The Education and Adoption Bill 2015

In essence, the proposals are for rationalisation and regionalisation. The Adoption Leadership Board, chaired by Sir Martin Narey, has been leading the charge in improving the adoption situation. Some 5,000 children per year are being adopted, a substantial increase in recent times. The national adoption register has opened
up opportunities, and the time lapse between being taken into care and adoption has fallen.

Considerable public funds have gone into adoption, too: £200m has been provided to local authorities through the adoption reform grant, £17m
has been given to voluntary adoption agencies, and £19.3m for the Adoption Support
Fund, for therapeutic support.
At the same time, adopters and potential adopters are informed of their rights in assessment, entitlement to services, and priority in school admission. Court delays are reducing but are still seen as too long, despite the efforts of judges to fast-track adoptions.

Still, many problems remain. More and more children are coming into care, and some 3,000 are waiting for adoption. Ethnic minority, disabled, and older children are difficult to place, along with sibling groups. The system has been described as bureaucratic, time-consuming, fragmented, and inefficient. There are 180 adoption agencies in existence, though 20 local authorities manage less than ten adoptions per year, and ten manage less than 20. The real problem, though, is how to prevent the family breakdown
in the first place.

The Bill proposes to encourage, if need be by ministerial direction, local authorities to cooperate or to transfer their adoption functions to regional adoption agencies, such as recruitment, assessment, approval of adopters, decisions as to placement, and the provision of support services. Further, £45m will be made available for the process of transition, which could result in a culture change in the adoption process.

The advantages of the new system are claimed to be efficacy and effectiveness, the spread of best practice, a bigger pool of potential adopters, better opportunities for matching, a wider range of adoption support services, and a better use of available resources, generally.

The proposals have received support from the Association of Directors of Children’s Services and Adoption UK, but have also attracted some criticisms. These are that the criteria for direction to be applied by the minister are not prescribed in the Bill; the ‘last resort’ principle might be used too readily; the agencies might see adoption as an easy way out to reduce the number of children in care; and that those voluntary and innovative communities might be at risk of being swallowed up by big, faceless regional agencies. Let us not forget that organic growth and adaptation are usually preferable to imposition. SJ

Alec Samuels is a barrister and former reader at Southampton University