Adoption hearing

[Cheltenhamgirl]

Hi all, we have our hearing this week but I have a feeling the birth parents will contest what will happen in this case? Any help or advice will help. Thank you.

[fasparent]

Know and feel for your concerns but matters of this nature are beyond your control, best too wait for the judgment out come, never know who are watching these threads. best keep all confidential.

[Lilka]

It's very common, and it's nearly always worrying. However as far as I know there hasn't been a case where any birth parent has succeeded.

What will happen is that (assuming you're in England and Wales) on the date of the first hearing, the birth parent/s will want to apply for permission to contest the making of an adoption order. They can't actually contest the making of an order unless they get permission. Providing they do manage to show up to the hearing and get some evidence together (if they come to the hearing with nothing and plead their case, they might be given a few weeks to get some evidence together and get representation if they need it)...to get the Judge's permission they will have to demonstrate a significant enough change in their circumstances. It's pretty rare for BP's to get this permission. If they don't that's the end and the adoption will be finalised.

If they do it proceeds to another hearing, and this is when they are actually contesting. This is the stage the rest of the cases fall down...no BP has 'won' at this stage, no matter how many hearings or appeals they've had (and even being allowed more than a couple of hearings is very rare). They not only have to persuade the Judge of their change in circumstances, but the childs best interests also come into play, and the childs interests are going to be served in nearly all conceivable cases by remaining with their parents where they are settled and loved, not uprooting them again.

So concerning and nerve wracking as it can be, this happens a lot and in the end it has so far never succeeded, which I hope you find reassuring. Also it only rarely gets passed the first stage, so at most normally only delays the order slightly, by a couple of weeks maybe.

[OurMiracle1106]

I am a birth parent and though at adoption order was in a much better place to look after my son I looked at a simple question "could I give him more?" I consented with a heavy heart and a lot of tears.

However if I was to fall pregnant I would fight To prevent that baby from being placed in care now and I feel I would have a much better chance of maintaining that child in my care

[islurpmyspaghetti]

I have been fretting about this, Lilka, so thank you. I have copied your post and saved it so I can refer back to it when I get anxious about this issue.

[Lilka]

There are quite a few court judgements online about opposing adoption orders - they make for interesting reading, and for reassurance as well really. I'm reading one right now which OP or you spaghetti night be intersted in reading (it's here), because it's relatively short but the judge very clearly explains what the birth parents needed to do in order to ask permission to oppose, how he decides whether or not to give them permission (ie. what they need to convince him of) and basically exactly what's going on at this stage of proceedings. There are other very clear court judgements on the same issue as well, this one just struck me as being easy to understand as far as court judgements go! You'll notice that in this case as in so many others, the only practical consequence is that the adoption order has been put back by about 7/8 weeks.

I personally think that given that in all probability 50%+ of all applications are opposed, that social services are still doing a very poor job of explaining the process to prospective adopters, and how it works, so causing a lot of unecessary stress, worry and confusion. Parents will nearly always be worried and stressed in this situation, but there's no need for the confusion.

[islurpmyspaghetti]

I totally agree, Lilka, and thank you for posting this link. I know that I'm fretting unnecessarily over this issue but I absolutely agree that we needed more information on this from our LA. I've added it to the ever-growing list of advice to anyone that approaches me about the agony and ecstacy of adoption.

[Cheltenhamgirl]

Thank you all for your comments. Without giving much away it looks like we are having to wait until next month