the greater use of 'fostering for adoption'. Under the scheme the move to a placement with foster carers who are also approved prospective adopters would take place after the decision has been made by the local authority that the child should be placed for adoption, but before authority to place the child has been granted by the court. In that scenario there would be no rehabilitative work with the birth parents. We urged the Government to widen the scope of the proposed duty to require all local authorities actively to consider a fostering for adoption placement for all children for whom adoption is the permanency plan. In order to expand the number of children able to benefit from a fostering for adoption placement, we also recommended a review of the statutory guidance on adoption to ensure that permanency planning is given serious consideration one month after a child enters care.

81. The Children and Families Bill makes provision, in clause 1, for the placement of looked-after children with prospective adopters who are also approved foster carers. It imposes a new duty on local authorities to consider a fostering for adoption placement. The point at which the new duty arises is when the local authority is considering adoption for a child—i.e. before the decision that adoption is in a child's best interests has been taken.

82. This clause, compared to the draft clause which we considered in our previous report, widens considerably the circumstances in which a fostering for adoption placement will be considered. It creates the possibility that a child could be placed with prospective adopters, and that bonds and attachments could be formed, before the local authority has decided that adoption is the plan. The risk to the prospective adopters of the child being returned to the birth family is much greater in these circumstances.

83. There is also the significant risk of challenge under Articles 6[96] and 8[97] of the ECHR on the basis that the decision has been pre-judged and that the birth family have not been afforded a fair chance at reunification.

84. We put these concerns to Edward Timpson MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Children and Families) at the Department for Education. In replying he drew our attention to the fact that the proposed duty must be read in the context of the wider requirements of section 22C of the Children Act 1989, under which local authorities must make arrangements for a child to live with his or her parents, or with a person who has parental responsibility, or in whose favour a residence order was made prior to the care order, unless that is not reasonably practicable or consistent with the child's welfare. The Minister summarised the position as follows:

85. We welcome this clarification. However, it is in the implementation of the new provisions that risk of challenge under Articles 6 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights emerges. Local authorities will need to be mindful of their obligations under the ECHR in applying the new duty. We agree with the Minister that "where rehabilitation with the birth parents remains an option local authorities will need to ensure they comply with the Convention rights of both the parents and the child."[99] This places more pressure on the quality of work in the pre-proceedings phase to ensure that all reasonable steps have been taken by the local authority to explore reunification of the child with the birth family at the earliest opportunity, and the parents have been able effectively to participate in the decision-making process.

86. We welcome the Government's proposal to impose a new duty on local authorities to consider a fostering for adoption placement when considering adoption for a child. We are concerned, however, that there is a risk of challenge under the European Convention on Human Rights, unless the local authority has taken all reasonable steps to explore reunification of the child with the birth family at the earliest opportunity, and the parents have been able effectively to participate in the decision-making process. We are concerned that this may inhibit the extent to which local authorities will choose to place children in fostering for adoption placements.

87. We strongly urge the Government to issue clear guidance to local authorities on how to satisfy their obligations under the ECHR when applying the new duty on fostering for adoption.

Delays caused by kinship care assessments

88. Another source of delay cited by witnesses was the late emergence of possible kinship carers once proceedings were underway.[100] Some witnesses felt that the current legal framework allowed alternative carers to come forward "too late in the proceedings."[101] The Association of Directors of Children's Services suggested that "explicit guidance" would be useful on the extent to which kinship carers must be considered once proceedings have begun. An alternative suggestion was for the judge to raise the issue directly at the first or second hearing.[102]

89. On the other hand, some witnesses had sympathy with the reasons behind the delay in kinship carers coming forward: "Quite often, there is someone who would like to put themselves forward but they do not because they do not want to scupper the chances of the birth family. So they really leave it until the last moment when they see that probably the birth parents are not going to be caring for the children."[103]

90. The benefits of kinship care are demonstrated by the outcomes. We were told that children in the care of family or friends do as well if not better than those in unrelated foster care, in terms of their health, school attendance and performance, self-esteem and personal and social relationships.[104] Kinship carers are normally of the same ethnic background and have a previous relationship with the child, providing continuity and a shared sense of identity; because of their emotional commitment to the child, such placements tend to be stable.[105]

91. In our previous report we supported family group conferences as a mechanism for ensuring early engagement from the wider birth family, and we recommended its inclusion in a pre-proceedings protocol, with specific guidance on how such conferences should be conducted. We note the importance of ensuring that children are involved in family group conferences, and that their voices are heard, either directly or via an advocate[106]; we discuss the voice of the child in more detail in Chapter 5. Convening such a conference before a child enters care has the benefit of raising concerns about a child's care with the wider birth family, and enables the identification of possible family or friends carers at the earliest opportunity.

92. We are persuaded of the benefits of friends and family care as alternatives to local authority foster care, where a suitable carer is available. To avoid delay such carers should be identified as early as possible, ideally pre-proceedings.

93. We recommend that it should become normal practice where possible for local authorities to convene a family group conference, or similar arrangement, with family members and friends, before a child becomes looked-after, or as soon as possible after entry into care, to enable identification of alternative carers before any decision about the child's future has been made. It is essential that the child is involved either directly or via an advocate in such conferences.

Delays in matching children with prospective adopters

94. A further source of delay in adoption is the practice of waiting until after the placement order has been granted before commencing family finding. The reasons given for this are two-fold. Social workers spend time and money preparing prospective adopters and they therefore guard their list jealously.[107] They are unlikely for this reason to take one of their adopters off the list by matching them with a child whose legal status remains uncertain. In addition, there is concern about sharing a child's details with prospective adopters and possibly allowing them to form attachments, before that child is legally available.[108] There is also some suggestion that the courts have been reluctant to sanction early family finding, contributing to an overall delay.[109]

95. The concern about legal uncertainty appears unfounded—we were told that it is extremely rare for placement orders to be refused.[110] This is borne out by the figures: in 2011 only two placement orders were refused in county courts or family proceeding courts in England and Wales.[111]

96. The inertia about family finding before a placement order has been granted is compounded by the fact that there is in many cases poor communication between adoption teams and those working in child protection (which we discussed above at paragraph 76). Adoption social workers therefore have little advance notice of the children who may soon become available for adoption.

97. In our earlier report we commented on the need to begin family finding at an earlier stage in order to enable greater take-up of 'fostering for adoption'; we note that the new duty to consider a fostering for adoption placement before a decision on adoption has been made, as set out in clause 1 of the Children and Families Bill (see paragraphs 82-88), would require family finding to take place even sooner.

98. We reiterate the recommendation in our earlier report that it is vital for Directors of Children's Services to address the current practice among some local authorities of delaying family finding until a placement order has been granted.

Social work culture and practice

99. Sir Martin Narey, the Ministerial Adviser on Adoption, argued that the current child protection system remained "gripped by an unrealistic optimism about the capacity of deeply inadequate parents to change"[112] and that children were disadvantaged as a result of "the naïve optimism that paralyses the system."[113] The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) and the College of Social Work refuted the notion that social workers were governed by a culture of optimism, but they were clear about their statutory obligation under the Children Act 1989 to promote the upbringing of children within their birth families: "we have a duty as social workers to ensure that we give families the best chance."[114]

100. It was clear from much of the evidence that social workers are overburdened in terms of case-load but also by "managerial cultures" which combined to "prevent them from spending the time with the family and the children that they need to spend."[115] The Munro Review found that the demands of bureaucracy—of statutory guidance, targets and local rules—had become so extensive as to limit the capacity of practitioners and their managers to work directly with children, young people and their families.[116] A succession of high profile failings in child protection, including the cases of Victoria Climbié and baby Peter Connolly, had led to a "hugely risk-averse" culture.[117] As the Munro Review reported, successive Governments had responded to failures in child protection with more regulation and more proscription, leading to a "very defensive compliance culture"[118] in which social workers and their managers were "more concerned with pleasing Ofsted than meeting the best interests of a child."[119]

101. Professor Munro explained to us that a target-driven culture which focused explicitly on timescales risked losing focus on outcomes for the child.[120] Another issue frequently identified by witnesses, including BASW, was a "skills-gap" in front-line social work.[121] Social workers were described as "not sufficiently well-trained, well-supervised" to do their work, and in particular the detailed assessment work required for child protection cases.[122] This was attributed to some extent to the fact that experienced social workers, once promoted, ceased to be involved directly with families, and their expertise was therefore lost to the front-line. Others referred to social workers becoming "de-skilled" by the system.[123]

102. Detailed and high quality supervision of social workers was cited as an important part of good practice, and critical in ensuring that the child's best interests were met. BASW and the College of Social Work agreed that it was easy for social workers to be "drawn into families and you do need a supervisor standing outside saying 'Enough already. I think it is time to draw the line here'."[124]

103. The issues raised above have largely been addressed by Professor Munro's review of child protection. The recommendations included radically improving the knowledge and skills of social workers from initial training to continuing professional development, and encouraging social workers to draw on the latest research evidence to support their decision-making. There were also proposals for creating senior posts within local authorities which retain direct involvement with families. The Government has accepted all the recommendations of the Munro Review, with some provisos, and eight local authorities are trialling new approaches to assessing children in need. We welcome the review and the Government's response to it.

104. Social workers perform a vital role in protecting the most vulnerable children in society; the status, training and reward of social workers are therefore extremely important. We invite the Government to give this further consideration.

105. We support the findings of the Munro Review, in particular, the focus on improving the knowledge and skills of social workers and their supervision; and the proposal to retain experienced social workers in front-line services after promotion.

106. We were concerned throughout our inquiry that adoption was not sufficiently taught in social work undergraduate courses. Professor Munro concluded that there was not enough focus on children and family work in basic social work training.[125] Once qualified, social workers might have little experience of adoption, depending on the size of their local authority and the prominence which adoption is given by the management and leadership of the authority. But it is evident that social workers themselves recognise the gaps in their training. A survey of members by the College of Social Work revealed that many wanted more training on a range of subjects, including adoption.[126]

107. We recommend that social workers' training on adoption, alongside other forms of permanence, is strengthened. We also recommend that permanence planning, including adoption, becomes part of a post-qualifying specialism for social workers, with a particular emphasis on the importance of timely decision-making.

Improving the training and supervision of social workers will, of course, have cost implications. However, we believe that this is an area of work of such importance to society as a whole that under-resourcing it would be a false economy.

37 An Action Plan for Adoption: Tackling Delay, Department for Education, March 2012, paragraph 10 Back

38 See Box 2: Adoption (p.13) Back

39 Roger Bullock, written evidence Back

40 Safeguarding Children Across Services - Messages from Research, ed. Carolyn Davies and Harriet Ward, published by Jessica Kingsley, 2012, pp29-31: https://www.education.gov.uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/DFE-RR164.pdf Back

41 ibid. Back

42 ibid. Back

43 Q 838 Back

44 1^st Report of Session 2012-13, HL Paper 94. The report can be found at: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201213/ldselect/ldadopt/94/94.pdf Back

45 Social work assessment of children in need: what do we know? Messages from research, Danielle Turney, Dendy Platt, Julie Selwyn and Elaine Farmer, March 2011, ref DFE-RBX-10-08, p. 3 Back

46 Barnardo's, written evidence Back

47 After Adoption, Association of Directors of Children's Services (ADCS), Coram, NSPCC Back

48 Written evidence from After Adoption, Barnardo's, Birmingham City Council's Adoption Service, British Association of Social Workers (BASW), Bradford Metropolitan District Council, Coram, Fostering Network, Resolution, TACT Back