Parents and Carers

Children can stay in foster care until they are 21

Here is a good article from Mark Kerr on the Community Care site, who is worried that the law allowing children to stay with foster carers until they are 21 years old is ‘confusing and discriminatory’.

Contact Post Adoption – time for a new default position?

This is a post by Sarah Phillimore, the bulk of which was written in 2014 when there was a hope that there may begin to be a shift in attitudes towards the possibility of contact with birth parents post adoption, particularly when the parents did not seek to disrupt the placement and had not caused actual significant harm to their children but had lost their children on finding that the risk of future harm was too great. Now the first case has been decided which looks carefully at the arguments for and against and has re-affirmed the position that orders for post adoption contact are unlikely to be made unless the adoptive parents agree. However developments continue in a push to make post adoption contact something that is actively and seriously considered by professionals – see discussion below and further Court of Appeal decision from 2024.

EDIT March 11th 2019 – First case to be considered in the Court of Appeal

On the 30th January 2019 Court of Appeal handed down judgment in the case of B (A Child : Post-Adoption Contact) [2019] EWCA Civ 29 (30 January 2019). This case involved parents with a learning disability who did not wish to disrupt the placement, Nevertheless the Court of Appeal affirmed that it must be ‘exceptional’ to impose an order for contact post adoption with which the adopters did not agree. The court stated at para 59:

ACA 2002, s 51A has been brought into force at a time when there is research and debate amongst social work and adoption professionals which may be moving towards the concept of greater ‘openness’ in terms of post-adoption contact arrangements, both between an adopted child and natural parents and, more particularly, between siblings. For the reasons that I have given, the juxtaposition in timing between the new provisions and the wider debate does not indicate that the two are linked. The impact of new research and the debate is likely to be reflected in evidence adduced in court in particular cases. It may also surface in terms of advice and counselling to prospective adopters and birth families when considering what arrangements for contact may be the best in any particular case. But any development or change from previous practice and expectations as to post-adoption contact that may arise from these current initiatives will be a matter that may be reflected in welfare decisions that are made by adopters, or by a court, on a case by case basis. These are matters of ‘welfare’ and not of ‘law’. The law remains, as I have stated it, namely that it will only be in an extremely unusual case that a court will make an order stipulating contact arrangement to which the adopters do not agree.

See further this article by the lawyers involved in the case, Sarah Jennings and Phil Storey, where they offer the following suggestions for lawyers involved in such cases:

to be aware of the current research in respect of post-adoption contact. If it is expected that the professionals working within the field are considering the recent and relevant research then it is crucial that we are able to appropriately analyse this information during the course of any hearing.
continue to raise issues relating to post-adoption contact through the care and placement proceedings and adoption proceedings.
hope that prospective adoptive parents and adoption social workers familiarise themselves with the developing research showing the benefits of post-adoption contact and how changes can be made on the ground. This needs to form the basis of some realistic training for prospective adopters around post-adoption contact.
consider making more applications for contact orders alongside placement orders under Section 26 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002) so that the issue of post-adoption contact at a realistic frequency is identified and discussed with potential adopters at an early stage in the process.

RE B (A Child) (Post-Adoption Contact) [2019] EWCA Civ 29: What is the Future for Post-Adoption Contact?

Discussion in 2014

We have come a long way from the days when adopted children might never even be told they were adopted. The huge majority of adopted children are not new born babies but much older children who may retain clear memories of their birth families. They will go to their adoptive families with the benefit of ‘Life Story’ work and photographs as we are now much more aware of the importance of knowing about and understanding our roots.

What kind of contact with birth families is either desirable or necessary after a child is adopted? The ‘default’ position appears to be ‘letter box’ contact a couple times a year but the issues raised by research and experience suggest that this default position needs re-examination.

The Children and Families Act 2014 came into force on 22nd April 2014 and introduced a new section 51A of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 which will allow applications to be made for contact after an adoption order has been made. Suesspicious minds has written a detailed post about this here.

In this post we shall look at some of the lessons from the research and direct experience of those who are trying to start or maintain contact in such difficult and emotional circumstances.

Why is it important?

When an adoption breaks down, this is extremely traumatic for both the child and the adoptive parents. Disruption rates for adoption are quite high, considering the amount of care and time that goes into the assessment process; some studies show the breakdown rates for adoptions can be as high as 25%. There is some interesting research here from the US about rates of adoption disruption and what causes them.

Research published on April 9th 2014 by the University of Bristol offers another perspective on adoption disruption rates, concluding that they are low but emphasising the importance of post adoption support, particularly for older and more challenging children.

Therefore, it is important to know about the possible or likely effects on the placement of post adoption contact.

There are a number of other factors to consider:

Positive factors for post adoption contact

Answers children’s questions about their past and allows them to know the reality of their birth families, saving from possible disappointment later;
May assist child’s self esteem and sense of identity to know that birth family cares and is interested;
Supports older children to continue established relationships with birth family members – the ‘disappearance’ of such people may hinder the child’s ability to form attachments to his adoptive parents;
Helps birth family members to resolve their grief and keep them informed about how their child is doing;
Helps adoptive parents feel more secure as ‘parents’ as the issue of contact is being addressed in structured and planned way

Negative factors for post adoption contact

Direct contact with birth family could have negative implications for a child’s ability to form attachments with adoptive family and stop them feeling a sense of ‘belonging’ and permanence;
If the birth family can’t sustain contact or the contact experience is negative this could be harmful for the child who experiences another rejection;
Adoptive parents may find it very difficult to sustain a positive relationship with birth families, depending on circumstances of the child’s removal from their care.
There is a risk birth families could use direct contact to try to undermine the adoptive placement, either consciously or unwittingly.
Even if positive, contact can cause emotional strain, particularly for older children.

What does research tell us about contact post adoption?

The numbers of children adopted each year have decreased significantly from about 21,000 in 1975 to 5,797 in 1995 and 3,980 in the year ending March 31st 2013; a reflection of the increased availability of abortion and the societal shift that no longer stigmatises illegitimacy.

The average age at adoption in the year ending 31st March 2013 was 3 years 8 months

2% (90) of children adopted during the year ending 31st March 2013 were under 1 year old
74% (2,960) were aged between 1 and 4 years old
21% (850) were aged between 5 and 9 years old
2% (70) were aged between 10 and 15 years old
<1% (10) were aged 16 and over

Adopted children are therefore very unlikely to be brand new babies, given up by desperate teenage girls, but rather older children who may have already suffered significant trauma. It is not difficult to understand how adoptive parents may be very wary about the idea of continuing ties with the very people who might have hurt their child.

Research suggests that ‘communicative openness’ in adoptive families – how they think and talk about adoption – is positively linked to ‘structural openness’ – contact with birth family members – and can have a positive impact on the adoptive parents feeling more secure in their role of parents. However, it seems that children’s emotional and behavioural development was not related to either the type of contact they were having with their birth families or the communicative openness of their adoptive parents. See Post-Adoption contact and Openness in Adoptive Parents’ Minds; Consequences for Children’s Development Elsbeth Neil (2009).

Some messages from recent research

The Centre for Research on Children and Families/UEA Contact after adoption: a follow up in late adolescence (Dec 2013)

Every case is different, and contact planning should be individualised.
Prospective adoptive parents and birth relatives should be prepared thoroughly for contact.
The long term needs of the child should come first in contact decision making and children should be involved once they are old enough.
Both adoptive parents and birth relatives need to be treated sensitively so that their questions and anxieties about contact can be addressed.
Facilitated meetings between adoptive parents and birth relatives to plan post adoption contact could be considered.
Information about background is essential in building a sense of identity, therefore it should be made available to young people either via contact and/or life-story work.
Where contact has been agreed, adoptive parents and birth relatives should stick to their side of the arrangements. If contact needs to decrease or stop, the other parties need to know the reasons why.
Social workers should review and support contact to ensure that it continues successfully.
There should be more support offered to young people at age 18 about deciding on the future of their contact.

Challenge of finding answers in research

Elsbeth Neil recognises

finding empirical answers to questions about outcomes of contact after adoption is frustrated by significant methodological challenges …what is meant by contact after adoption? The type, frequency, duration and management of contact all need to be considered, as does the type of birth relative involved.

In addition (Neil and Young 2009):

We are left with no simple answer to the question of whether contact will be beneficial with any specific adoption placement. Each study reveals differences between children and families according to whether contact is appreciated and experienced in a positive way and also shows patterns and changes over time.

Each adoptive placement is unique and there cannot be one path for all or even one path for all time within a placement. The developmental stage, attachment and parenting history, personal qualities and personalities and context of the child and adults involved will no doubt have a part to play in how contact is experienced.

Elsbeth Neil urged social workers to remain open minded about the issue of direct post adoption contact, resisting blanket predictions of either help or harm. However, it seems that the prevailing attitude is to assume it shouldn’t happen. Different reasons are given for this and they are compelling; birth parents may try to undermine the placement, the children may have unpleasant memories of the birth family and become upset by contact. Many social workers worry that potential adoptive parents will be ‘put off’ adopting if they also have to manage direct contact with birth parents.

But in practice it is rare to find social work analysis that goes beyond those familiar shibboleths, to consider the particular circumstances of children and birth family currently under scrutiny. Those of us who represent birth parents in care proceedings will be sadly familiar with the ‘party line’ around post adoption contact. It seems that the best we can get is a vague expression of a ‘hope’ that an adoptive family can be found who would be ‘open’ to direct contact but in the majority of cases the industry standard is letter box contact once or twice a year. This is so even in cases involving parents who would not actively attempt to undermine the placement and who had not subjected their children to serious abuse, such as parents with a learning disability whose children were removed on the basis of risk of significant future harm.

Perhaps we are still left with a residue of those earlier desires to entirely absorb the adopted child into the new family and to protect a sense of entitlement for adoptive parents. After all, it is asking a lot of someone to undertake the arduous task of raising a child (who often is neither grateful for nor welcoming of the parents’ input) without clear recognition of the status of ‘parent’.

Problems with indirect ‘letter box’ contact

This should not be thought of ‘the easy option’.

It is hard to write to people you don’t know;
indirect contact may falter without initial support to help all involved provide quality information;
there is a risk of what is written being misinterpreted or misunderstood, particularly when birth families already feel a lack of trust in the system;
adoptive parents will often ‘give up’ when birth families don’t respond.

Photographs were seen by almost all as more ‘real’ and honest than brief written updates but letters could be successful when written in a ‘newsy’ and friendly style.

What’s happening in practice?

The current motivation appears to be to assume that adoptive families should be left in peace without any direct dealings with the birth family throughout the child’s minority. The child’s need for information can be met by Life Story books, some photographs and possibly a letter once or twice a year. An adopted child and birth families can now enter their details upon the Adoption Contact Register to apply for contact with one another. However the clearly stated purpose of the register is to permit contact only between adults if both want it.

Section 4 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 provides that adoptive parents, children and birth families all have the right to request an assessment of their needs for post adoption contact. A recent study investigated the levels and nature of such support (see Supporting post adoption contact in complex cases – briefing paper June 2010). It found that direct contact happens only in a minority of cases and support for such contact is likely to be organised on a case by case basis rather than via dedicated staff or formal systems. The prevailing attitude of social workers towards direct contact is to focus on controlling risk rather than pro active consideration of how to overcome problems that would affect contact.

The main type of support offered to both adoptive and birth parents was co-ordination and administration of contact, rather than providing emotional or therapeutic support such as work on relationship building. Unsurprisingly, for direct contact to work well it helped to have an element of emotional support together with facilitators who were organised and forward thinking, anticipating challenges and changes rather than simply responding to them. The ‘average’ family used contact support services 12 times over the course of a year and the cost was £999. Unsurprisingly, the cheapest model of support was administered contact averaging £395 per year whilst supervised and facilitated contact averaged at £1,371 per year, but these costs were probably an underestimate.

As Dr Claire Fenton-Glynn comments in her report to the European Parliament in June 2015:

… the jurisprudence of the English courts shows that it will be rare for direct contact to be awarded against the wishes of the adoptive parents. Although their wishes will not be determinative, as the decision will be determined by the child’s welfare, the courts have recognised that it will not usually be in the child’s best interests to impose an obligation on the adoptive parents that they are unwilling to agree upon. This is based on the premise that the welfare of the child depends on the stability and security of the adoptive parents, and a decision that undermines this will be damaging to the child.

This position fails to take into account the changing nature of the driving forces behind adoption. When it was first introduced in English law, it provided a mechanism for single mothers to place their infants with an adoptive family without anyone being the wiser. Birth outside wedlock was a social stigma for both the mother and the child, and as such, the adoption would cut all legal ties with her, and there would be a complete legal transplant from one family to the other, under the shroud of secrecy. However, in the current era, the majority of children that are adopted are older, and have an established relationship with their parents, siblings and wider relations. Even where circumstances dictate that they require alternative care, it does not necessarily require that there be no further contact with their birth family. As such, this is an area in which English law needs to evolve so that greater recognition is given to the child’s pre-existing ties with the birth family.

It would be interesting to develop existing research and to have greater consideration of the existing structure of post adoption contact support together with a more rigorous cost/benefit analysis of the different types available. Considering the detailed nature of the assessment and matching process in adoptions, some studies show the disruption rate is surprisingly high at about 25%. It is certainly worth investigating whether or not greater structural and communicative openness in adoptions is a protective factor against breakdown.

That investigation becomes even more urgent when considering the inexorable rise of the new social media and the impact this has had on the way information now flows and is disseminated. It seems unlikely that the current rather static and limited framework to post adoption contact, with emphasis on adult control and choice, can survive the challenge posed by Facebook or other similar social networking sites. See this review of the book ‘Bubble Wrapped Children‘ by Helen Oakwater, which examines the issue of adoptive children seeking out their birth families with the help of social networking sites.

Conclusions – what helps make post adoption contact work?

The adopters are able to help the child understand a full and honest account of his background;
This account is given at a pace which is sensitive to the child’s ability to take it in;
The adopters are able to show empathy towards the birth family;
The birth family accept the adoption and don’t try to use contact to undermine the placement;
The child understands what is going on and is comfortable with contact;
The purpose of the contact is clear and understood by all;
The parties trust each other to make it work;
Contact is supported.

EDITS – FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS

March 27th 2017 – new developments

There have been some important new developments. First, McFarlane LJ spoke of his disappointment that there had been no ‘sea change’ in attitudes towards post adoption contact after the 2002 Act. We now also have the Contact After Adoption site which supports practitioners working on making positive post-adoption contact plans and supporting birth relatives and adopters through contact planning for their child.

Research from Cardiff University 2018

See ‘The support needs and experiences of newly formed adoptive families: findings from the Wales Adoption Study’ which one of the authors commented shows that adoptive parents have a more open and flexible attitude than they are commonly assumed to hold.

This paper reports on findings from the Wales Adoption study, which used a sequential, mixed method design to explore the early support needs and experiences of newly formed adoptive families. Ninety-six adoptive parents completed a questionnaire four months post-placement and sub sample of forty parents were interviewed in-depth five months thereafter. The main support needs of the families fell within five key domains: promoting children’s health and development, strengthening family relationships, fostering children’s identity, managing contact with significant others and financial and legal assistance. Whilst the age and developmental stage of the child placed for adoption often influenced the nature of the support required across the various domains, the need for some form of support in every family was universal. Most, however were not facing insurmountable difficulties. Arguably, many of the support needs identified could have been anticipated, as they illustrate the complexities of ‘normal’ adoptive family life. The implications for social work practice are discussed.

Research from Sydney 2019

Collings, S., Wright, A. C., & Spencer, M. (2019). Family Connections and Contact Study: Final Report. Institute of Open Adoption Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Science, The University of Sydney.

Key findings

State-wide permanency reforms to increase the uptake of guardianship and open adoption by existing caregivers appear to be having an effect. A third of participants (N=19) were actively pursuing a move from kinship care to guardianship or long-term foster care to open adoption.
Agency support appeared to taper off gradually for families during the transition to more permanent arrangements for children. Caseworkers could perform an important mediation role between carers and birth parents, modelling active listening and empathic communication, and supporting birth parents to attend contact visits.
Families who were in guardianship and open adoption arrangements had more evolved relationships than those in long-term foster care.

The type of contact in place and the access to professional support for contact influenced the quality of relationships between carers and birth parents. Supervised contact was associated with under-developed relationships between adults.
Young people in care wanted to be consulted about their views of whether seeing some birth relatives was in their best interests and about contact planning.
Children wanted contact to be a special time and many wanted to spend more time with birth relatives, particularly siblings. Children avoided raising topics that would upset parents in order to keep contact visits happy and positive.
Contact experiences for children and birth relatives were influenced by interactions that took place outside of contact and often did not involve children directly, such as those between caseworkers, birth parents or carers.
Agency processes could get in the way of adults building partnerships when carers and birth parents were discouraged from getting to know each other or being more flexible.
Agencies could be perceived to take sides by both carers and birth parents, highlighting the need for clear and transparent messages and open communication.
The experience of child removal was a source of ongoing grief and trauma for birth parents, regardless of how much time had elapsed. When encounters with child protection systems were negative and parents were coping with complex issues and adversity, they were less able to trust carers and caseworkers.
Long-term foster carers with no plans to pursue open adoption held negative views of independently facilitated contact and wanted an agency buffer between themselves and birth relatives.
Carers who had managed to transform their views and approach to contact from a legal obligation to a rewarding time with family shared common traits of being positive and optimistic, tolerant, and cooperative.
Contact was viewed positively by adults when birth parents were able to accept a new parenting role and carers could recognise that birth parents had a legitimate emotional investment in their child’s life.

EDIT November 2024 – see Public Law Working Group guidance on best practice in adoption

The Guidance published in November 2024 examines the issue of post adoption contact and says

The group also recommends greater support and
counselling for birth parents and that the full range of contact options, including
digital options, should be actively considered by the professionals and the court
during care and placement proceedings. We do not suggest that contact orders
should routinely be made in the face of opposition from adoptive parents, whether
at the time of the adoption itself or later, but it is believed that opposition is much
less likely where adoptive parents are given a thorough understanding of the
child’s needs right at the start and are given the right support. The statutory
framework for making contact orders has existed for many years, but the decisions
of the Court of Appeal make clear that making contact orders in the face of
opposition from adoptive parents should happen only rarely (albeit see the
comments of the President of the Family Division, Sir Andrew McFarlane, in his
lecture, Adapting Adoption to the Modern World: Part 2: May 2024).

See also R & C (Adoption or Fostering) [2024] EWCA Civ 1302 – Court of Appeal decision re s26 ACA 2002 contact – court has a duty to “set the template for contact going forward” at the placement order stage and the court has the responsibility to make orders for contact under s26 if they are required in the interests of the children

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2024/1302.html

Experience of those dealing with post adoption contact.

Birth Families

Here are the views of one grandmother, who is finding the experience very difficult. What could or should we be doing to improve this experience for all involved?

Loosing my grandchild through no fault of my own or my son and problems with the first letterbox to us has been chaos emotionally. I am not used to being written to with such ‘ill feeling’. I am just hoping it was first letter nerves. We are trying to write a reply without being sarcastic and make things worse next time. There was no support for me and her Grandad throughout the whole of the SS proceedings. We felt like ships adrift with no hope. The first letter was a like a bombshell which left us wondering what the adopters had been told about us. Did they think we were monsters too?

We have no faith in the SS and we has hoped for some sort of comfort from the adopters. We thought they may understand or have had some training in how to help extended family who get letterbox. Is there anything anyone could suggest we try to break the ice, or do we just have to put up with what we get. I have no faith in the system that has treated us so badly and we had hoped for better from the people who will be looking after our grand child for the next 16 years. We are still waiting permission for getting photographs, so we can put them with our family ones in our new house. A house we had to move to during the guardianship fiasco which was doomed to fail we found out too late. Also is it allowed to write one to the adoptive parent and one to my Grandchild for when they get older? How will I know if they are shown them? I have huge trust issues at the moment. I just need reassurances from people who are doing it. I cannot and never will be able to trust what the SS tell me.

..I have seen a poem and have a few photographs to add from the first birthday party we were allowed. Songs which remind us of our time together. There are so many of us on our side of the family. Each year they will be eager to hear how things are going. Her birthday is the same day as her Dads cousin and it will remain a double celebration regardless. Her great grandparents will never forget either and it is a shame that they did not all get to meet her in person.

I really do hope that her new parents realise how much we love her and want her to know this while being loved by them too. We do not want to steal their thunder, a glimpse of the rainbow is all we ask.

Prospective Adoptive Parent

My thinking on the topic starts from the belief that unless contraindicated, e.g. known to be detrimental for the child in question, contact has got to be a good thing.

Good for the child: I can imagine many circumstances where the downsides of a mother basically just disappearing from a child’s life, heavily outweighs any benefits in terms of the child being able to settle and bond with their new family better. I can imagine that this idea that a child needs their birth mum to be completely out of the picture, in order to be able to form secure attachments with the new family, to be mainly fuelled by the new parents’ insecurities. However I would be very interested to know if any research has been undertaken on this, or if this strategy is just based on assumptions.
I think that nowadays the reality will be that average resumed contact with birth family will come at a much earlier age than previously, simply due to the social media. Whereas cutting off contact and then leaving the adoptee to reinstate contact in their twenties or thirties or even later – point is, when THEY feel the desire and the maturity for it; seemed ok; when we’re talking about cutting off contact as a toddler and reinstating it at age 13 as a vulnerable teenager, through social media, perhaps sought out on a whim by the teenager, but perhaps sought out by the birth family, it’s a different story. Here I think it may be better for the child, for contact never to have been cut off in the first place. Supervised, carefully managed contact throughout the childhood years has got to be better (in many cases) than BM totally disappearing, then reappearing by Facebook message at teenager age. And I fear the latter is going to be more and more of a reality.

Better for the birth parents: Removing a child from a parent, and placing it for adoption, with no contact until age 18, seems like a very harsh ‘punishment’ for what in some cases may not have been big ‘crimes’. Even when it is totally right that a child is removed from their BM, it doesn’t have to mean that they have done anything deserving of such punishment. An adoptive placement with ongoing contact would mean providing for the child’s needs whilst at the same time not ‘punishing’ the BM more than necessary.

Better for the adopters: If adoptive parents can get over their own insecurities, then regular meetings with their children’s birth parents may in many circumstances enable them to have better understanding of their children’s past, and thus may enable them to be better parents to them. Also they won’t have to deal with issues such as the child idolising the birth parents, or seeking out unsupervised contact by Facebook etc. at a young age.

Of course there are equally many circumstances where direct, and sometimes even indirect contact, are totally contraindicated. This obviously needs to be taken into account. From fostering experiences it is known that some children absolutely hate having to go to contact sessions, and stop going as soon as they have any say in it. I can imagine that these children feel repercussions in other areas, such as never growing to feel that their foster carers really keep them safe, since after all the FC keep sending them to the contact sessions. Etc.

Over all, I get the impression that direct contact is one of the key issues which distinguish long-term fostering from adoption. (Of course there are many others, particularly legally). From my own, somewhat rambling thinking, I think this should not be the case. Adoption should become more like fostering, in that (circumstances permitting) direct contact remains in place. Fostering should become more like adoption, in that contact should not be unquestionable, should be something which is decided from case to case and the decision should be able to be revisited. Or in other words, in fostering as well as in adoption, direct contact should be sought if possible but stopped/not started at all, if not appropriate/detrimental to the child.

So the key question becomes, is it good or bad for the child. Since on paper, the child’s wellbeing is paramount anyway, I get the impression that people believe that direct contact is good for a (long term) foster child (where it is the default) but bad for an adoptive child (where it is exceedingly rare). I am willing to accept that this MAY be so, but I would be very interested in the reasoning behind it, and the scientific evidence for this reasoning.

What happens if no one does anything to help?

A true story.

This is a post from one of our contributors who wishes to remain anonymous.

In 1951 an unmarried woman (H) aged 23 had a relationship with a married man. Her parents sent her to a home for unwed mothers. In 1952 she gave birth to a daughter (C). Despite the social mores of that time and that place H decided to keep C. C was 2 years old when H’s parents allowed her to return to their home with C.

When C was 9 years old H returned home from work one day and announced that she had got married that afternoon. She had married a man that neither her parents nor her daughter had ever heard of much less met. The next day H brought her new husband (O) to her parent’s house to meet the family. The first shock was that O was 36 years older than H. He was in fact 12 days older than H’s father. Then the family was told that O was renowned in his artistic field.

Within a week H and C had moved into O’s home. C became increasingly unhappy and uncomfortable. Within 6 months what would now be called grooming began in earnest with H’s encouragement. It was ‘artistic’ for C to be urged to wander around only partially clothed. The female body was something to be celebrated, not hidden. C was nearly 11 when the active sexual abuse started. H was in hospital for a few days and O insisted that C sleep in his bed. The abuse continued covertly after H returned home.

Shortly after C turned 12, O informed H that he was divorcing her so that he could marry C. There were jurisdictions nearby where such a marriage would be legal. O presented C with a diamond solitaire ring. He then divorced H. H and C returned to H’s parents’ home.

A few months later O and H remarried. H and C returned to live in his home. H insisted that the diamond solitaire was merely a birthstone ring, not an engagement ring. C was forced to wear it. The sexual abuse resumed immediately. It continued for a couple of more years until O again divorced H. Once again H and C returned to H’s parents’ home.

A short time later O and H re-married for the third time. However this time C was allowed to remain living with her grandparents.

It should go without saying that by this time C was a deeply disturbed and depressed teenager. Although she was safe with her grandparents, she fantasised about how she could escape her excuse for a life.

C went to university when she was 18. During that academic year she made a ‘cry for help’ suicide attempt. She was admitted to the psychiatric ward at the hospital. For the first time she told someone about the abuse. She confided in her doctors. Somehow H discovered what C had said. The hospital bill was being paid for by H’s insurance. She told the doctors that C was lying and immediately instructed the insurers to stop paying the bill. C was discharged the next morning. C finished that academic year but did not return to university the next year. She found a job and a place to live and never returned to live at home again.

O died that summer. H had 3 months to vacate his home. She moved back in with her mother and filled her mother’s house to overflowing with O’s possessions.

C married at 21. She was 23 when she gave birth to her son (J). She was still disturbed and depressed. She probably also developed severe post natal depression. When J was 10 months old, C made an extremely serious suicide attempt. She was only saved by a miracle. She was again admitted to the psychiatric unit but this time it was her insurance paying for it and she received the help she desperately needed.

A couple of months after she was discharged from hospital she and her husband separated. C and J went to live in subsidised housing. C’s mother H also more or less moved in with them. To be fair the initial help that H provided enabled C to continue working. But soon that help turned into H attempting to take over completely. H also began a relationship with a man that reminded C far too much of O. J’s father had no interest in helping or supporting his son.

C took J and moved to another city. She was unable to find a job and a few months later returned to her home town. She stayed with friends. It was at this point that she had to accept that she could not provide for her son or give him the life he deserved. She had to make the most difficult decision of her life. She therefore took J to live with his father’s brother and his wife. They formally adopted him about 18 months later.

The after effects of all of this have plagued C for 30+ years. The demons are still there. C is beginning to confront them. But they are strong.

This is what can happen when child abuse is not acknowledged. This is what can happen when there is no help available. This hurts. It stabs and slices. C wishes there had been a service whose main aim was to protect children at risk when she was a child.

Be thankful for Social Services.

The importance of independent advocacy for children

The National Children’s Bureau provided this analysis of the need for indpendent advocacy for children within the child protection system in 2013.

They concluded with recommendations for both Government and Local Authorities.

Recommendations for Government.

Use the opportunity of the Children and Families Bill 2013 to introduce a
statutory presumption that children are supported by an independent
advocate in initial and review child protection conferences, unless they
choose otherwise.

Update ‘Get it Sorted: Guidance on Providing Effective Advocacy
Services for Children and Young People making a Complaint under the
Children Act 1989’ to reflect the current policy and practice environment
and to specifically include the role of advocacy in the child protection
process.

Commission a study of good practice models of independent advocacy in
child protection procedures to facilitate the sharing of practice across
the country.

Recommendations for Local Authorities

Local authorities should review their advocacy and child protection
conference services to:

Set in place a clear service level agreement for all stakeholders
following commissioning of independent advocacy regarding the role of
the advocate to ensure that children are supported before, during and
after child protection conferences on an ‘opt-out’ rather than ‘opt-in’
basis.

Ensure that advocacy and child protection conference processes are
child-centred and meet the needs of specific groups of children and
young people, such as disabled children and young people, those in
custody and those in out of area placements.

Ensure that they foster effective working relationships between social
workers and independent advocates.

Formalise a process regarding information sharing, setting out issues of
confidentiality and data protection.

Develop advocacy training programmes.

Conduct an annual report and evaluation of child protection advocacy
services, both quantitative and qualitative, from the perspective of all stakeholders including children and young people.

Provide opportunities for children and young people to participate in
decisions relating to the design and delivery of advocacy services.

Parents with Learning Disabilities/Difficulties

What is a learning disability or difficulty?

This post contains information taken from talk by Beth Tarleton from the University of Bristol at the St John’s Chambers Fair Access seminar on 4th December 2014.

Mencap describe it in this way:

A learning disability is a reduced intellectual ability and difficulty with everyday activities – for example household tasks, socialising or managing money – which affects someone for their whole life.

A parent with a ‘learning disability’ has a IQ below 70; a parent with a ‘learning difficulty’ has an IQ above 70, but both parents may struggle with the same difficulties. Often, mainstream services don’t have experience of working with adults with learning disabilities or learning difficulties [LD] and may not use specialist assessments.

There is little reliable data about how many parents currently face such challenges; there is an estimate of 53,000 in the UK with a diagnosed learning disability. Dr Sue McGaw (1997) estimated there are 250,000 parents with learning difficulties known to health and social services agencies in the UK.

What challenges do parents face with LD in care proceedings?

Best Beginnings describe it in this way:

Many people who have a learning disability prefer to use the term “learning difficulty”.
A person with an IQ of less than 70 can be diagnosed as having a learning disability.
Around 7% of adults with a learning disability are parents, but most have a mild to borderline impairment, which may make it difficult to identify them as they will not have a formal diagnosis.
Around 40% of parents with a learning disability do not live with their children. The children of parents with a learning disability are more likely than any other group of children to be removed from their parents’ care.
Parents with a learning disability are often affected by poverty, social isolation, stress, mental health problems, low literacy and communication difficulties.

Parents with LD may suffer discrimination from professionals who have little relevant experience and who make assumptions about what parents with LD can or cannot do. This leads to parents with LD often fearing intervention from state agencies. The parents may perceive:

Opposition to their desire to parent
People assuming the pregnancy was a mistake
Assumptions that their parenting capacity won’t improve
Negative expectations/stereotypes about their parenting ability
Their learning difficulty is automatically equated with an inability to parent
People don’t given enough consideration to other environmental or social factors which could impact on parenting difficulties.

There is no consensus from research that children of parents with learning difficulties will automatically face poor outcomes; some studies find that children born to parents with LD are vulnerable due to poor parenting; other studies report that children can do well in the care of their parents if the parents are given support and help.

There needs to be a recognition from support services that parents with LD need life-long support and that support needs to be effective, making provision of information accessible to parents. Effective support services will:

cover the family life cycle and a variety of situations
offer a co-ordinated approach across services
be family-centred in approach and support children in their own right
provide accessible and understandable information about parenting
recognise the strong association between supportive social networks and the positive psychological well-being of parents with LD
include a range of services
assess/educate parents in their own homes and using their own equipment, wherever possible.

Case law

Medway Council v A & Ors (Learning Disability; Foster Placement) [2015] EWFC B66 (2 June 2015) deals with the failures of the LA to be fair to a parent with LD.

The court cited from the judgement of Baker J in Re X Y X (Minors) [2011] EWHC 402 (Fam):

132. The last thirty years have seen a radical reappraisal of the way in which people with a learning disability are treated in society. It is now recognised that they need to be supported and enabled to lead their lives as full members of the community, free from discrimination and prejudice. This policy is right, not only for the individual, since it gives due respect to his or her personal autonomy and human rights, but also for society at large, since it is to the benefit of the whole community that all people are included and respected as equal members of society. One consequence of this change in attitudes has been a wider acceptance that people with learning disability may, in many cases, with assistance, be able to bring up children successfully. Another consequence has been the realisation that learning disability often goes undetected, with the result that persons with such disabilities are not afforded the help that they need to meet the challenges that modern life poses, particularly in certain areas of life, notably education, the workplace and the family.

133. To meet the particular difficulties encountered in identifying and helping those with a learning disability in the family, the government published in 2007 “Good Practice Guidance on Working with Parents with a Learning Disability”. In their closing submissions, Miss Ball and Miss Boye contended that such good practice guidance is required because there is little evidence of effective joint working between adult and children’s services and practitioners in each area rarely have a good working knowledge of the policy and legislative framework within which the other is working. They submitted that local authorities frequently do not take account of the fact that, if children are to be enabled to remain in their own families, a specialist approach to a parent with a learning disability is absolutely central to any work that is done, any protection which is offered and any hope of keeping the family together. The 2007 guidance points out, inter alia, that a specialised response is often required when working with families where the parent has a learning disability; that key features of good practice in working with parents with a learning disability include (a) accessible and clear information, (b) clear and co-ordinated referral and assessment procedures, (c) support designed to meet the parent’s needs and strengths, (d) long-term support where necessary, and (e) access to independent advocacy; that people may misunderstand or misinterpret what a professional is telling them so that it is important to check what someone understands, and to avoid blaming them for getting the wrong message; that adult and children’s services and health and social care should jointly agree local protocols for referrals, assessments and care pathways in order to respond appropriately and promptly to the needs of both parents and children; and that, if a referral is made to children’s services and then it becomes apparent that a parent has a learning disability, a referral should also be made to adult learning disability services. The guidance also stresses that close attention should be paid to the parent’s access needs, which may include putting written material into an accessible format, avoiding the use of jargon, taking more time to explain things, and being prepared to tell parents things more than once.”

Another important case is re D (A Child) (No 3) [2016] EWFC1 which looked at how parents could be supported at home to care for their children (although in this case the court concluded that the children should be removed). Suesspiciousminds identified some useful questions put to the court by the parents’ lawyers:

Were the things that happened to this child a result of parental deficiency, or were they frankly things that could happen to any child and any parent, but they were pathologised because of the parents known issues?
Were the failings here attributable to the parents, or the support provided?
Is there such a thing in law as reparative care, or is insisting that a child needs higher than good enough care simply a social engineering argument in disguise (topical, given the proposed reforms to adoption)
Is a parent with learning difficulties treated differently (or discriminated against) than a parent with physical disabilities?
Is a plan that involves extensive professional support and carers really harmful to a child, or is it the sort of thing that happens all the time with children whose parents are very rich?

Academic Research

Parents with learning difficulties, child protection and the courts

Professor Tim Booth from the University of Sheffield carried out research in this area which was published in 2004. He noted key features of professional practice and service organisation that undermined parents in their parenting and heighten their vulnerability. Parents with LD are disproportionately represented in care proceedings and have a high risk of having their children removed from their care. He noted the impact of ‘system abuse’ or setting up vulnerable parents to fail by depriving them of adequate support:

System abuse – meaning policies and practices that harm the families they are supposed to support or protect. System abuse is the unacknowledged scourge of families (see, for example, Booth and Booth, 1998, chapter 9). It is rampant, pervasive and destructive of family life…

Competence-inhibiting support – meaning support that deskills parents, reinforces their feelings of inadequacy and undermines their independence.

Parents with LD and advice about the law

There is also research from the University of Bristol in July 2013 ‘What happens when people with learning disabilities need advice about the law’

The report concluded that:

The research confirms the findings of previous research that access to legal services for people with learning disabilities remains problematic. The study adds detail and depth to our understanding of the barriers that they face, but also furnishes some of the potential solutions. It highlights the different needs of people with mild learning disabilities and those with more complex disabilities who rely on others to act on their behalf.

The report makes recommendations which centre on:

Developing accessible information for people with learning disabilities about the purpose of legal services and how they can be used;
Developing information and resources to clarify the routes that family carers and others can take to access specialist legal services on behalf of others;
Strengthening the awareness legal professionals have about learning disabilities through professional training and guidance;
The promotion of collaborative working between legal services and the social care sector.

The influence of ‘powerful others’

There is an excellent and informative article from the British Journal of Learning Disabilities about parents with learning disabilities and their experiences of having their children removed for not being ‘good enough’ parents. Its a useful reminder that there is no universal accepted definition of what exactly makes us ‘good enough’.

Thanks to Matt Harding for bringing this to our attention.

Accessible summary

People with learning disabilities might have their children taken from their care. If they do, what then happens to the parents?
I talked to nine mums who had their children taken away from their care. They told me about what this was like and how they felt.
This research gives advice to people (particularly professional people) about how to work better with mums who have had their children removed. It also shows that sometimes it is difficult for people with learning disabilities to know their rights and say what they think.

Abstract

There is a recognised risk of parents with learning disabilities having their children removed. Little research has investigated the impact of this on these parents. This article looks at the perceptions of nine mothers with mild learning disabilities and their experiences having had their children removed. Interview data were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Findings reveal the struggles mothers with learning disabilities faced being ‘suitable mother’ – including presumed incompetence and scrutiny of parenting. Participants’ responses to having had their children removed are looked at and support reviewed. Finally issues of power were highlighted throughout Participants’ accounts and the impact of this is discussed. Clinical implications indicate areas for service improvement.

Conclusion

There appears to be an overwhelming influence of ‘powerful others’ upon the lives of mothers with learning disabilities. Before they even have a child, society seems to suggest they should not. When they do have their child, however, they appear to have to be better than ‘good enough parents’ and seem set up to fail by the standards of those monitoring them (Chinn, 1996 cited in Edmonds 2000). When the mothers do ‘fail’, powerful others remove the child. There seems little negotiation in this process. Few mothers appear to have advocates and the child is often then adopted –a decision sometimes not even made through court. To the mothers, the decision appears a foregone conclusion over which they have little control or choice.

What then do the mothers do? How do they cope? They are left feeling helpless and bereft. They could turn to others for help but past experience has taught them that this may not be beneficial. Moreover, for many mothers it might mean turning to those who removed their child in the first place. Should mothers reveal their true feelings it might only serve to prove it was right to remove their children. Worse still, it could support the removal of yet more of her children. The mothers’ voices and feelings therefore seem to remain hidden and they attempt to block out upsetting thoughts and reminders. It appears their only solace is that one day their child might return. Meanwhile any contact will suffice. However, all this once again appears to rest in the hands of powerful others.

Useful resources

Books/Assessments

‘Care Proceedings and Learning Disabled Parents: A Handbook for Family Lawyers’ by Abigail Bond. A handbook for all those involved in care proceedings where one or both of the parents is learning disabled. The book sets out the relevant governmental policy and guidance in this area; examines the statutory framework relevant to adult learning disability social workers and children s services social workers where there is a parent with a learning disability; considers and analyses the legal and practical arguments and issues likely to arise in learning disability cases.
Competency based assessment of support needs: PAMS 3.0 is a complete Parent Assessment Application used by social workers, psychologists and other professionals across the UK and abroad. Developed by psychologist Dr Sue McGaw.

Guidance/blogs

Good Practice Guidance on Working with Parents with Learning Disabilities [DoH and DoE 2007] Includes a summary of relevant legislation and policy, on how adult and children’s services should work together to improve support to parents with a learning disability and their children. This has been updated in 2018; see Guidance from the President of the Family Division.
You may also be interested in this post on how the court should ensure proceedings are fair for parents who have a learning disability.
The Advocate’s Gateway -The Advocate’s Gateway gives free access to practical, evidence-based guidance on vulnerable witnesses and defendants. Their ‘toolkits’ provide advocates with general good practice guidance when preparing for trial. See for example the Toolkit ‘Case Management in young and other vulnerable witnesses cases‘
See this post about how the court ensures fairness for parents with a learning disability.

Organisations

Working Together with Parents Network – supports professionals working with parents with learning difficulties and learning disabilities, and their children. Provides information and research about parents with learning difficulties, guidance, packs, toolkits and links to other organisations.
Communicourt – Provides intermediaries at all stages of the legal process, to ensure the vulnerable client has a fair hearing, understanding the process, being involved fully in decision making and able to respond to questions if appropriate.
Mencap -organisation with a vision for a world where people with a learning disability are valued equally, listened to and included and for everyone to have the opportunity to achieve the things they want out of life.
Changepeople.org – is a human rights organisation led by disabled people and looking to build an inclusive society. The focus is on delivering real change in areas that matter.
Choice Advocacy – a service based in Bradford that supplies free advocacy to adults with learning disabilities.

Ehlers Danlos Syndrome

You may be interested in our post here about the issues around certain genetic conditions and accusations of non accidental injury or Fabricated or Induced Illness (FII).

Meeting at the Houses of Parliament

Justice For Families in collaboration with EDS UK is holding a Family Law Meeting in the Houses of Parliament on 24th June 2014, as a response to all the allegations of child abuse and FII reported in the EDS community.

Mr John Hemming MP and Lara Bloom, Chief Operations Officer for EDS UK, will host a gathering of professional minds to discuss Ehlers within Family Law and NAI’s.

The confirmed speakers so far are:

Professor Rodney Grahame

Professor of Clinical Rheumatology – Senior Consultant in Clinical Genetics – Extensive experience in complex cases involving allegations of serious non accidental injuries especially those concerning scientific or medical issues.

Dr Anand Saggar

Senior Consultant in Clinical genetics.

Paul Storey QC and Alexa Storey

Barristers with extensive experience in complex cases involving allegations of serious NAI.

Time and place

The event will take place on June 24th from 6.30 – 9.30 at the MacMillan Room at Portcullis House SW1A.

If you would like to go, please email Jacque Courtnage at [email protected]

as attendance is by invitation only.

Words don’t come easy

This contribution is from a group of ‘birth’ and ‘adoptive’ parents who started discussing this issue on Twitter. What is the impact of the words we use to talk about people in the care and adoption process?

Do we need to be more considerate of or more challenging about the terms we use?

You may also be interested in this blog post from an adoptive parent.

Does the terminology associated with adoption need to be challenged?

The current adoption climate in the UK has seen the use of many terminologies being uttered that evoke negative emotions for all involved. Adoption in itself is very emotive for all involved especially where consent has been dispensed with. So can the use of some of these terms be considered as “hate speech”? Possibly, possibly not, but what is clear is that we need to remove the use of some of these terms as it builds an even greater divide between the “birth family” and the “adoptive family”.

Whichever side you find yourself on, it is the child at the end of the day that is most affected by whichever term is used. Some can denote that the one family is either lesser or even better than the other family, leaving the child in the middle feeling they are being torn in two having to choose sides. This has a devastating and lasting effect on the child’s identity, self worth, emotions and psychology not to mention a test on their loyalty to the families involved.

So let’s look at some of the terms and the emotive relationships associated to them:

Birth Parent

Person who gave birth is nothing more than a ‘surrogate’ or ‘breeder’. Denotes derogatory connotations. If an adopter has a blood child and an adopted child, it segregates the two making the adopted child always feel isolated.

Genetic Parent

Person is nothing more than a donor of an egg or sperm

First / Second Family

Renders the essence of a family unit moot. Undermines the role of permanence and stability. Suggests families can be discarded summarily and breeds lack of respect.

Forever Family

This is considered one of the most offensive terms in adoption. There is not such thing as a ‘forever family’ as the whole process of adoption contradicts the entire term. It is also suggestive to children in families who have not been separated by adoption, that their place in the family is temporary which has devastating consequences in terms of building trust, relationship alienation etc.

Natural Parent

Who will carry this term (adopter or other?) and is being a parent a ‘natural’ thing so that assistance is never required at any point? Everyone needs help and guidance as children do not come with manuals and no two children are alike. Whoever coins their family as ‘natural’ will them imply that the other family is ‘unnatural’.”

Real Mother/Father

Adopters are made to feel they are artificial parents

Mother/Father

The use of this term for adoptive parent dismisses the emotional and psychological link the ‘biological’ parent has and will always have, with a child who has been adopted.

Family

Many adopters feel they should have the use of this term as opposed to the inclusion of the ‘birth’ family within the term, but is a ‘family’ simply all who love and care for the child and can simply be seen as a ‘cohesive family’ ?

Adoptee

Denotes that the child is ‘different’ and unloved by those who gave birth to them. In the UK, this term is becoming synonymous with having come from an abusive home, hence they were removed for adoption. Not all children are removed from abusive or neglectful homes and parents who did not love them. Many parents who have lost their child to adoption will go to extra-ordinary lengths to fight for their child’s return. Another obvious observation is that if ‘birth’ parent is used does that make this child a ‘birth’ child?

Parent

Not everyone can parent. This applies to ‘birth’ parents as well as ‘adoptive’ parents. So do we keep the term parent for both?

The impact of terminology

The emotive responses can either have positive or negative connotations and more suitable terminology must begin to be accepted, especially amongst the legal fraternity and social care societies as it is from there that the initial steps can be introduced. So what do we use? There is much debate around this very subject with no definitive conclusion.

Do we start referring to “birth” parents as the “Alpha” parent/family while “Beta” is used for extended families, “Gamma” for Step families and “Delta” for the adoptive family? Does this make one again lesser than the other or is it simply a matter of numeric’s. After all, without the “birth” family coming first, there would be no adoption?

Literature and research accepts that the majority of ‘adoptees’ will at some point seek out their ‘birth’ family. How reunions turn out often depends on how the child, adopter and ‘birth parent’ have associated each other’s role based on the terminology that each has grown accustomed to or been offended by. If the reunion is a success, the adoptive family, especially the parent, will often feel sidelined and abandoned whilst the adoptee reconnects with the biological ties that will forever bind them to their ‘birth’ family.

We need to be realistic and frank if we are ever to get to the bottom of all this, despite everyone’s sensitivities. Adoption is nothing more than giving a child which is not your own, a potentially safe environment to grow up in, but how is this different to growing up with grandparents or extended families? Would you raise an eyebrow if a child referred to their grandparents as ‘my adoptive mom’? So is the use of Adopter still appropriate and should this term perhaps be replace with “Guardian”?

As adoption can be cross-cultural, do we also need to consider religion and culture in the terminology as translations can change an entire meaning? Or do we stick with the English speaking populous and leave the rest to be interpreted as each culture and religion sees fit?

Will changing the terminology go a long way to building a more constructive framework and solid foundation for the child involved and even possibly lead towards successful open adoptions?

What if we used similar words with similar meanings but either spelt or pronounced differently?

We call two grandmothers in a family different things so that we can distinguish them e.g. grandma, nan etc.., and one is not loved more or less than the other. The same can be done for mothers for example, so that the child knows the difference but the terminology would be different for every family.

Some possible suggestions are:

Female Carers: Mom, mommy, mother, mama, mammy, mum, ma, mummy, etc.

Male Carers: Dad, Father, Pops, pappy, daddy, papa, pa, etc.

It has to be argued that this has to be the better option for all involved but more so, for the child. If you accept that, then why not go the extra step when referring to ‘Birth’ and ‘Adoptive’ parents both as ‘Parents’? Similarly, both sides can be referred to as ‘Families’ because that is pure and simply what they are and will always be to the child.

Removing the adjectives and verbs will improve long term outcomes for the child and that dear reader, has to be what is in every child’s best interest.

A child’s perspective – Tammy’s story

Thanks to the TaKen UK website for letting us share this. Obviously, we don’t know all the details of what happened to Tammy’s family – the fact that care proceedings lasted from 1989 – 1992 suggests that the case was about more than just one accident in the kitchen.

But whatever happened in this case, her perspective on her pain and hurt about what she believes happened to her and her family emphasises the emotional cost of decisions in the family courts; something we should not lose sight of.

Tammy’s story – told in 2006

“In the best interest of the child” that’s what the professional’s state, but even the professionals and the family courts can be wrong as they were in my case.

Let me explain about my birth family, and myself. I am a young adopted adult; I was taken from my mum nearly 17 years ago on a false allegation, I was seven months old and sitting in my bouncing chair, my mum had gone into the kitchen to make me a night feed. I was happily playing with an activity toy, which I dropped on the floor; I leant forward to reach the toy but the chair followed me arid tipped forward falling on top of me. I sustained a bruise on my cheek. And that’s where my life was changed forever.

My case was heard within the family court in the years 1989 which lasted all the way to 1992. I was placed with a set of foster carers whom I stayed with for 13 months.

Then one-day social services accused the foster carers of suffering from depression and removed me from their care! I was then placed with three lots of emergency foster carers before being placed with my pre adopters, who then became my parents.

While this was happening to me my mum gave birth to my brother Cameron. One minute after his birth social services (a male) walked into the labour suite and tried to hand a place and safety order in writing to my mum who was laid on the bed with no clothes on and she had not even delivered the placenta. Medical staff asked the social worker to leave on three occasions eventually the social worker left the labour suite, leaving my mum very distressed and losing all her dignity.

My mum and Cameron went home to my grandparents where they resided until the 28th of December 1990. My mum then went to the family court as social services were trying for an interim care order to remove my brother from her care. My mum fought and won full parental rights of Cameron and no further action was taken.

All my mum wanted was to fight for me, she attended many family courts, which were held in secret and she was not allowed to talk about our case or me to anyone.

Time passed and Cameron reached the age of 21 months old, when the social services actually reached a date for my freeing order, which was in the year of 1992; there were no concerns to Cameron’s welfare. She was an excellent mother to him.

The judge who heard my case made his decision on the basis that social services had delayed my case for over two and a half years. On reading his decision to my mum (he stated) “Miss Coulter if I return your daughter home to you, you will be a stranger to her” and on that decision I was freed for adoption and my whole future was completely changed.

Finding out that you are adopted is one of the worst feelings in the world because you feel that all your identity you have known of yourself is a lie; for example your whole childhood and personality.

I found out through photos that my brother was still with my mum and is one and a half years younger than me. This was very upsetting and left me wondering why my mum wanted my brother and not me.

Left with these unanswered questions and feeling very confused; like I did not belong anywhere I wanted to find the truth, and the answers to my questions, the only person who could answer them was my mum.

My decision to find my birth family was not supported in the way in which I would have liked from my adoptive parents. I went about looking for my mum by first of all ringing support after adoption that told me I must wait until I am 18 years of age and would not offer me any help or advice. Which left me more confused and very upset?

In January this year on a Thursday night I received a phone call from my best friend. She told me to go over to her house, as it was very important. I had no idea of what I was to be told. Her laptop was placed on her bed and she told me to read the posting. I was ecstatic as I read the information, which confirmed that my mum was looking for me as much as I was looking for her.

My friend who knew as much as I did about my adoption found the posting when secretly putting my name on GENES REUNITED. I found myself emailing her my mobile number as I knew the same information which was written in her posting; which included information that nobody would have known about me.

I waited three and a half hours for the phone call which would change my whole life, and answer all the unanswered questions which had been tormenting me since the age of about 11 when I moved to Comprehensive School where I met many other adopted and fostered children.

Waiting for the phone call was the most exciting and precious time of my life, the hours seemed like weeks. In the next breath I was actually talking to my mum on the phone, we spoke for an hour about everything that we could. We put the phone down and later that evening I rang my mum back and told her I know it was short notice but could we please meet the following morning and she agreed to.

Our meeting was very emotional for the both of us, neither of us spoke we just put our arms around each other and cried together, we held each other very tight and I cant explain how happy I was feeling.

After many secret meetings I decided to tell my adoptive parents about my news, I did not tell them for about two months because I knew what their reaction would be. When I told my mum, as my dad was at work she cried and turned her back on me making me feel very isolated as if I had done something wrong. They never did understand why it was important that I find my birth family nor did they support me at the emotional time. I was keeping in contact via the Internet with my birth family as my mobile phone was confiscated; however they also stopped me from using the Internet to stop any contact, which I was having with my birth family. During this time I was studying for my AS levels which I failed due to all the stress and confusion.

The way my adoptive parents were towards my other life caused a huge conflict in the house making life unbearable at home and at school. I was eventually turned away from my home due to arguments other than my birth parents; this is when I phoned my birth mum, as I had nowhere else to turn. It was too late when I was asked to return to the house I did not want to be treated like a child nor did I want to my feelings to be ignored any longer, so I decided to move in with my birth family.

This brings me to why I am here today, I was a child who was wrongfully removed from the care of my mother and most of all I have had the rights taken away from me to have enjoyed the right to a family life with my natural family.

I would like to say I have had a good upbringing by my adoptive parents and I love them very much, however the complication of my adoption also ruined my relationship with my adoptive parents, as I only wanted to find the truth about my life.

I am publicly speaking today on behalf of children and parents who have also been through the secrecy of family courts and the injustices that have taken place and do still take place and the devastation of what one decision that determines the future of a child can cause to a whole family.

Since I have moved in with my birth family I see the relationship between my mother, brother and sister and cannot help feeling like I have missed out no matter how much I fit in now. We have all bonded very well, I now feel as if I fit in somewhere and feel I can be myself as I have found out who I really am and that my mum never did anything wrong. Over the years Yvonne has been fighting to prove her innocence and that an injustice has taken place. I am very angry and also upset that my mum was treated like a criminal and punished for life on something that she never did, and she had the right to a family life taken away.

Let me explain to you how I am feeling:

• Confused
• Hurt
• Stripped of my identity
• I missed out on a relationship with my brothers and sisters, mum and dad and other close relations
• Exhausted through lies

• I know I am not the only person to have gone through the hell of secrecy in family courts and hope to have expressed the way in which they will feel and are feeling at my age.

Changes that I would like to see happen.

1) For medical evidence used in the courts to not be based on probabilities when determining a child’s future, it must be fact.

2) To stop social services making medical diagnoses when not qualified to do so.

3) For social services when conducting assessments to be thorough and not based on self-opinions but facts.

4) For an independent body who is impartial to social services to be brought in when social services are assessing a family and to check they are following all guide lines of social work.

5) More support for families with whatever reason; a low IQ, a mother whom has depression, a parent that has suffered domestic violence and also a parent whom has a disability. More outside agencies should be involved to help put support packages in place to help families stay together and have the right to a family life.

6) Slow integration of a child back with its natural family should be paramount and decisions to take away the child should be the last resort. For example my mum was told she would be a stranger to me if I were returned home to her however my foster parents and my adoptive parents were also strangers.

7) The most important factor of us all being here today is about the secrecy surrounding the family courts and why they should be opened, you have all listened to my story and many of you would have read similar stories to mine in the media. I am of age where I can talk about the detrimental effects that the secrecy of the family courts has caused to me.

Many of the children who have been taken in the past and are still being taken do not have a voice.

The opening of the family courts would make it a fairer, non judgmental and a more impartial system which would help children that are left in the hands of abuser’s and would also work by stopping children from being wrongfully removed and injustices from taking place.

So please when considering the opening of the family courts take into account that we are all human and we have feelings and the way in which the courts have been working up to this day has been inhumane in many cases and human rights have been exploited.

The detrimental emotional effects and the separation, has on children torn apart from their birth families, lasts a life time.

Lawyers need to see it through the parents’ eyes

This is a guest post from Jacque Courtnage founder of the TaKen UK website. She has the perspective of not only being a parent who went through the system but she is also a lay advisor to other parents in family proceedings.

Here she describes some of the frustrations and difficulties she has encountered concerning the parent/lawyer relationship. We agree that it is important for professionals to always be aware of how confusing proceedings can seem to their lay clients and just how anxious and afraid their clients can be.

The importance of clear explanations

One of the problems we are finding is that some of the legal aid solicitors appear to only be going through the motions and tend to forget they are dealing with people who do not know their rights, the legal system or the practices and expectations of social care. I have taken on cases where some of the basics of the legal process is little, if not at all understood. From many of those whom I have assisted, they have often come back saying to me “why did my lawyer not tell me that” or “if only someone had explained that to me”. Whilst an explanation of lack of time, high case loads and resources can often be blamed, an excuse already used by social care, it is but yet just another nail in the coffin of the family facing forced permanent separation.

Some of the lawyers I have spoken to about this have admitted they tend to forget they are dealing with laymen not to mention most of these families are traumatised and can barely see the wood for the trees.

So how do you fix this? I do not know, but what I can say is the role I often fulfil in these cases, is acting as an intermediate between client and solicitor. Whilst this is unique and I do not know how many do what I do, it works and alleviates the solicitor having to deal with incessant queries. To make the relationship work, there has to be a good understanding and working relationship between myself and the solicitor. We each know each other’s boundaries and we keep each other in check whilst the client benefits knowing that all areas are covered and their best interests are always put first. Whether this can be allowed as an extension of the role of a Mackenzie Friend is something only the relevant law firm and courts can consider.

The benefits of working with a lay advisor

There are many benefits in pursuing this course of action. Just some pluses is that not only does the MF learn more about the system the correct way to help those who cannot afford representation, but the solicitor gets a different set of eyes as well as the benefit of having someone help weed out the irrelevant and highlight pertinent stuff that may otherwise be missed or dismissed by the carer.

Whilst many solicitors will cringe at the very thought of the aforementioned suggestion, it must be remembered that whilst solicitors have long fought for individuals in court, the majority will never have had the experience of being the subject to care proceedings and all that that entails, whilst many MF on the other hand have and can be considered experts in their own rights. Please do not mistake this for plugging MF’s but would it not be beneficial to gain access to ALL experts in the field to help your client case? I am by no means challenging the role of solicitors, what I am challenging is the very real perception of an invisible insurmountable wall between client and their family law solicitors.

Simple things like, open communication, access to information or at least be informed that there is information and support out there and where to find it.

The biggest of them all is building a trusting relationship with their client because let’s face it, whilst many consider this as just their job and yet another case, for the client it is their worst nightmare come true and they are terrified.

Access to counselling

All I can further add is that it would be very helpful to families who are the subjects of care proceedings to ensure they have access to counselling as PTSD is very seldom considered, if at all. All we are asking from solicitors is for just a few minutes to consider what they would want if they found themselves in unfamiliar surrounding fighting for their and their families lives and then use that list to help their clients.

Recording interactions between social worker and parents

Is this becoming the norm? And if so, what are the consequences?

What is the impact of this practice on the working relationship between parents and social workers? Is this a good thing or do you find it concerning?

You may also be interested in this blog post by suesspiciousminds on the subject.

Section 36 Data Protection Act

The Data Protection Act makes it clear that individuals do not need the consent of professionals to record meetings/visits, as the information being discussed in that situation is personal to them and therefore exempt from the data protection principles. There may be problems if the meeting is going to deal with issues relating to a third party.

Update – Louise Tickle writes in the Guardian on 17th June 2015.

Louise Tickle, who attended the Child Protection Conference on 1st June, organised by the Transparency Project, was interested to hear comments from the parents about recording their meetings with social workers. This prompted comments from the lawyers present that they could see no objections to this practice. You can read her article here.

Recording and more specifically covertly recording

This is a guest post by Jacque Courtnage who runs the TaKen UK website which campaigns against the wrongful removal of children by the State. She has experience of the system both as a parent and a lay advisor to other parents in the family court. Here are her views about what appears to be the growing practice of parents recording their interactions with social workers.

is becoming the norm and in some cases is being accepted as evidence by the courts. This is matter that does need further consideration and exploration by more of the courts.

I say this for a number of reasons as I have been present on many occasions where professionals, and in particular – social workers, have relayed pertinent information to the parents/carers and have then denied all knowledge of having said these things whilst giving evidence. I refer to conversations where either social workers have given the carers reassurance that no action will be taken or they have no concerns, and then when their witness statement has been produced, the complete opposite is stated. Because many of these parents all come before the courts disadvantaged, they are considered to be lying.

On the opposite side, we have also had social workers being aggressive and intimidating to carers and indeed some of the children involved, and when complaints are lodged, the parent is considered to only be doing so for vindictive reasons. Again the same with telephone calls. A lot of misinformation is being populated to parents by some social workers to ensure they either miss contacts or behave in certain ways that can then later be used against the parents in court.

I have attended many meetings as a mediator where communications have broken down between parents and LA. I have challenged where things were stated as fact but the professional would not go on record with their statement. I have challenged some of these individuals when they were giving evidence and their uncanny manner to feign amnesia is laughable. Had some of these things been recorded, many cases would perhaps be less detrimental to families involved.

Having said all of that, many parents also do lie. If recordings became the accepted norm, it would ensure there is no miscommunication or fabrication of events and that everyone involved will be forced to take responsibility for their actions and accountability will be able to become part of the transparency needed. If the individuals have nothing to hide and are behaving in a manner they would consider to be lawful, then there should not be any problem. The UK is full of CCTV that records everyone’s movements without the public going on a full riot, so why can this not then be rolled out to include public law areas?

Simply put, it protects everyone from unsavoury behaviour and starts to help making the system work the way it was meant to. There is just too much suppositions, speculations and individual personal perspectives involved in family law. Taking this to the next level, recordings will also help diffuse a problem as emotions are always heightened at times of intervention, and much is either misunderstood or misinterpreted. The recordings will allow for the individual who is aggrieved at the time, the opportunity to review the recording and see if they had perhaps initially overreacted.

The other matter is the recording of hearings and judgments. Whilst there must be legislation as to the use and availability of the recordings, the issue of getting transcripts is a rather problematic. Despite Munby’s PD on judgment transcripts, these are still not being produced many weeks and months later. Many families involved in care cases do not have the finances to afford the exorbitant costs of transcribing 3 to 5 days Fact Finding hearings let alone a judgment. Recordings of hearings can be used to help progress cases for the Court of Appeal or indeed when they carer acts as as litigant in person because they do not qualify for funding.

A view from a family barrister

For discussions about the pros and cons of recording interactions from the family bar, please see this useful post on Pink Tape. There are serious concerns about recording children and a warning that this can often back fire on the person responsible for the recording, particularly if the child is distressed. But with regard to recording interactions between parents and professionals, this has the potential to be helpful:

There are lots of reasons why a parent’s understanding, experience or perspective of a meeting might be very different from the professional – they may well not be a “reliable” historian in any forensic sense simply by virtue of the fact that emotions are high and the stakes are high also. But the truth of the matter is that sometimes social workers are also less than reliable – sometimes even untruthful.

I know that many parents would suggest that social workers are routinely and regularly untruthful, such is their desire to meet their targets to have children removed and secure their adoption bonus. Leaving that aside for one minute (I don’t think that is really what happens) I have met plenty of social workers who are just not great with detail, who don’t recognise their own emotional involvement and how it alters their own perspective and responses to a situation, and who are see, record and retell the history in an overly negative light. I have met social workers who seem to be prepared to gloss over the specifics of a particular conversation for the “greater good”, which is to secure the outcome that they genuinely think is best for the child.

I have sometimes suspected dishonesty on the part of a social worker but have rarely proved it. There are cases in which social workers have been caught out lying, but they are infrequent. Here is a notorious example of a case where the honesty of a social worker became a really big issue : Bath & North East Somerset Council v A Mother & Ors [2008] EWHC B10 (Fam) (22 December 2008). Here is one recent example of where a recording was crucial : Man Wins Compensation After Recording Saves Him From Prison.

The view from CAFCASS

See para 2.27 from the Cafcass Operating Framework

We should have nothing to fear from covert recording. Our attitude should be, “I am doing my job and I have nothing to hide. I can explain why I said what I said or why I did what I did”. This is within the spirit of transparency in the family courts. We should always be transparent in our work, to meet contemporary expectations, including being able to defend whatever we say or write in a court under cross-examination, because we are working to a professional standard on behalf of a child. In this sense, we should expect that everything we say or write could become public knowledge

Some service users ask in advance of an interview whether it can be recorded. Advice on handling advance requests from service users to record interviews is available on the Cafcass Legal intranet page. In cases where no advance request has been made and the practitioner subsequently becomes aware that they have been recorded without their knowledge, they should tell the court. In some cases, however, the practitioner may not become aware of the recording until the service user presents the recording, or a transcript of it, at court. In such situations, the practitioner should make clear to the court that the recording was made without their knowledge. The practitioner may ask for the opportunity to listen to the recording or read the transcript before it is admitted into evidence, if the court is minded to take this step. It is a matter for the court to decide whether the recording or transcript can be included in evidence.