*Parents and Carers*

National Adoption Week – An Adopter’s view Part II

Who or what is helping traumatised children?

We are grateful for this second post about National Adoption Week from the perspective of an adopter. She queries why the only open and honest debate appears to be coming from adopters or adoptees. This is particularly so when talking about the impact of trauma upon children and their development. That the only intervention for traumatised adopted children appears to be to put them in section 20 accommodation is a ‘national disgrace’. 

I have spent a little too much time reading, listening and watching the coverage of National Adoption Week 2015. I was hoping for a bit more honesty than previous years. I am not at all surprised but am saddened that we really are having the same old tripe being spurted out by those who should know better.

The only honest, open, truly adoption focussed reality checks have come from adopters or adoptees.

We have seen this years strapline emblazoned on some important buildings in a few cities
`Too old at 4’. What the strapline or the hype don’t mention in a realistic way, is the level of trauma those children have suffered or the fight that adoptive parents will have to get them the help and support needed to live with that trauma.

A report published in 2014 ‘Beyond the Adoption Order’ gives a very detailed description of the difficulties.

Children who have suffered trauma – who promotes their ‘best interests?’

In this guest blog, I want to tell you about what can happen when those that should know better do not act in ‘our’ children’s best interests. When I use the term ‘our’ I am talking about adopted children who have, in reality, if not law, two families.

Our children’s trauma usually takes a while to surface, often years and often during the turbulent teens. There will have been a few signs during primary school days for many. Our children will struggle with friendships, with the structure of the school day. They will get far more than their fair share of fixed term exclusions and even permanent exclusions before anyone in local authority education depts will agree to assess them for an education, health and care plans.

The evidence is clear that children in care do not fair well in comparison to their peers and yet adopters struggle to get those in education to believe that our children will suffer the same , if not more, difficulties. We have been able to access the pupil premium over the last few years and we know how it should be spent to help our children. Sadly this doesn’t happen in most local authorities because our children do not have a right to have their education overseen by a virtual school head teacher like children in care do.

If our young people get through the education system, they may not be so lucky in the way their sometimes fragile mental and emotional health is concerned.

The failure of CAMHS Teams and the disgrace of long term section 20 accommodation

Despite their early maltreatment and unresolved trauma, many Child and Adolescent Mental Health (Camhs) teams fail to address the mental health of our children. Adopted children got a mention in an overview of current Camhs provision and their particular difficulties have very recently been the subject of a roundtable discussion.

Social care are often no better than education or health. Adopters have something that birth families, special guardians or kinship carers don’t. We have access to post adoption support social workers. Like many services nationwide, those services vary in quality. The good ones come into their own when our children start to live their trauma out in the here and now. The children make allegations of abuse against their adoptive parents. Thankfully, many of the allegations are false and in a tiny amount of cases where they are found to be true, we all need to know that those children will be kept safe.

However, the majority of allegations are false. We know why our children make allegations but childcare social workers have little experience of traumatised children who are now safe with their adoptive families , safe enough for the trauma of their past to leak everywhere.

Sometimes that trauma shows itself in the violence that our children perpetrate against us, their parents, to their siblings, their friends or even to animals. They can also turn the violence to themselves, taking risks that belie the range of normal teenage risk taking or self harming.
At this point in their lives, many of our children will become `looked after` for the second time in their lives. They will be voluntarily accommodated under Section 20 of the Children’s Act.

For many of our children, they will remain in the care of the local authority under S20 until adulthood. This is a national disgrace. That a maltreated child, removed from their birth family for all the right reasons, does not get the help they and their adoptive families need to resolve (or at least come to terms with) their trauma, is unforgivable in a civilised society.

My message throughout NAW was that children and young people must always be at the core of everything that is done in their name. Those who have returned to care are no different.

‘OUR’ Kids must always be the priority.

National Adoption Week – An adopter’s view

We are grateful for this post from an adoptive parent, who calls for an end to the distorting rhetoric about adoption; without honest and open discussion of what is gained and lost through adoption, we risk losing focus on what should be the fundamental core of all our endeavours here –  the children and what they need.

During National Adoption Week, as a society, will we be able to finally have the conversation we urgently need? Or will rhetoric and political agendas continue to stifle that debate?

I have come to understand that adoption is more about loss than gain

Today is the start of National Adoption Week (NAW) when Adoption Agencies (on behalf of the Government) want and need to inform the public about how their country needs them. Not to go to war but to parent children and young people through adoption when nothing else will do

I am an adopter. I have a few problems with National Adoption Week. I probably shouldn’t because I can recall seeing some daytime tv 16yrs ago and thinking – `yep, that is what we need to do.’ Hubby and I would make good parents and if children need a forever family, that can and should be us.

Over the years that followed that day, I have come to understand that modern adoption is more about loss than gain. I hope you will understand why I think that by the end of this week.

I am a member of a peer support group for the parents of traumatised adopted children and young people. Trauma is a term we think best describes the losses our children have lived with. It describes their loss of birth family, identity, childhoods where they had rights to be kept safe, physically and psychologically.

A few weeks ago a few of us attended the first Family Law Class open to all . It was a good class. We were well aware that ‘our’ children’s birth families could be sat next to us and that was ok. It was ok because we know about their loss, their difficulties with communicating and dealing with professionals at an immensely difficult time in their lives. We know because a minority of experienced adopters go through the same experience with social services as many struggling birth parents. I will talk about that later this week.

Today I want to talk about what I feel is often unsaid during NAW, about birth parents, adopters and ‘our’ children.

The elephant in the room – what will happen if my child’s birth parents didn’t harm them after all?

Those professionals and interested adopters will know that the answer to the question is – probably nothing. The circumstances under which any Judge will reverse a decision involving an Adoption Order (certainly after some time has elapsed) are very rare.

But experienced adopters are well aware of the miscarriages of justice that have happened in the UK. I speak for many adopters who feel that these miscarriages of justice are a travesty. A child and maybe their siblings will have lost their birth parents, each other and everything they hold dear. They may be moved from pillar to post within the care system, being sent to live with strangers and one day, will have to learn that none of that should have happened. Such a loss can never really be put into words can it?

Adopters feel for birth parents where miscarriages of justice have happened. We have genuine empathy for them and hope that agencies (& if necessary the courts) do everything in their power to ensure that those children, birth parents and adoptive families are enabled to build a mutually rewarding relationship in the future. It can be done, I am sure of it. Society needs it to be so.

But what of those children and young people that were rightly removed from their birth parents?

People approved for adoption will have been told and will have read reports written by social services about the children’s life with birth parents. We will have been told that the children need a new `forever` family because birth parents are not able to safeguard them. The birth parents are deemed by all in authority to not be `good enough parents’.  This is my first problem with NAW.

NAW will have you, the person wanting to be a parent, believing that that is absolutely the case. It may well be, but I have been concerned for a number of years that it isn’t that simple.
Prospective adopters need to believe that for `our` children to have been placed for adoption, their birth families must not have been ‘good enough’ to do the job. Parents need to keep the children safe, not to abuse or neglect them, to put the children’s needs above their own. Parenting isn’t just about loving them. Social services are meant to prove that to be the case. Family law courts are supposed to ensure that that is the case before they agree to a placement order and thereafter an adoption order. Adopters need to believe that social services have also ruled out that other forms of permanence would not be in their child’s best interest too.

We will be led to believe that some birth parents should either never have direct contact (I prefer to say `have a relationship with`), or should absolutely have a relationship. We need to know that all the decisions made in relation to `our` children are made with the best of intentions.

We adopters need to know these things because contrary to some rhetoric, adopters do not want to steal children, we are not a market of middle class do gooders or people that need to have a child as a fashion accessory. We are not the reason that children need to be removed from the otherwise loving caring homes any more than the government have `targets` for removing children to support some black market.

We are just people who know we can give love, nurture and care to traumatised children and young people. We can and do put our children’s needs above our own.

My message throughout NAW is that children and young people must always be at the core of everything that is done in their name.

`OUR’ kids must always be the priority.

The LA tell me my child should be in foster care

What is foster care?

Under the Children Act 1989 section 22C, if a LA is ‘looking after’ a child – i.e. that child is either subject to a care order or the parents have agreed the LA should find the child a home under section 20 of the Children Act – the LA must arrange for the child to live with either:

  • a parent;
  • someone who has parental responsibility
  • or someone who has a child arrangements order that states the child should live with him or her.

BUT if that isn’t possible, either because it is not ‘reasonably practicable’ OR would not be consistent with the child’s welfare then the LA must put the child in ‘the most appropriate placement available’ (see section 22C(5). These ‘appropriate placements’ are  listed as:

  • placement with a person who is a relative or friend or otherwise connected with the child and who is also a LA foster parent
  • placement with a LA foster parent
  • placement in a children’s home
  • any other placement which complies with regulations.

 

LA Foster Placements

Under the Children Act 1989 Section 22C(6), one option for a ‘looked after’ child is to go to a LA foster parent. A LA foster parent is defined as a person who is approved under regulations made by virtue of paragraph 12F of Schedule 2 of the Children Act 1989.

These regulations in England governing such placements are the Fostering Services (England) Regulations 20112 as supplemented by the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010.

Therefore, the LA may only place a child with a foster carer if the foster carer has been approved in accordance with the regulations, and the foster carer has entered into a foster care agreement either with the LA or with another fostering service provider.

The LA must continue to monitor the child’s welfare and visit the child at the foster home.
Emergency and temporary placements with LA foster parents may only be made in accordance with and for the time specified in the regulations.

Ending a foster placement

A LA which has arranged the placement of a child must not end the placement without carrying out a review,  unless there is an immediate risk of significant harm to the child or the placement must end to protect the child or others from serious injury.

Duty of LA to promote contact with child in foster care

If the child is subject to a care order then the LA must provide ‘reasonable contact’ under section 34 of the Children Act 1989. If the parents have agreed to the foster placement, the LA has a duty to promote contact between the child, parents and other connected people unless this would not ‘reasonably practicable’ or not in the child’s best interests. Parents also have a duty to keep the LA informed about where they are living. See further Schedule 2 para 15 of the Children Act 1989.

Private Fostering

A ‘privately fostered child’ for the purposes of the Children Act 1989 section 66 is a child who is under the age of 16 years and who is cared for, and provided with accommodation in their own home, by someone other than:

  • a parent
  • a person who is not a parent but who has parental responsibility
  • a relative.

A child is not a privately fostered child while he is being looked after by the local authority or if the person caring for and accommodating him has done so for less than 28 days and does not intend to do so for any longer.

There is also a detailed list of exemptions to the definition at the Children Act 1989 Sch 8 paras 1-5. In the case of a child who is disabled, the definition extends to a child who is under the age of 18 years.

Private fostering is regulated by Part IX of the Children Act 1989. The LA are under a duty under section 67 of the Children Act to make sure that children in their area who are privately fostered are being properly looked after. Some people are disqualified from being private fosterers, for e.g. those people convicted of certain criminal offences. You will need to get written permission from the LA to be a private foster carer in these circumstances.

If you want to foster a child privately must give written notice to the LA of the proposal at least six weeks before the private fostering arrangement is to begin. Where the private fostering arrangement is to begin within six weeks, the LA must be informed immediately.

 

Further reading

See our post on the differences between adoption and fostering.

For the duties of a LA towards a child in foster care, and children who have been in foster care see section 22 – 24D of the Children Act. Generally, the LA should provide accommodation, pay for the child’s upkeep, visit the child in placement and provide ‘personal advisers’ and ‘pathway plans’ for children to ease the transition from foster care to independent living.

Has the child’s welfare pendulum swung too far – are Parents’ rights disregarded?

We are grateful for this guest post by contributor and parent Maya Birdwood-Hedger.

The current state of the law is probably best summed up by Re B (A child) [2009] UKSC . In summary, the court held that it is only as a contributor to the child’s welfare that parenthood assumes any significance. Have we gone too far in our focus on the welfare of the child and the child alone as the issue of paramount concern? Can the interests of parents and children be so easily distinguished?

Introduction – what is meant by parental rights and responsibility?

Lord Steyn, writing extra-judicially, said: “A constitutional democracy must protect fundamental rights. It is morally right that the state, and all who act on its behalf in a broad functional sense, should respect the fundamental rights of individuals. Without such a moral compass the state is bound to treat individuals arbitrarily and unjustly.” [Lord Steyn – quoted in Brayne and Carr. Law for social workers/ 10th edition/ Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008, 75]
Bainham and Gilmore ask two separate (albeit connected) questions:

  • is it possible to identify independent interests which parents have in relation to their children?
  • If so, should the law recognise and accommodate these? [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 328]

To answer the first question, they quote philosopher David Archard:

Being a parent is extremely important to a person. Even if a child is not thought of as the property or even an extension of the parent, the shared life of a parent and child involves an adult’s purposes and aims at the deepest level… parents have an interest in parenting – that is, in sharing a life with, and directing the development of their child. It is not enough to discount the interests of a parent in a moral theory of parenthood. What must merit full and proper consideration is the interest of someone in being a parent.[ Archard/ Children, Family and the State/ Ashgate 2003, 94]

Although the second question is more difficult to answer, given the current commitment of the law to the welfare of children, Bainham and Gilmore say that there are at least two good reasons why the law should recognise the interests of parents:

  • once parentage is established, very wide-ranging and extensive burdens are placed by the law on the parents – financial, emotional and practical. Moreover, these responsibilities last for 18 years and longer than that if more than one child is involved.
  • Secondly, the law needs to reflect the reality of everyday life.

The honest position is that parents do not, and are not required, to act at all times with their children’s interests paramount in their minds. It would be far better for this to be transparently and openly acknowledged rather than to act out a pretence that only children’s interests count.[ Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 329-330]

Herring distinguishes three different forms of parental rights:

  • Parents’ human rights, the rights that parents have as human beings, e.g. a right to free speech. These rights include those protected by the Human Rights Act 1988.
  • Parents’ child-centred rights. These are the rights that are given to parents in order to carry out their parental obligations, e.g. to clothe, feed and house the child.
  • Parents’ parent-central rights. Here Herring refers to law professor and author Alexander McCall Smith who explains that parent-centred rights are given to parents not specifically to further the welfare of the child but to reflect the interests that parents have in bringing up their children in the way they wish. An example of this may be religious upbringing. Here it may be impossible to prove that one particular form of religious upbringing promotes a child’s welfare better than any other or no religious upbringing. The right of a parent to involve their child in religious practices does not necessarily reflect the welfare of a child, but rather promotes the interests of the parent to raise the child in accordance with the parent’s religious beliefs. These parent-centred rights could be said to further society’s interests as well in that children are brought up to have different beliefs, interests and lifestyles, thus contributing to a culturally diverse and rich society[Herring, Jonathan / Family Law/ London: Routledge, 2012, 145; McCall Smith, Alexander (1990). Is anything left of parental rights? In Sutherland and McCall Smith Family Rights: Family Law and Medical Ethics/ Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.]

Historic developments

As Sawyer explains, “children were historically useful as labour or as a source of income by being hired elsewhere” [Sawyer, Caroline/ Children’s Representation by Their Parents/ in Responsible Parents and Parental Responsibility/ Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2009: 228] but gradually a growing perception that parents did not always know or do what was good for their children did lead to the idea of children having their own place in the legal process.

According to Hendrick (2005), the Children Act 1948 heralded a new approach to parent-child relationships, which encouraged the newly established Children’s Departments “to view children with individual human beings with both shared and individualised needs, rather than an indistinct mass.” Thereafter the parents did not formally appear during care proceedings, but effectively exercised their legal right of representing their children in the proceedings. Soon after the Adoption Act 1949 allowed adopting children without their parents’ consent on the basis that the parents were unreasonably withholding their consent. [Adoption of Children Act 1949, s.3 (1)]

The further shift appears to have happened with the death of Maria Colwell in 1973: her mother and stepfather successfully argued she should return home to them, and then the stepfather killed her. Following that case, section 64 of the Children Act 1975 provided that children in care would be represented by professional Guardians ad Litem – trained social workers. Further on, the 1989 Children Act provided that the court should appoint a guardian ad litem for the child in all “specified” (broadly speaking, public law) proceedings unless it was satisfied that the child’s welfare would be adequately safeguarded without one [Children Act 1989, s 41].

The duty of the social worker to balance between children’s and parents’ rights was established even more firmly in the report by Martin Narey for the Times newspaper: it was proposed to give greater prominence to adoption in social work training so that social workers’ role is seen as unequivocally that of protector of the child rather than friend of the family [The Narey Report on Adoption: Our Blueprint for Britain’s Lost Children. /The Times. July 5, 2011.]

The Children Act 1989

There is recognition that The Children Act 1989 represents the philosophy of its time, i.e. it “ostensibly put the child at the centre of all proceedings about the family”. [Sawyer, Caroline/ Children’s Representation by Their Parents/ in Responsible Parents and Parental Responsibility Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2009: 228.]

Section 1(1) of the Children Act provides that “the child’s welfare shall be the court’s paramount consideration.” Bainham and Gilmore question if paramountcy can actually survive the Human Rights Act 1988. [EDIT – It has: see this article by Claire Fenton Glynn] They reiterate that adult rights to respect for private and family life must be respected and must not be interfered with unless the specific justifications envisaged by Article 8(2) exist and only when they are necessary and proportionate to a legitimate aim. [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 62-63]

Below we will consider some situations where courts can interfere in family life.

Private law orders

According to Wallbank (who used the 2004 data), only 10% of parents sought help from the courts to resolve issues regarding post-separation arrangements concerning children. [Wallbank, Julie/ Parental Responsibility and the Responsible Parent: Managing the ‘Problem’ of Contact/ in Responsible Parents and Parental Responsibility Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2009: 304] The numbers may have plummeted further, following the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 removing legal aid for most private law cases. [Baksi, Catherine/ Family lawyers sound alarm on separating parents/ The Law Society Gazette, 14.08.14]

Section 8 of the Children Act 1989 sets out and defines three orders, known as “s 8 orders” and regulating the exercise of particular aspects of parental responsibility while leaving parental responsibility itself intact. The “child arrangements order” replaces the old ‘residence’ and ‘contact’ orders following the 2014 Children and Families Act. This allows the courts to address the practicalities of with whom the children will live or have contact. A “prohibited steps order” allows the court to prohibit the exercise of certain aspects of parental responsibility while a “specific issue order” to determine a specific question.

Section 11 of the Children and Families Act 2014 provides a presumption that the involvement of a parent in a child’s life will further the child’s welfare, unless the contrary is shown. ‘Involvement’ means ‘involvement of some kind, either direct or indirect, but not any particular division of the child’s time’ [CFA 2014 s 11(2)(2B)]

The extent to which the legal system should promote shared parenting has been the subject of considerable debate. Fathers’ rights organisations have been campaigning against the “social catastrophe” of fathers not being allowed access to their children. [Fathers4Justice campaigner jailed for defacing Queen’s portrait. The Guardian, 05.02.14] There is, however, some evidence that shared parenting may be an independent risk factor for younger children as well as those who become caught between parents in high conflict. [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 224.]

 

Commonly used orders in public law

This section looks at the range of orders the court can make in the course of care proceedings.

Emergency protection order

Under this order the court may remove a child from the household if there is reasonable cause to believe that the child is likely to suffer significant harm if—

(a) (i) He is not removed to accommodation provided by or on behalf of the applicant; or

(ii) He does not remain in the place in which he is then being accommodated;

(b) (In the case of an application made by a local authority—

(i) Enquiries are being made with respect to the child under section 47(1) (b); and

(ii) Those enquiries are being frustrated by access to the child being unreasonably refused to a person authorised to seek access and that the applicant has reasonable cause to believe that access to the child is required as a matter of urgency. [Children Act 1989, 44(1)]

In X Council v B (Emergency Protection Orders) [2004] EWHC 2015 (Fam), [2005] 1 FLR 342 Munby J (as he then was) reiterated the stringent nature of the obligation on the local authority when considering protective measures to comply with the obligation for procedural fairness and to respect the Article 8 right of the family generally and the parents in particular. The guidelines are that “save in wholly exceptional cases, parents must be given adequate prior notice of the date, time and place of any application by a local authority for an EPO. [X Council v B (Emergency Protection Orders) [2004] EWHC 2015 (Fam), [2005] 1 FLR 342]

Care and Supervision Orders

On the application of the Local Authority or the NSPCC the court can consider making either order if the provisions of section 31 of the Children Act 1989 are made out. This requires the judge to be satisfied that a child has suffered or is at risk of significant harm. Under the Care Order the Local Authority obtains parental responsibility for the child. [Children Act 1989, 33 (3)] Although de jure the parents also retain parental responsibility, in reality it allows them little more than the right of consultation.

While a supervision order is in place, it allows the Local Authority “to advise, assist and befriend the supervised child”. [Ibid. 35 (1) (a)] However, if the parents refuse to comply with the supervision order, the Local Authority is likely to apply for a care order, even if the parents maintain that they are capable to look after their children without supervision or support. That becomes apparent in the judgement by Mrs Justice Parker:

Throughout these proceedings it has been the father’s view that he can cope; he can be trusted; in deciding to make sure the support is there. He is opposed to the role of the local authority; and he says that their anxiety to check that all is well with the children is misplaced because it is totally unnecessary. But the local authority has statutory duties in respect of all children in need and particularly children who are the subject of proceedings. [Hertfordshire County Council v F & Others [2014] EWHC 2159 (Fam) (23 May 2014), para 9]

In this case the application to remove the child was made because the Local Authority was concerned about the father preventing them from supervising the child. One can then argue that the needs of the child to be supervised by the Local Authority were viewed by the court as superior to the parents’ right to care for their own children.

In the case above the child was placed in the care of the Local Authority. The family then had another baby who was taken into care on the interim care order shortly after birth. The father was later criticised by the judge for not having given the baby a first name. The judge believed it was emotionally harmful not to give a child a name. The father is this case is a British Indian and a devout Hindu. The parents were anxious to have their child named according to Hindu tradition, which involves a temple ceremony, Namakarana, which only the parents, close family and friends can attend. But the social workers insisted that they be present, lest the family “abduct” the child. [Booker, Christopher. The real story of the ‘baby with no name’/ In The Telegraph, 31.05.14]

Here one can see an apparent conflict between the rights of the parents and the rights of the child: the child has a right to be named. The parents have the parental duty to name their child, but also the right to name him in a ceremony, compatible with their religious and cultural beliefs. In this case they were not allowed to exercise that right, but the judge was more concerned with their failure to fulfil their parental responsibility.

The Placement Order

This order allows the Local Authority to place a child for adoption with potential adopters chosen by them. After the placement order is made, the Local Authority will implement a gradual reduction in contact between the parents and the child. Once a placement has been identified, the birth parents will usually be offered a final contact with the child, sometimes euphemistically described as a “wishing you well” contact and sometimes more accurately described as a “goodbye” contact. The majority of parents can expect no more than “letterbox” contact once the child has been placed. [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 677.]

The “goodbye” contact is understandably traumatising to both parents and children, but, when the parents cry, they can get criticised for “emotional abuse”. [Craig, Olga. Stolen by the state: A story of love and loss that’ll make you seethe – a mother falsely accused of abuse reveals her relentless hunt for her three babies. In the Mail on Sunday, 06.06.15]

Once the child has been placed with the prospective adopters and lived there for at least ten weeks, they can apply for the Adoption Order to be made. One of three conditions under section 47 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 must be satisfied before the court may make an adoption order.

The first condition is that, in the case of each parent or guardian of the child, the court is satisfied—
(a) that the parent or guardian consents to the making of the adoption order,
(b) that the parent or guardian has consented under section 20 (and has not withdrawn the consent) and does not oppose the making of the adoption order, or
(c) That the parent’s or guardian’s consent should be dispensed with.
(3)A parent or guardian may not oppose the making of an adoption order under subsection (2) (b) without the court’s leave.

(4)The second condition is that—
(a) the child has been placed for adoption by an adoption agency with the prospective adopters in whose favour the order is proposed to be made,
(b) Either—
(i) the child was placed for adoption with the consent of each parent or guardian and the consent of the mother was given when the child was at least six weeks old, or
(ii) The child was placed for adoption under a placement order, and
(d) No parent or guardian opposes the making of the adoption order.

The question of dispensing with parental consent has been at the heart of the conflict between what professionals view as “the best interests of the child” and the fundamental rights attached to the relationship of parent and child. While parents might understand that they are unable to look after a child themselves and may be prepared to have the child looked after by other people, they might not be willing to accept the complete termination of their legal relationship with the child. Traditionally English law has viewed this as a question which involves the rights of parents and has made provisions, through the statutory consent requirements, for the proper accommodation of those rights. The major change brought about by the 2002 Act is that the welfare of the child has, controversially, been put centre stage. This has led to legitimate concerns about what has happened to the rights of parents and may give rise to challenges under the ECHR. [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 688.]

Section 52 (1) of the Adoption Act 2002 has abolished all the previous grounds for dispensing with parental consent except for one and has replaced them with the welfare principle:
The court cannot dispense with the consent of any parent or guardian of a child to the child being placed for adoption or to the making of an adoption order in respect of the child unless the court is satisfied that—

  • the parent or guardian cannot be found or is incapable of giving consent, or
  • the welfare of the child requires the consent to be dispensed with.

The second condition is now the major ground for dispensing with parental consent. It raises the serious question of what weight, if any, is to be given to parental interests or rights in preserving their legal relationship with the child. It becomes clear that if the court’s view is that adoption is in the child’s best interests, then whether or not the parent is behaving reasonably in objecting to this will have no bearing on the decision. [Bainham and Gilmore/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013, 689]

When a parent endeavours to oppose the making of the adoption order at that stage, they have to clear three fences which can be seen to be progressively higher fences. The first is to establish the necessary change of circumstances. The second is then to satisfy the court that, in the exercise of discretion, it would be right to grant permission. The third and final stage would of course be to persuade the court at the opposed hearing to refuse the adoption order and to reverse the direction in which the child’s life has travelled since the inception of the original public law care proceedings. [Borough of Poole v W & another [2014] EWHC 1777 (Fam), para 8]

In paragraph 24 of the judgement quoted above the judge recognised that the parents had demonstrated “a commitment to the child which entitles them to have their wishes and feelings considered” yet was concerned whether the child in question would “survive the process of rehabilitation” to her parents’ care. On balance, the judge decided to make the adoption order, concluding:

In making the order which, in my judgment, promotes the welfare of SR, I fully recognise the grief of the parents who do not share my view and I recognise that I have no comfort to offer them, beyond letterbox contact. If ever an example was needed of how legitimate and heartfelt aspirations of parents can be trumped by the welfare needs of the child, this surely is it.

Adoption order

Section 67 (1) of the Adoption Act 2002 provides that “an adopted person is to be treated in law as the child of the adopters or adopter”. Adoption thus terminates existing parental responsibility and transfers it to the adoptive parents; it also terminates the very legal relationship of parent and child. The effect of adoption was recently described by a Supreme Court Judge Lord Wilson as “an act of surgery which cuts deep into the hearts and minds of at least four people and which will affect them, to a greater or lesser extent, every day of their lives” (Wilson, 2014, 19 Denning Society Lecture at Lincoln’s Inn: Adoption: Complexities beyond the Law, 13 November 2014, The Supreme Court)

As the purpose of adoption is to effect a permanent change of family, the making of an adoption order is seen as final, and it is thus very rare for an adoption order to be put aside, even where natural parents have suffered a serious injustice. In Webster v Norfolk County Council and the Children/ by Their Children’s Guardian [Webster v Norfolk County Council and the Children/ by Their Children’s Guardian [2009] EWCA Civ 59] three children were adopted without parental consent because of what was thought to be non-accidental injury to one of the children who had suffered fractures. Later on expert evidence suggested that the fractures had been caused by a rare case of scurvy as a result of the child’s diet which had been recommended by doctors.

The Court of Appeal refused the parents leave to appeal out of time to have the adoptions set aside, having regard to the public policy considerations regarding adoptions as well as interests of the children: they were settled with their adoptive parents. The adoptive parents argued that overturning the adoptions would “cause enormous stress, anxiety, disruption and emotional / psychological harm, particularly to the children” (para 92).

Wilson LJ concluded that it was too late to set aside the adoption orders, considering the interests of the children: “almost four years ago they moved into alternative homes which they were told would be permanent and of which they would be full, legal members; and at that time they ceased even to see the applicants.” (para 204). Thus, the interests of the children prevailed to the extent that the Court effectively decided to leave the children in their “alternative homes”. The parents, on the other hand, are determined to remain living in the same house until their children are old enough to come and find them. “When she knocks on our door, we will be here with all the love and the kisses and the memories and hugs that we have all missed. I pray for that every night”, the mother said in a recent newspaper interview. [Craig, Olga. Stolen by the state: A story of love and loss that’ll make you seethe – a mother falsely accused of abuse reveals her relentless hunt for her three babies. In the Mail on Sunday, 06.06.15]

The Children and Families Act 2014

The Children and Families Act 2014 came into force in April last year. Most practitioners agree that its main reform was at section 14, to introduce a time limit of 26 weeks for care and supervision proceedings, although the court can extend that period, but “only if the court considers that the extension is necessary to enable the court to resolve the proceedings justly”. The main reason for the reform was the view that delays in care and supervision proceedings were harmful to children. “These family justice reforms put children clearly at the heart of the family justice system and focus on children’s needs rather than what parents see as their own ‘rights’”, announced Simon Hughes, the then Justice Minister. [Family Justice Reforms to Benefit Children – Press release – GOV.UK/ 22.04.14].

Many judges, on the other hand, are concerned that the imposed time limit could be in conflict with the court’s aim to determine the right outcome in the proceedings: “Where the proposal before the court is for non-consensual adoption, the issues are too grave, the stakes for all are too high, for the outcome to be determined by rigorous adherence to an inflexible timetable and justice thereby potentially denied.” [Re B-S (Children) [2013] EWCA Civ 1146, para 49]

Concern about the time limit has been expressed by other professionals: for example, a study by the Family Drug and Alcohol Court (FDAC) concluded:

The government’s agenda for adoption reform places emphasis on speeding up decisions and action in placing babies and young children with potential adoptive parents. When combined with the push to complete care proceedings within 26 weeks, and the research evidence about the fragility of reunification in some circumstances, this could serve to heighten doubts about the value of FDAC’s focus on supporting reunification in cases where that is appropriate. [Hayes, Derren. 26-week target ‘could limit help for substance misusing parents’  [Children & Young People Now, 01.05.14]

Reporting restrictions and transparency – a glimmer of hope?

There are long-standing and well-established “automatic restraints” on the publication of information relating to proceedings under the Children Act 1989. Section 97 of the Act provides that:
(2) No person shall publish [F3to the public at large or any section of the public] any material which is intended, or likely, to identify
(a) any child as being involved in any proceedings before [F4the High Court, a county court or] a magistrates’ court in which any power under this Act [F2or the Adoption and Children Act 2002] may be exercised by the court with respect to that or any other child; or
(b) An address or school as being that of a child involved in any such proceedings.

In addition to the “automatic restraints” courts can make injunctions preventing parents from discussing their legal cases with other parties even after the proceedings have been completed. However, parents who have lost confidence in the English family court system often turn to other organisations for support. A potential conflict thus arises between the parents’ rights for free speech and the child’s life to a private life, and numerous authorities have grappled with this issue in recent times. For example, in November 2014 the EU parliament’s Petitions Committee condemned “unacceptable” moves to pressure people from giving evidence to MEPs at a time when most complaints about forced adoption or the unjust loss of children to social services are coming from Britain. “In my experience, the UK is unique in Europe for the secrecy of its family courts and for the threats and bullying by authorities of parents who want to speak out about their treatment,” said Tatiana Zdanoka, a Latvian MEP [Waterfield, Parents fight British social services ‘gag’ to petition European Parliament. In The Telegraph, 12.11.14]

In Re J  [Re J (A Child) [2013] EWHC 2694 (Fam)] the father of four children, all of whom had been the subject of care proceedings, posted a film of the execution of the emergency protection order in respect of his youngest child. The film was shared on Facebook and YouTube. The issue for the court was whether or not there was justification for extending J’s anonymity after the care proceedings were over. The President of the Family Division agreed that the case raised “important questions about the extent to which the public should be able to read and see what disgruntled parents say when they speak out about what they see as deficiencies in the family justice system”. He made an order contra mundum, but the restriction was only against the publication of J’s name, not his image, largely because internet viewers are unlikely to be able to identify a one day old baby.

The President expressed his view at paragraph 71 of his judgment:

The father wishes to share such information with others and, so long as he keeps within the confines of section 12 of the 1960 Act, why should he not be able to do so? And why should those who may wish to hear his views not be permitted to approach him?

Conclusion

Having considered orders frequently made in private and public law, it is my view that parents’ rights are often disregarded in favour of children’s rights.

Choudhry and Herring attempt to answer the question: why is it that children’s interests should be seen as being particularly important as compared to the interests of an adult? They suggest that an order which is interfering in a child’s right to private or family life is likely to be “far more of a blight” than an identical order on an adult’s life. This is because the child is less equipped to deal with setbacks in their interests and life changes. They lack practical possibilities of remaking life plans, experience, maturity and even intelligence to develop alternatives. Moving them from a place where they have an established set of friends would be particularly disturbing for a child. [Choudhry and Herring/ European Human Rights and Family Law/ Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2010, 234.]

This is, of course, true – but the result of the current policy of intervention is exactly that: many children are moved from their homes, parents, friends, siblings. Two younger children in the Webster family, for example, have never even met their siblings.

At a Multi-Disciplinary Conference “Is the child protection system fit for purpose?” (01.06.2015) recently retired High Court Judge Sir Mark Hedley suggested that children who have been removed from their parents may grow up and challenge the Local Authority: “What have you done to keep me in my family?”

Bibliography

Books:
Bainham, Andrew, and Gilmore, Stephen/ Children – the Modern Law/ Fourth edition/ Bristol: Jordan Publishing Limited, 2013.
Choudhry, Shazia and Herring, Jonathan (2010)/ European Human Rights and Family Law/ Oxford: Hart Publishing
Gilbert, Neil; Parton, Nigel and Skivens, Marit/ Child Protection Systems: International Trades and Orientations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Hendrick, Judith (2005.) Law and Ethics in Nursing and Health Care/ New York: Nelson Thornes Ltd.
Herring, Jonathan (2012.) Family Law/ London: Routledge.
McCall Smith, Alexander (1990). Is anything left of parental rights? In Sutherland and McCall Smith Family Rights: Family Law and Medical Ethics/ Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Sawyer, Caroline (2009.) Children’s Representation by Their Parents/ in Responsible Parents and Parental Responsibility. Oxford: Hart Publishing, 215-235.

Periodical articles:

Baksi, Catherine/ Family lawyers sound alarm on separating parents/ The Law Society Gazette, 14.08.14

Booker, Christopher. The real story of the ‘baby with no name’/ In the Telegraph, 31.05.14

Craig, Olga. Stolen by the state: A story of love and loss that’ll make you seethe – a mother falsely accused of abuse reveals her relentless hunt for her three babies. In the Mail on Sunday, 06.06.15

Family Justice Reforms to Benefit Children – Press release – GOV.UK/ 22.04.14

Fathers4Justice campaigner jailed for defacing Queen’s portrait. The Guardian, 05.02.14

Hayes, Derren. 26-week target ‘could limit help for substance misusing parents’ | Children &
Young People Now, 01.05.14

Lord Wilson gives the Denning Society Lecture at Lincoln’s Inn: Adoption: Complexities beyond the Law, 13 November 2014, The Supreme Court.

The Narey Report on Adoption: Our Blueprint for Britain’s Lost Children. /The Times. July 5, 2011

Waterfield, Bruno (2014.) Parents fight British social services ‘gag’ to petition European Parliament. In The Telegraph, 12.11.14

Statutes:

Adoption Act 2002
The Children Act 1989
The Children and Families Act 2014

Cases:

Borough of Poole v W & another [2014] EWHC 1777 (Fam)
Hertfordshire County Council v F & Others [2014] EWHC 2159 (Fam) (23 May 2014
Re B-S (Children) [2013] EWCA Civ 1146
Re J (A Child) [2013] EWHC 2694 (Fam)
Webster v Norfolk County Council and the Children/ by Their Children’s Guardian [2009] EWCA Civ 59
X Council v B (Emergency Protection Orders) [2004] EWHC 2015 (Fam), [2005] 1 FLR 342

The impact on parents when their children are removed

This is a contribution from a mother who wishes to be anonymous.

What happens to the mother?

The first night I walked, literally just kept walking for hours. I wanted to die.

This is a personal story of instant removal of my children. It is a snapshot, with some details left out to protect the children’s identity. I wanted to write it mainly for other mothers to relate to, but also that professionals may increase their understanding of the effect of removal on a parent.

 

Initial impact

What you would expect, if you have ever seen a distraught mother wailing waiting to see if their child gets pulled out of the rubble of a collapsed building, it was the same level of emotion. The first night I walked, literally just kept walking for hours. I wanted to die.

Why?

When a baby grows within you , you develop a relationship with him or her before they are born. You talk to them, you touch them as a they wriggle around, you get to know them.

When my children were born I was blessed enough to have instant love for them alongside with the need to nurture. For me, it had to be give birth then feed, it was what came naturally. I could not take my eyes off the baby.

When my children were taken this need I had to nurture was disregarded, the bond between myself and my children was hacked through and I could not keep them safe. Apart from the devastation it actually appears so surreal that you can not think straight and get the necessary help, for instance I did not contact a solicitor. My sleep was disturbed, I either did not get to sleep or woke in the middle of the night. I had the most horrrendous nightmares mainly about the children being in danger and not being able to help. I struggled to eat or concentrate. Privately I cried ,screamed, swore. I walked around with my head down. Nobody in my local small community talked to me for months , so I was also isolated. I received no support in the first six weeks then I had a weekly, which soon went to fortnightly talking therapy from the NHS for three months.

I know this is a generalisation but men talk about their jobs and woman talk about their children. If I ever went on a course and had to do one of those dreadful ice breaking exercises I would say I was a mum first. When your children are taken your identity is stolen also. I have discussed this with mums who have been bereaved and it is the same experience, some people who knew that you had children will cross the road rather than speak to you, others will not mention it.

What is different, is that some people tried to be helpful and said that you may have a relationship when the children are adults. It is not helpful.

It is unnatural not to be able to care for your children if they are ill, I had an instance when one of my children needed hospital treatment, I struggled to get anyone to take them and eventually when they went I was proved right.

A mum has that sixth sense about their child. It is abnormal to be unable to wish your child a happy birthday or know their shoe size and to only see your children for an hour or two supervised by strangers.

Practically speaking I was left in a mess, I obviously lived in a family sized house, I had all the children’s belongings including pets and because like many I had a special needs child, due to lack of support (another article!) I did not have a full time job. So in the midst of care proceedings I had to weed out the children’s belongings and pack to move to a smaller property. It is also of course expensive to move. So stress on top of stress. As care proceedings were on going every slightest moment I put a foot wrong and quite of number of times I didn’t was recorded and used against me in court.

I believe each family effectively has a template for bringing up children. Good or bad you will bring something from your own childhood and you have your own ideas. I had a mum myself who had encouraged me to have interests, she attended school functions and encouraged me to broaden my mind. I carried that on with my children, I had been involved with the school, I encouraged interests,I tried to create memories for them with high days and holidays.

These values have been obliterated and a different template imposed on my children’s lives. It goes against every instinct.

 

Long Term

I think to some extent I have used denial as a tool. I cannot comprehend not living again with my children so I don’t face it as a possibility. I do not think about my children’s futures as it is too bleak. The childhood they are having will not prepare them for a functional adulthood. As a parent it is usual to want the very best for your child, not a backwards step. I am well aware that someone whose child has been adopted does not have this strategy to use.

I have rebuilt my life but it is very different, none of my new friends have children at home. I live a false life, I cannot do the normal motherly stuff like worry about whether they have done their homework or if they are being bullied, bake or even buy clothes for them. I have nothing to do with children and it has affected my employability as well as previously I worked with children.

Some days I feel old before my time, I’m sure this amount of stress will later on come out in physical illness . Most days I cope well, I am kind to myself on the bad days. I can not talk about my children except to those who know me well. Sometimes I think I have spotted my child on the street and there is an incredible sadness when I realise it is a child that looks like mine. I can no longer say I am a mum if I meet someone new, that major part of me has been taken.

Parents’ views of the proceedings – we have lost faith in the process

 I find it almost impossible to believe that justice will prevail. 

This is a contribution from one of our readers ‘M’ about how her partner saw the system unfolding around then and how it made them lose faith in the proceedings and to feel very unfairly treated.  It is very sad to read this, as a lawyer and wonder why these parents felt so unsupported by their own legal team. What should parents’ lawyers be doing differently or better, to have a positive impact for these parents?

 

Support for Parents in Care Proceedings

When a child is taken into care the parents are often left completely in the dark as to where they should go and who they should approach. The only thing you are told is that you should get legal representation as soon as you can.

 

Emergency Protection Order

In the case where your child is taken on an Emergency Protection Order you have less than a week to organise any legal representation. Additionally on an EPO the first hearing for an Interim Care Order it seems is often heard at a magistrates court which means you have no chance of getting the order reversed. If you are lucky enough to find a good solicitor in the few days it still seems to make no difference. As in our case the ICO hearing was scheduled in a magistrate’s court and was given enough time only for the ICO to be granted stopping us from challenging the order. We then find that we can only contest the ICO at a hearing at the end of August some 6 weeks after M’s son was taken into care. Even then the hearing was postponed for a further 2 weeks.

 

Care Proceedings 6 Month Limit

The 6 month limit on care proceedings starts from the moment the child is taken into care. This is clearly grossly unfair in the situation where your child is taken into care on an EPO and you are not allowed to challenge this for 2 months. It is particularly unfair in the situation where the child is taken into care in July as the 6 month period would end late December / early January and it was clear in our case that there was no intention and that finishing the case within 5 months became the target. Given the late start due to the summer and wanting to finish within 6 months we had barely 2 months to go through any assessment’s or possible solutions. It is hardly surprising the local authority took the “easy” approach and stuck with their original plan to keep M’s son in care and seek a placement order.

 

No-Win For Parents

Everything you say during the period you are in proceedings is used against you no matter what it is. If you are emotional when seeing your child then you are deemed to be harming them and if you are not then you are uncaring. It seems that once a decision has been made by Social Services to pursue a course of action you have almost no chance of getting a fair hearing. I can barely believe that we were not allowed to challenge much of the case that Social Services put forward. It may be that we were poorly represented in court – I cannot be sure as I only have this experience to go on. M was criticised for considering a move to B as if B was somehow an inappropriate place to live and yet M’s son is placed in G where Primary school education is one of the poorest in the UK.

 

The Basic Fault in the System

The underlying fault in the system as it stands is that you are assumed to be “guilty” unless you can prove you are innocent. Justice has been turned on its head in the drive to protect children and can only lead to many miscarriages. Considering the damage taking a child into care can do to the child and to the parents it should very much be a last resort. However I believe our case demonstrates that it is being used as anything but a last resort and possibly in […] in particular is being used to excess as can be seen by the Local Authority now finding it has neither the finances nor the numbers of foster parents needed. I don’t believe there is any independence in the courts as M’s son was taken on an EPO on two grounds which we proved were incorrect. There seems to be no restraint on the Local Authority if it decides to pursue parents. Documents were presented in court with outright lies in them and M was told several times that the Local Authority have to put these statements in even though they know them to be “untrue” because they would otherwise “weaken” the Local Authority case.

 

Aggressive Questioning in the Final Hearing

During the Final Hearing I was subjected to the most aggressive questioning I’ve ever witnessed. I have twice done Jury service and have never seen such questioning used in the criminal cases there. I felt I was being attacked as if I was somehow guilty of some serious offence like murder. I had previously made it quite clear to the Social Services that I wouldn’t put myself forward to care for M’s son unless I honestly believed I could do this. The people that know me know that I am a very honest person. I produced a couple of witness statements from people I know and have worked with to this effect. Before this hearing I had believed that justice would prevail but I find this almost impossible to believe now.

 

Local Authority Policy on Keeping Children in Care

I had thought the Local Authority would take a realistic look at the options for returning M’s son but instead they’ve taken a hard line attitude which seems to be at odds with the stated objectives of keeping families together. Given M’s sons cultural background they should have made efforts to keep up his language skills which would have put him ahead of his peers at school. Instead they seem to have made a conscious effort to remove this heritage and made no effort to keep his language skills. M was banned from speaking to him in anything other than English during our contact sessions.

 

Missed Contact Sessions

We missed 2 contact sessions in August last year as I had to be in E for work. I know M could have stayed in K and gone to the contact sessions but she was not coping well at the time and also the contact locations were far away in G.

 

Placement of M’s Son in Foster Care in far away location

We were told that G was the only place that M’s son could be placed but from our conversations with the contact supervisors it seems to have been an unusual foster placement. How many other children in care are placed an hour’s drive away or 2 hours by public transport? It may be that the foster placement was the only choice but along with the later statements and lack of support from Social Services it’s hard not to believe that the intention was to make things as hard as possible for M. Applying extra pressure to both M and me while we were already under pressure is completely immoral and has destroyed my trust in Social Services. All along it seems the actions of Social Services have been aimed at justifying taking M’s son into care and making life as difficult as possible for both of us in the hope we would give up. I can no longer believe they have the best interests of children at heart but are pursuing their own targets and objectives. Speaking as an honest person who finds lying virtually impossible I cannot understand how the Social Worker can stand in court and say that M’s son has suffered “emotional harm” when there is nothing to suggest this. All along the “expert” legal advice has been to accept the findings and agree a plan with Social Services to return M’s son but following this got us nowhere as at no time would Social Services offer us any credible option.

 

God like Powers Granted to Social Services without any Checks

It seems we have given God like powers to Social Services but without any checks or balances. Reliance on the courts to provide this is clearly not working and especially so when the system of Guardians is clearly not providing any independence. Considering the cases one reads about and which I have more recently heard about from M’s contacts in Facebook our case seems very unusual and our treatment exceptionally severe.

 

Current Situation

We are still awaiting the Court’s response to our appeal. Lamentably, the LA solicitor has written to the Royal Court of Justice, submitting that the permission to appeal should be refused. There is obviously no requirement for the Local Authority to provide a response to our Appellant’s Notice, so their attempt to “expedite matters” can be viewed as their attempt to infringe upon our right to a fair and public hearing, guaranteed by Article 6 of the ECHR.

What do children think about opening up the family courts?

There is serious concern that opening up the family courts, for increased media access for example, is going to harm children and is not what they want.

The Children’s Commissioner investigated this issue in 2010 and said:

For our research, we spoke to more than 50 children and young people, and what they said raises a number of serious concerns. The overwhelming view was that reporters should not be allowed into family court proceedings because the hearings address matters that are intensely private. The events discussed are painful, embarrassing and humiliating and the children and young people said their deeply personal details were the business of neither newspapers, nor the general public.

They did not trust the press to get the facts right and felt strongly that articles would be sensationalised. They were worried about being identified and fear being bullied as a result.

It is of great concern that the children and young people said that if a reporter was in court to hear the evidence, they would not speak freely to professionals charged with undertaking assessments. This could seriously impact on a judge’s ability to make difficult and often life changing decisions in the child’s best interests.

You can download the report here.

 

There has been a further report by the ALC and NYAS in 2014 which you can read here.

The children interviewed were not happy with the idea of information about their cases being widely accessed and did not think that was a solution to dealing with criticisms of the family court system.

  • In the context of early discussions young people said they are not always informed about what is happening in their case – before or during proceedings. They said out dated paternalistic approaches by professionals are not in children’s interests: they need honesty and accurate information about processes and decisions about their care and at a time when they can make informed choices.

Further reading

The not-so-secret life of five-year-olds: legal and ethical issues relating to disclosure of information and the depiction of children on broadcast and social media

Marion Oswald, Helen James & Emma Nottingham

Abstract

Widespread concerns around the privacy impact of online technologies have corresponded with the rise of fly-on-the-wall television documentaries and public-by-default social media forums allowing parallel commentary. Although information about children has traditionally been regarded by society, law and regulation as deserving of particular protection, popular documentaries such as Channel 4′s ‘The Secret Life of 4, 5 and 6 year olds’ raise questions as to whether such protections are being deliberately or inadvertently eroded in this technological ‘always-on’ online age. The article first describes the documentary series and the results of an analysis of related Twitter interaction. It considers responses to freedom of information requests sent to the public bodies involved in the series with the aim of establishing the ethical considerations given to the involvement of the children. The paper goes on to explore the privacy law context; the wider child law issues, the position of parents/carers and the impact of broadcast codes. It considers if lessons can be learned from how decisions in the medical context have dealt with issues of best interests in decision-making and in disclosure of information concerning the child. The paper concludes that additional legal and ethical safeguards are needed to ensure that the best interests of children are properly considered when images and information are exposed on broadcast and social media.

 

Directly involving children in the court process

In care proceedings children are represented by a solicitor and a guardian – this is called the ‘tandem model’ of representation. The solicitor may also instruct a barrister for certain court hearings. The child’s solicitor takes instructions from the guardian about what to do in the child’s best interests, unless the child can show that he/she has enough understanding to give their own instructions. This post considers various options open to the child who wants to directly express their wishes and feelings. 

I don’t agree with what my guardian is saying and I want my own solicitors

If the child has a good enough understanding of what the proceedings are all about, s/he can chose to be represented by their own solicitor. The guardian should be alert to the possibility that an older child may not agree with the guardian’s recommendations, and that the child may want to give instructions directly to the solicitor.

  • Representation of children in proceedings is dealt with by Part 16 of the Family Procedure Rules.
  • The key test about deciding if a child has ‘sufficient understanding’ remains Gillick v West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority [1985] UKHL 7; [1986] AC 112, which is discussed in the case of CS v SBH, link below.
  • For a case where the Judge decided a 14 year old child was able to instruct his own solicitor, see Z (A Child – Care Proceedings – Separate Representation) [2018] EWFC B57 (29 June 2018)
  • A child can also write a letter to the judge or ask to speak to the judge directly – see discussion below.

There is a useful case from the Court of Appeal W (A Child) [2016] EWCA Civ 1051 which discusses the relevant test to see if a child is capable of instructing their own solicitors. The Court of Appeal decided that the Judge at first instance had been wrong not to allow a 16 year old girl to have the solicitor of her choice; there was a confusion over issues of ‘welfare’ and ‘understanding’.

The Court of Appeal agreed the relevant rule of the FPR to be applied was Rule 16.29 which sets out that when a solicitor is appointed for the child, the solicitor must represent the child in accordance with the instructions received from the guardian. If the solicitor thinks that the child wants to give instructions which will conflict with those received from the guardian and that the child is mature and understands enough to give his/her own instructions, the solicitor MUST conduct proceedings in accordance with the child’s instructions (rule 16.29 (2))

If the child wants to terminate the appointment of their solicitors, the child may apply to the court and the Judge will consider this application and the solicitor and the guardian will have a chance to have their say (rule 16.29 (7)).

See further the decision in CS v SBH & Ors (Appeal FPR 16.5: Sufficiency of Child’s Understanding) [2019] EWHC 634 (Fam) (18 March 2019) which considered how the FPR may differ depending on whether or not there was a new set of proceedings or that the child wished to instruct new solicitors within existing proceedings. The court set out at para 64 of the judgment the factors to consider about whether or not a child was able to instruct solicitors in an appeal:

  •  The level of intelligence of the child
  • The emotional maturity of the child.
  • Factors which might undermine their understanding such as issues arising from their emotional, psychological, psychiatric or emotional state.
  • Their reasons for wishing to instruct a solicitor directly or to act without a guardian and the strength of feeling accompanying the wish to play a direct role.
  • Their understanding of the issues in the case and their desired outcome any matter which sheds light on the extent to which those are authentically their own or are mere parroting of one parents position…. An unwise decision does not mean the child does not understand although it will no doubt depend on the extent to which the child’s view diverges from an objectively reasonable or wise decision.
  • Their understanding of the process of litigation including the function of their lawyer, the role of the judge, the role they might play and the law that is applied and some of the consequences of involvement in litigation. Care should be taken not to impose too high a level of understanding in this regard; many adults with capacity would not and we should not expect it from children. An ability to understand that their solicitor put their case but also has duties of honesty to the court, an ability to understand that the judge makes a decision based on an overall evaluation of the best interests of the child which balances many competing factors; the ability to understand that they might attend court, could give and evidence, could read documents; the ability to recognise the stress of exposure to the court process and the arguments between others. The presence of all of these would be powerful signs of a high level of understanding. Conversely the absence of them or evidence of a distorted understanding would be contra-indicators.
  • The court’s assessment of the risk of harm to the child of direct participation for the risk of harm arising from excluding the child from direct participation and the child’s appreciation of the risks of harm.

I want to talk directly to the Judge

There is a very helpful article here from Family Law Week which discusses how Judges have become more willing recently to meet children and talk to them. However, the Judge must not use this meeting to collect evidence from the child, or test the existing evidence, because that that has to be done in court with everyone present. But this meeting will allow a child to tell the Judge what he or she wants and will allow the Judge to explain what the court does.

Such a meeting between Judge and child is not intended to undermine or displace the work of the guardian, but it is hoped that such meetings could help the child understand what is going on and feel reassured that people are listening.

Obviously, for very young children this could simply be overwhelming and not very helpful but it will be a matter for the individual Judge in each case whether he or she thinks meeting the child is the right thing to do.

Familly Justice Council Guidelines

In April 2010 the Family Justice Council published guidelines for Judges who want to speak to children. The purpose of the guidelines is:

… to encourage judges to enable children to feel more involved and connected with proceedings in which important decisions are made in their lives and to give them an opportunity to satisfy themselves that the Judge has understood their wishes and feelings and to understand the nature of the Judge’s task.

What happens when meeting the Judge goes wrong?

For an example of the problems that can arise if a Judge doesn’t follow the guidelines, see the case of KP in 2014. Although this was a case involving the Hague Convention, (a dispute between separated parents who wanted the child to live in another country) the points raised apply to any situation when a Judge speaks directly to a child:

Despite having great respect for this judge, who is highly experienced in the conduct of proceedings where the voice of the child needs to be heard, our conclusion is that on this occasion the conduct of the judicial interview did indeed fall on the wrong side of the line. Having summarised the submissions of Mr Turner and Mr Gupta, with which we agree, we can set out the reasons supporting this conclusion in short terms as follows:

i) During that part of any meeting between a young person and a judge in which the judge is listening to the child’s point of view and hearing what they have to say, the judge’s role should be largely that of a passive recipient of whatever communication the young person wishes to transmit.

ii) The purpose of the meeting is not to obtain evidence and the judge should not, therefore, probe or seek to test whatever it is that the child wishes to say. The meeting is primarily for the benefit of the child, rather than for the benefit of the forensic process by providing additional evidence to the judge. As the Guidelines state, the task of gathering evidence is for the specialist CAFCASS officers who have, as Mr Gupta submits, developed an expertise in this field.

iii) A meeting, such as in the present case, taking place prior to the judge deciding upon the central issues should be for the dual purposes of allowing the judge to hear what the young person may wish to volunteer and for the young person to hear the judge explain the nature of the court process. Whilst not wishing to be prescriptive, and whilst acknowledging that the encounter will proceed at the pace of the child, which will vary from case to case, it is difficult to envisage circumstances in which such a meeting would last for more than 20 minutes or so.

iv) If the child volunteers evidence that would or might be relevant to the outcome of the proceedings, the judge should report back to the parties and determine whether, and if so how, that evidence should be adduced.

v) The process adopted by the judge in the present case, in which she sought to ‘probe’ K’s wishes and feelings, and did so over the course of more than an hour by asking some 87 questions went well beyond the passive role that we have described and, despite the judge’s careful self-direction, strayed significantly over the line and into the process of gathering evidence (upon which the judge then relied in coming to her decision).

vi) In the same manner, the judge was in error in regarding the meeting as being an opportunity for K to make representations or submissions to the judge. The purpose of any judicial meeting is not for the young person to argue their case; it is simply, but importantly, to provide an opportunity for the young person to state whatever it is that they wish to state directly to the judge who is going to decide an important issue in their lives.

I want to give evidence in court

The courts used to be reluctant to agree that children should give evidence in court, but there has been a shift in attitude more recently as we see with the decision of the Supreme Court in  re W [2010] UKSC.

When deciding whether or not a child should come to court and give evidence, the essential test is whether justice can be done without further questioning of the child. To answer this question,  the court looks at two issues:

  • The advantages that the child giving evidence will bring to the determination of the truth.
  • The damage giving evidence may do to the welfare of this or any other child.

The following factors will help the court to weigh up these two issues.

The fair and accurate determination of the truth

  • The issues it is necessary for the court to decide;
  • The quality of the evidence already available, including whether there is enough evidence to make the findings without the child being cross examined;
  • Whether there is anything useful to be gained by oral evidence in circumstances where the child has not made concrete allegations;
  • The quality of any ABE interview and the nature of the challenge; the court will not be helped by generalised accusations of lying or a fishing expedition. Focused questions putting forward an alternative explanation for certain events may help the court to do justice;
  • Age and maturity of the child and the length of time since the events.

Risk of harm to the child

  • Age and maturity of the child and the length of time since the events;
  • The child’s wishes and feelings about giving evidence. An unwilling child should rarely if ever be obliged to give evidence and, where there are parallel criminal proceedings, the child having to give evidence twice may increase the risk of harm;
  • The level of support the child has and the views of the Guardian and those with parental responsibility;
  • The fact that the family court has to give less weight to the evidence of a child who is not called may be damaging to the child;
  • The court is entitled to have regard to the general understanding of the harm that giving evidence may do to a child as well as features peculiar to the child and case under consideration. The risk, and therefore weight, will vary from case to case.

The Family Justice Council issued guidance on children giving evidence in 2012. 

For an interesting case where Judges in Court of Appeal disagreed with each other about how the Re W principles had been applied, see S (Children) [2016] EWCA Civ 83 (09 February 2016)

In the case of R (Children) [2015] EWCA Civ 167 a 14 year old was successful in her appeal against the court refusing to let her give evidence in support of her father, saying he had not abused her. Briggs LJ commented at para 36:

To my mind it is the absence of any real recognition of the basic importance of the cross-examination of GR to a fair trial of the serious issues in this case, in the judge’s judgment or even in the respondents’ submissions on this appeal, that makes it necessary that the appeal should be allowed. I would regard the welfare implications of the choice whether to permit her to give oral evidence and to be cross-examined as being evenly balanced. The risk of harm which the process may cause to this bright and articulate fourteen year old does not seem to me to be more substantial than the risk of long-term harm at being denied the opportunity to have her evidence properly weighed in the determination by a court of matters of the utmost importance to her.

I want to tell my story to the press

In 2003 Munby j (as he then was) heard the case of Angela Roddy. She was 16 years old and she wanted to tell her story to the press about becoming pregnant at 13 and then having her baby taken into care.  She was allowed to be interviewed but the identities of her baby (Y) and Y’s father (X) would remain confidential.

Munby J commented at para 56 of the judgment:

56.The courts must face reality. We must, as Lord Scarman said, be sensitive to human development and social change. Angela may not yet be quite 17 years old but she is a young woman with a mind of her own and, as her solicitor B has said, a mature and articulate young person. We no longer treat our 17-year-old daughters as our Victorian ancestors did, and if we try to do so it is at our — and their — peril. Angela, in my judgment, is of an age, and has sufficient understanding and maturity, to decide for herself whether that which is private, personal and intimate should remain private or whether it should be shared with the whole world. She is what Ward LJ described in In re Z (A Minor) (Identification: Restrictions on Publication) [1997] Fam 1 at p 30 as a “competent teenager taking [her] story to the press”. She is, to use the language of Woolf J (as he then was) in Gillick v West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority [1984] QB 581 at p 596, “capable of making a reasonable assessment of the advantages and disadvantages” of what is proposed.

57.In my judgment (and I wish to emphasise this) it is the responsibility — it is the duty — of the court not merely to recognise but, as Nolan LJ said, to defend what, if I may respectfully say so, he correctly described as the right of the child who has sufficient understanding to make an informed decision, to make his or her own choice. This is not mere pragmatism, although as Nolan LJ pointed out, any other approach is likely to be both futile and counter-productive. It is also, as he said, a matter of principle. For, as Balcombe LJ recognised, the court must recognise the child’s integrity as a human being. And we do not recognise Angela’s dignity and integrity as a human being — we do not respect her rights under Articles 8 and 10 — unless we acknowledge that it is for her to make her own choice, and not for her parents or a judge or any other public authority to seek to make the choice on her behalf.

Reform Proposals

In July 2014 Simon Hughes announced at the Voice of the Child Conference the government’s proposals to permit all children over the age of 10 an opportunity to speak directly to the Judge. He said:

Children and young people must by law have their views heard before decisions are made about their future, and where decisions are made that will impact them. At the moment, it is still too often that their views are not heard. Or that the law is interpreted to mean that others can make a assumption about the view of the child or young person – often for the best of intentions and acting in their interest, but nevertheless with the outcome that the child or young person does not feel that their own distinct voice was heard.

I therefore want to announce that it is the intention of the Ministry of Justice, and therefore the government, that we move as soon as is practical to apply in all our family justice proceedings in England and Wales where children and young people are concerned the policy that it will be the normal practice, the norm, that, from the age of 10, children and young people involved in public or private law family justice proceedings before the courts will have access to the judge, in an appropriate way which reflects their feelings and wishes to make clear their views as to what is the best resolution of the family dispute in their interest.

Children and young people of 10 and over will therefore be given the chance to make clear their views in person or if preferred in another way. We will also work with the mediation sector to arrive at a position where children and young people of 10 years old and over have appropriate access to mediators too in cases which affect them.

The Minister also agreed with the following:

Children and young people should be given the opportunity to meet and communicate with the professionals involved with their case including workers from the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service ( CAFCASS), social workers, the judges and legal representatives; every child of sufficient age and ability should have the opportunity of meeting with the judge overseeing their case; every child should have the opportunity through Cafcass of submitting their views directly to the judge in writing; all children should be able to communicate their wishes and feelings to the judge; children and young people should be kept informed about the court proceedings in an age appropriate manner, kept informed of the stage their case has reached, and contacted prior to the first hearing, and have the opportunity of giving feedback through email, text, telephone or written form.

EDIT However, as of the time of writing this edit (Nov 2015) nothing further has been heard of these reforms and it is likely they have been kicked into the long grass. 

FURTHER EDIT in 2018 it was confirmed that there had been no movement on these reform proposals and it is likely they will be shelved. 

Further reading

Answering birth parents’ questions about adoption

Answering questions about adoption (by an adoptive parent)

A bit of background about me first – I’m a single mum, with three children, all of whom are adopted. Two of my children are now adults; the third is still in primary school. I spend a lot of time online nowadays, and I’ve been really privileged in the last few years to be able to talk with several birth mums about their experiences, and answer some of their questions about adoption and adoptive parents.

I could never truly know what it’s like to lose your child to adoption. But talking to mothers whose children have been adopted, has shown me that it’s often really confusing. They had a huge number of questions about adoption and adoptive parents, and no answers. They didn’t know any adoptive parents themselves, or at least none they felt comfortable asking their questions to.

I think these mothers were incredibly brave to ask me to answer their questions – they didn’t know me, I was just a random adoptive mum. They must have been worried that I would be judgemental or unkind. However it doesn’t matter to me whether someone is an adoptive parent or a birth parent or an adoptee. I hope I can find a way to support everyone who asks me to.

But I strongly feel that these mothers should have had an opportunity somewhere in the process to have all these questions answered, without having to reach out to a stranger on the internet. I am also sure that if these mums I talked to had questions, then there must be a lot more parents/grandparents (and other family) who also have the same questions about adoptive parents and adoption. So I’ve made a list of the questions I’ve been asked the most often by birth parents, and here are my answers. I’ve also included questions I’ve seen online which I haven’t been personally asked.

If you are a mother or father (or grandparent, sibling etc.) whose child (or grandchild, or sibling) is being adopted, then firstly I am sorry you are going through this. I hope you find these answers helpful. If you have any more questions you want to know about adoption that you think I could answer, please comment on this post, and I’ll try my best to answer for you.

And finally, from the bottom of my heart, thank you to the mums who asked me these questions first, who opened my eyes to how the process worked for them and who will remain in my thoughts always, as very courageous people who wanted the best for their children.

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Why do adoptive parents want to adopt?

Adoptive parents have very different reasons for adopting. Many come to adoption following infertility, but quite a few of us don’t. For me, adoption was my first choice because above all, I wanted to become a mum and love a child with all my heart. I was a single lesbian woman and no other method of becoming a mother felt like the right thing for me to do. I felt that there were so many older children in care that I wasn’t comfortable creating a new life instead of becoming a mum to a child who was already here.

One thing all adoptive parents have in common is that we ALL adopt because we want to experience parenthood, in the same way that people who give birth to their children want to experience parenthood. I’ve seen a couple of people suggest that we want children as “accessories”, but nothing could be further from the truth. I want to reassure families of children in care, that with every adoptive family I’ve ever met, we love our children in exactly the same way as we would love a child born to us, and we would never treat a child any differently because they were adopted.

How does being approved as an adoptive parent work? Is it hard? Do they check up on you thoroughly?

It’s a long process, and it is definitely very thorough. It’s changed now from when I was approved to adopt, but the basics of it are the same. There are several key parts of it. Firstly, there are the basic checks – every adoptive parent will have a criminal records check (certain criminal offences bar you from ever adopting, including any offence against a child) and a medical check to make sure they are well enough to parent a child into adulthood. Social services will also check on prospective parent’s finances, inspect their home and make sure it’s safe for a child, and also get references from family, friends and others. For instance, my employer had to give a reference for me when I adopted the first time.

Secondly, there is a “preparation group”, which all prospective parents will attend at some point during the process. The point of this is to educate, and prospective parents will be taught about the legal process of adoption, why children are available for adoption, about parenting adopted children, and so on.

Thirdly, there are the homestudy visits. This is where a social worker visits the parent/s in their home and talks to them in huge depth about their life and about adoption. For instance, in my homestudies, we talked about my childhood, my family, what support I have around me, my beliefs, my previous relationships (including my sex life), how I would support and parent my adopted child, and about what kind of a child I would be adopting. We basically give social services our life story! A social worker even interviewed one of my ex-partners as part of my assessment.

The social worker who is assessing us will write all this information into a big report. Lastly, the report goes to an Adoption Panel, who review it all, and then recommend whether a parent should be approved to adopt or not.

So it is definitely a thorough process, and whoever adopts your child, will have been checked, questioned and scrutinised as far as possible to make sure they are up to the task.

Do you pay social services to adopt a child?

If we are adopting a child in the UK care system, no we don’t, absolutely not. Not even one pence! You might see people at some point claiming that we pay social services for a child, but this is not true at all. I think some of this confusion is because people see American adoption sites online, and over there, they also have a private adoption system for babies where money is paid by adoptive parents to the adoption agencies. This just doesn’t exist in the UK, so don’t let those sites worry you.

Do you pay any money to anyone else to adopt?

All adoptive parents have to have a (thorough) medical check. Doctor’s surgeries will usually charge for this, in the same way as they might charge for holiday vaccinations or some medical letters.

At the final part of the process, when you apply to the court to legally adopt your child, the court charges a fee. Some adoptive parents have to pay the fee themselves, but sometimes social services pay it for them. I have never paid for the court application for instance; the council have always paid it for me.

There is no other money paid to anyone in the adoption process.

Do you get paid to adopt?

No. Adoption is very different from foster care. Foster carers get paid a weekly allowance to foster. But when you adopt a child, they become your child (legally the same as if you gave birth to them) and so you are entitled to the same as birth parents get for their children (child benefit for instance).

What information do you get given about a child by social services, and what makes you “make your mind up” to adopt that child?

We get a lot of information. The very first thing we see is usually a short profile with just a little bit about the child, and if we are interested, we would get a lot more, in a report which is now called a CPR (Child Permanence Report). The information would include – about the child’s background, their birth family, why the child is in care and being adopted, the child’s personality, interests, behaviours, their health and medical information, their development, if they have any ongoing difficulties or need to be parented a bit differently to other children, about school and friends. It will also say what the plan is for contact after adoption with birth family.

After that, if you are still interested in adopting that child, the child’s social worker reviews your homestudy report and interviews you. Then they (and other members of their adoption team) come to a decision about whether they want to take things further. So it’s not just about you, as a parent, picking out a child. We adoptive parents do not just select a child to adopt like how it was decades ago. Social services have to choose you, based on whether they think you are the best possible parent for this child, and whether you can give this child everything they need.

If social services choose you, you then get even more information. You will meet the foster carer/s, and a medical advisor/paediatrician to get as much information as possible about the child and get all your questions answered. Finally after this, another ‘panel’ approve the match. This whole process of ‘matching’ lasts several months.

Making up your mind that you would like social services to choose you for a certain child, is really different for different people. Some parents ‘just know’ as soon as they read the CPR report, but others don’t and need more time.

When I read my eldest daughter’s information, I felt a strong connection to her, and I felt once I’d read her reports that she was most likely my daughter. I can’t tell you why I felt such a strong connection, it just happened! But we always use the huge amount of information we have to make up our minds as well. We have to be certain we can be the parent this child needs, and that we are comfortable with the child’s behaviour and their needs.

Whoever your child/relatives adoptive parents are, they will have put a huge amount of thought into whether or not to adopt your child/relative, and considered really carefully whether they are the right parents for this child.

Does eye and hair colour come into it?

No! I’ve seen birth parents being told that adoptive parents want children with blonde hair and blue eyes. Actually, we generally couldn’t care less what our child will look like! I’ve certainly never met any adoptive parent who cared whether their child was a blonde, or a brunette, or whatever. We view our children the same as we would a birth child. We wouldn’t care what our birth child looked like, and we don’t care what our adoptive child looks like. We just love them for who they are on the inside.

Personally, I thought it might be helpful for my children, if they looked like I could have given birth to them, because then my children could have privacy – they’d never have nosy strangers thinking ‘ooh, she/he must be adopted!’ based on their appearance. So for me, it was all about the child, and what I thought would be good for my child. It was not about me. As it happens, all my children look quite different, even the two who are birth half siblings!

Do you meet the child before you’ve decided 100% [if you want to adopt them]?

No. Being introduced to the child you are adopting is the very last stage. It’s called “introductions” and it’s where you and the child get to know each other before the child moves in. Before that happens, you’ve had all the information, made up your mind 100%, and been to the panel that’ve approve the match (and of course you’ve bought furniture and decorated etc.!) At this stage, everything is set. Once you’ve read the CPR and been to panel etc., you can’t meet the child and then decide if you want to adopt them. That would be very unfair and wrong for the child. As far as I was concerned, as soon as my children were told about me for the first time (by their foster carers and social worker) then I was absolutely 100% committed to them.

Do you “have” to tell the child that they are adopted? Could it happen that an adoptive family wouldn’t tell the child?

You don’t “have” to tell, because there is no law about it. We have the same freedom as birth parents to tell or not to tell our children about their early lives.

However, it is very rare nowadays for a child not be told they are adopted. Right from day one, we are told how important it is for children to know their story. Social workers and other adoptive parents, we are all very clear to prospective parents about how important it is for children to know about their adoption in an age appropriate way. Parents can access a lot of advice and tips about how best to do this. So whilst it could be that a child wouldn’t be told, it’s very unlikely. I’ve only come across a couple of people in about 18 years who haven’t told their children (and this includes online as well), as opposed to hundreds and hundreds who have.

At what age do you ‘tell’? And how?

Obviously with an older child, they know what’s happening. With a baby or toddler who is too young to understand, the way most adoptive parents try and ‘tell’, is in a way which means the child ‘always knows’. When they are older, they shouldn’t be able to remember a time when they didn’t know they were adopted. This means that for most children adopted as babies, they’ll be having little conversations about adoption by the age of 4 at the latest, but most usually a bit younger than that.

I told my youngest child the story of “the day we met” from when he was 2 years old (and he was 23 months old when we met), and I was also mentioning the word ‘adoption’ from that age. I didn’t bombard him with information; I just dropped in little things here and there. For instance, I remember when at age 3, a neighbour of ours was pregnant, and he pointed at her because she was getting so big. I said that yes, babies grow in the womb which is down in your tummy area, and you grew in X’s womb before you came to live with me. And he repeated that back to me.

All children who are adopted now are supposed to have life story books. These books, which as the name suggests, tell the child’s life story, might help parents to explain to the child the basics.

What are the options for any contact with birth mum? What’s the “norm”?

The norm in my experience is letterbox contact, which means letters going between you and the adoptive parents. This is normally either once or twice a year. It isn’t so common for there to be visits, but if there are, it will most likely be either once or twice a year. I’ve personally done both letters and visits.

For other adult family members, there might also be letterbox or, less commonly, visits.

The plan for contact should be mostly decided on before the child moves into their adoptive home, although it isn’t always. There may be a letterbox agreement which you sign and the adoptive parents sign. This agreement would say when the letters are being sent, to whom, how they are signed, and so on.

As the child gets older, they can have their own say in contact. For instance, my youngest child has asked for all letters to be stopped, so I stopped them. On the other hand, if my child had wanted the opposite and wanted more letters, I would have tried my best to add in another couple of letters a year. For adoptive parents, it’s about supporting our kids and helping them process everything.

What are the options for any contact with siblings? What’s the “norm”?

It definitely depends on where the siblings are living, whether they’ve lived together before and how close their bond is. But in my experience, visits with siblings are much more common than visits with any other members of the child’s birth family, especially if the siblings are also adopted or in long term foster care. I’ve supported my kids through a whole lot of sibling visits over the years. However, if there are no visits, letterbox contact is very often in place for the siblings, usually 1-3 times a year.

Will my child be told that I love them?

I realise how desperately you want your child to know that you love them. Every adoptive parent speaks to their children differently about their past, but most parents, when talking about their (young) child’s birth family, choose to say something along the lines of “your birth mum loves you very much, but can’t look after you”. As our children get older, we add in more about the ‘why’. I certainly have told my children that they are loved, and all the other adoptive parents I’ve met, tell their children the same. I want my children to know that they are loveable people, were the most loveable babies in the world, and that nothing that happened is their fault. I certainly want them to feel loved, and that’s something that all adoptive parents want for their children.

Will my child’s name be changed?

This is something I can’t give an answer to, because every situation is different. I can only say that in nearly all situations, the surname will be changed. Some children have their first names changed, but others don’t. Some of the things that may go into the decision are – whether there is a security risk (whether the child is likely to be recognised), how unusual the name is, its meaning and how old the child is.

I can give you my situation as an example – two of my children were older children when they came to live with me, hence it was entirely up to them what they did with their names. My eldest literally waltzed downstairs one morning and informed me that she was dropping both of her middle names, and had picked two new middle names for herself instead, which were x and y! And that was that, as far as she was concerned. My middle child on the other hand, only ever changed surname, and has kept all her other names as they always have been.

However my youngest child has been entirely named by me (and themselves!). I changed my child’s first name for many reasons, chief among them a security risk from a few people. I kept the old first name as a middle name, because I couldn’t take that away from my child. However, recently my child asked for that (original first) name to go entirely, and to pick a new middle name instead. So I went with my child’s choice, and we picked a new name together, which we are in the process of making legal now.

We are just one family, and every adoptive family will have a different story. So I can’t say whether or not your child will be given a new first or a new middle name. However I can say that if your child’s name is changed, they will at some point be told about it. My youngest always knew which name was originally the first name.

Again, if you have any more questions you want to know about adoptive parents/adoption that you think an adoptive parent could answer, please comment on this post, and I’ll try my best to answer for you.