More offensive TV!

[Velvet1973]

Lowry turner on The Wright Stuff just now talking about the current case of 10 month baby being removed from adoptive parents to go to grandparents. When challenged that the adoptive parents have raised the baby as their own with all the sleepless nights etc since it was 1 day old, she quickly retorted that "it wasn't theirs though! "

[JaneDonne]

Sadly it looks as though legally in that case that is a fact although we could debate belonging in terms of relationships forever.

Was it a fta case? Very very sad. I can only imagine the hurt.

Not sure we can expect too much from lowri Turner either tbh. Or anyone who thinks children can be owned outright.

Worth getting in touch with programme makers if you feel strongly?

[whydoicare]

Yes, this was a foster to adopt placement. The adoptive parents went to court when it became apparent that birth family members had been suitably assessed for SGO and they were going to lose the child. Devastating for them but it does reinforce the risks of fostering to adopt placements which are never guaranteed.

There are many issues here but 2 that jump out for me are:-

• there was a paternity test done and it confirmed the birth fathers identity was exactly who all had claimed it to be. Why were his parents not assessed prior to the f2a placement? Surely the LA should have exhausted at least immediate family members before going down the risky route of foster to adopt? It's not like a distant cousin popped up at the last second. These were paternal grandparents and were assessed 2 months post placement
  

• Much as I sympathise with the adopters, I'm not sure that fighting this in court was ever going to get them anywhere and strikes me as showing they never fully bought into the downsides. The risk of f2a is that adoption is the last resort and may not happen. The judge made clear, they had no more rights than any foster carer.
  

Should there be more robust counselling and guidance before this sort of placement for the adopters above and beyond the current adoption preparation. We were offered f2a as an option with no specific training or unique support and it can appear to be a wonderful chance to parent a new born baby for many people who desire that experience.
I've said it before but I really think the legalities around matching, placements and adoption in general need to be more fully brought to the table during the process.

[Velvet1973]

The case itself was not the issue it was more that Matthew Wright said to her "but they've loved this child like their own" and she was so blunt and blatant that it wasn't their child as they hadn't given birth to it!
In regards to why paternal grandparents weren't considered and assessed it was my understanding it was because the parents relinquished the baby, it had not been removed by LA so they were following the wishes of the parents.
I do think in this instance the judgement was wrong. I believe as it was and still is I believe the parents wishes to relinquish the child they should remain with the adoptive parents. There should however be a direct contact arrangement in place with the paternal grandparents.

[Italiangreyhound]

WhydoIcare Re Should there be more robust counselling and guidance before this sort of placement for the adopters above and beyond the current adoption preparation. I think that is a very significant factor, better training for all.

But I agree with Velvet1973 if as Velvet says ... In regards to why paternal grandparents weren't considered and assessed it was my understanding it was because the parents relinquished the baby, it had not been removed by LA so they were following the wishes of the parents.

If this is the case my understanding in law is that birth family do not trump adopters. Birth family only get to come in and take a child if the birth parents cannot look after the child and birth family are considered (and found to be suitable after checking) that they can look after the baby/child. So legally the adoptive parents have as much right to parent the child as the grandparents (if the birth father also relinquished the child) and if they have cared for the child since birth they would morally have (IMHO) have more right. So the comment "it wasn't theirs though! " goes for the grandparents too.

So I agree totally with Velvet.

[whydoicare]

I've linked to the judgement below if anyone wants to read.
As far as it states there, the parents signed a section 20 agreement allowing the child to be fostered but it doesn't state they were relinquishing and they both have specified they support the SGO route rather than adoption.
www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2015/983.html


However, I totally agree it's wrong to simply ignore adopters as not being parents because we didn't give birth. So many people still talk about real mums as if we are somehow babysitters.

[Italiangreyhound]

Thanks whydoicare so they did not agree to adoption.

IMHO I think this not only makes the baby not suitable for foster to adopt, as time has clearly proven, but it also makes this known from the outset!

I know parents may feel they need some sort of 'cooling' off period and must be in a high degree of inner turmoil etc, but parents have about 7 months of knowing they are pregnant, normally, to decide what to do and the authorities should not allow this degree of ambiguity. In some ways we are making it too easy for parents to not decide in cases like this. Young babies do not have the luxury of allowing months of uncertainty to pass, we do know that now.

If the couple felt the father's parents were the option why not ask them outright and not let their child be placed in foster care for a period of time at such an impressionable and significant age?

IMHO this case has four victims - the child, raised initially by people they will not see again (presumably - and I know this is sometimes unavoidable in fostering cases but presumably in this case was not; the foster to adopt parents are victims; and the fourth is the British adoption system which takes a further knock as people view adoption and its process as less valid than birth parenting!

No one would say that adoptive parents should exceed the rights of suitable birth parents but this is not the case, this is birth parents who have abdicated their responsibility.

The authorities are complicit in this in that they allowed a baby not freed for adoption to be placed in a foster to adopt situation. Utter negligence!

[Velvet1973]

Thanks whydoicare, that makes more sense now! And a little less concerning in regards to court judgements. Alas not in judgements from LA's though!

[whydoicare]

Really sad for all involved - I can't even begin to imagine how the adopters must feel. I think the theory of fostering to adopt is fantastic but it has the potential to destroy adopters.
I hope they are being supported and not left to fend for themselves.

[JaneDonne]

Well we can all hope but in my experience of las I'm guessing the support will extend to someone sitting in your living room eating biscuits and finding eight ways to say 'I did tell you this could happen' :(

[whydoicare]

Jane, sad but true.

[incywincybitofa]

I think though parents who relinquish have a cooling off period and the birth father used the option to change his mind about the plan and so put forward his parents
I can completely understand why the couple might desperately want to fight this but it shouldn't have come to the stress and trauma of months of proceedings in a case that though tragic was almost inevitably going to go against them in the circumstances.