Domestic adoption with international aspects - advice please? (passport issues)

[Rumpelstilzkin]

We have domestically adopted DS. DS was born and resident in the UK but did not have British citizenship - both his birth parents are from abroad. EU country which is member of the Hague convention, let's call it country B. DS has citizenship from country B and holds a passport from country B, which is in his birth name.

Country B allows dual citizenship, and we found some information online specifying that if citizens from country B should be adopted elsewhere, and acquire a new citizenship by virtue of being adopted, they could still retain their citizenship from country B.

We have applied for a British passport for DS. His claim to British citizenship is not being questioned (adopted in the UK by British parents). However the passport office has refused to issue DS with a passport as long as he holds a passport (from any country) in a different name; for security reasons.

We have now talked to country B's consulate and have been informed that they cannot change DS' name in his B-passport. Because, they say, the adoption needs to be recognised by a court in country B first. They say that as far as they are concerned, there has been no adoption. They have proposed that we get a lawyer from country B and submit an application for adoption in a court in country B.

So my first question is: I thought that by virtue of the Hague convention, any British adoption would be recognised by other Hague members. Is that not true? Is it true that we need to go through a (probably lengthy and expensive) legal process in country B in order to get the adoption recognised there?

My second question is: If so, can anyone recommend a lawyer who understands about international adoption, or point me in the right direction. I feel quite lost, don't know where to start!

And my third question: Does anyone know if there is any way to convince the British passport office to issue a passport for DS whilst all the above is still ongoing? I know that when people change names e.g. through marriage, they can encounter similar problems, and there seem to be no easy solutions. However I have also seen that name changes due to being adopted are/should not actually be classified as name changes, by the passport office. So that might make it a different situation. Is it possible that the officer dealing with our application falsely applied a name-change policy whereas it shouldn't be applied in adoption cases, and if so, how do we get them to acknowledge their mistake?

And now to the next set of problems:

Country B's consulate have told us that DS' passport from country B is absolutely valid for travel. Seeing as the adoption has not legally happened according to country B's laws/courts, DS' name is still his birth name, he is still the same 'legal person' as far as they are concerned. However they cautioned that if we were to travel with DS, we would need to have evidence that we had parental rights. They suggested that we should take an apostilled copy of the adoption order with us whenever we did travel, in order to convince border control that this child who has a passport with a different surname and different nationality than us, is indeed our child.
This strikes me as odd. If the adoption is not recognised outside the UK, as they seem to be saying, then surely DS is not our son according to other countries' laws, so bringing along the adoption order would convince no-one. If however the adoption order IS valid, then he is no longer (as his passport shows) but rather he is legally now ; so although he would be travelling with his legal parents, he would be travelling with an invalid passport.

This is giving me headaches. Can anyone help, or point me in the right direction please? I feel overwhelmed. Needless to say our LA never mentioned that DS' nationality/passport could pose any problems/incur any costs; and now that we are post-AO I doubt that they will be feeling very helpful. In fact DS' ex-SW said that any problems we had were our fault (for being honest with the passport office and informing them of the existence of DS' country B passport), and suggested we needed a lawyer (to deal with the British passport office).

Thanks in advance.

Sorry you haven't had any responses. I guess none of us have much idea about this but I feel for you. Have you posted in legal?

Sounds very complicated and I'm sorry you're going through this.

This website deals with parental abduction abroad - which I know is NOT the case in your situation! - but you might be able to find a lawyer on it who could help you.

Good luck!

www.reunite.org/specialistlawyers.asp

Wow, what a headache, poor you. I would get a lawyer on to it, if you can possibly afford it?

Alternatively, is it possible to use the B passport until it expires, the he won't have a passport in old name, and therefore UKPA shouldn't have that objection?

You would need to take the adoption cert. However, in my experience it is only the UK border you will have to show it, and the border guards are so unused to anyone actually having papers to show (they like to just give you a lecture on how you ought to have papers, and having papers interrupts their little power speech), they'll not have a clue anyway. But could be a stress.

Do you feel very strongly that he should keep his country B nationality alongside his British? If it is EU presumably it doesn't convey any particular advantages that the British passport doesn't entitle him to?

Lawsociety.org.uk has a find a solicitor function where you can search by region and area of practice eg; immigration.

Alternatively is there any kind of adoption charity that might be able to help?

I can answer one small part of it.
I am pretty sure that holding passport in birth name, plus apostilled document of adoption would be acceptable travel document. But I would probably (unless I had it is writing from a lawyer) not want to travel outside EU until it was sorted.

My dh is Dutch, and we were always told that kids could hold dual nationality from UK perspective. Unfortunately the Dutch government doesn't allow it, so they just have British passports. They retain the right to Dutch passports which they could claim at any point, but they would have to give up their UK ones in order to do that.
That was how it was 12 years ago. It is possible that that is no longer true and now UK have same policy?

Could you adopt him, have his new name in the British passport, and then subsequently apply for a new passport from his birth country with his new name?

That would be too simple, wouldn't it? I am missing something…

My DSs are in the same situation as steppemum's children - Germany does not allow dual citizenship.

He is already legally adopted in the UK where he was resident at the time?

I would be tempted to renounce his citizenship of country B and send back his passport and reapply for his UK passport.

I don;t think applying for a new passport from country B in his new name would work - he will have to prove why he's entitled to a passport from B and anything which proves this eg birth cert, birth parents birth cert etc will be in his birth name.

I'm afraid unless you want to take costly legal advice I would give up the idea of a passport from country B. If country B is a hague country then they should take a translated and apostilled adoption cert for his passport for country B but it doesn;t sound like they will. So they either haven;t ratified Hague or they are ignoring it. Either way I' think just sticking with UK passport and giving up country B's is the only way.

UK allows dual citizenship - my UK and Country K adopted child has both passports to the UK authorities full knowledge the difference is that his country K passport is in his current name as he was legally adopted there before being legally adopted here.

I believe that if you wish to retain dual citizenship you'll need to go through the adoption registration process in country B, too - it should be an admin process, essentially, but you'll need to complete it so that it's recognised.

Thank you so much everyone, this has been incredibly helpful.

For some reason it hadn't even occurred to me to seek advice from adoption charities!

And it is great to have some pointers regarding where to start finding a lawyer. I wouldn't even have known which area of law I was looking for.

And it is good to hear that the adoption registration process should essentially be an admin process - we have been led to believe that it would be tantamount to a whole new adoption process.

It looks like we will have to decide between renouncing his country B passport/renouncing or at least risking his claim to citizenship, or going down the route of registering the adoption in country B, then applying for a passport from country B in the new name, then re-applying for a British passport. The former definitely does sound easier and cheaper, and more certain!

One thing that is still confusing me is that the country B officials have always been talking about translating/apostilling the 'adoption order' rather than the 'adoption certificate'. Does anyone know anything/can explain?

If we choose the 'easy' path, I have one worry: I suppose the British passport office will want some evidence (rather than just a letter from us stating that we have returned DS' country B passport to the embassy). What if we send the country-B passport to the embassy applying for it to be invalidated, but they fail to give us any written confirmation? I suppose I will have to ask the British passport office what kind of evidence they would accept, and then ask country B if they could please provide that. But meanwhile we would be left with no passport at all, until we get that confirmation.

We could choose the more complicated path, and meanwhile travel with the country B passport and apostilled adoption certificate, as some of you have suggested should be ok. Here I worry though: The adoption certificate does not show DS' birth name, just his new name. It clearly shows that he is our son, but it doesn't create a definite link to that person who has that passport. (The adoption order does.) It just seems like asking for trouble...

You could try the inter country adoption agency in London - they will have loads of experience and could point you in the right direction of a lawyer

I doubt the IAC will have a clue - its a very unusual position but Madaunt is right they can probably point you in the direction of a lawyer. It uses to be easier to find a lawyer with some experience if intercountry adoption issues but with the massive decline in intercountry adoption there aren't many obvious choices.

I'm not even convinced that a "normal" lawyer with intercountry adoption experience would help here!

DD travelled on birth country passport - also EU country - but once adoption was finalised (in birth country which is where i live and work) old passport ceased to be legal as her name no longer existed and her birth (ID) number was changed. When we travelled before she had a passport with my surname on it we also had to travel with court papers to prove I had legal custody of her, both for getting into UK and getting into birth country. She now travels on her birth country passport and it has my surname now. Still causes issues as I travel on a Brit passport! Is there an organisation in the birth country which either assists with domestic adoptions (eg a charity) that can advise you or a government office/dept which oversees international adoptions. If so they may be able to help you. Failing that, try the British Embassy in the child's country of origin to see if they have any lawyer recommendations. TBH you may also be better trying the American embassy there as they normally are very good at have English speaking lawyers they can recommend.

Adoption order - is likely meaning the court papers relating to the legal transfer of parental rights to you and the termination of birth parents rights We have court papers and no adoption certificate.

The adoption order is the order made by the court-and it is this order that they would want to uphold in their jurisdiction

The certificate is the new birth certificate that is issued in it's long form.

The passport office have some people who are more knowledgeable than others, this wont be the first time that this has come up and it may be worth seeing if someone more senior can go through the issues with you over the phone.

We adopted our DCs from a Hague country though they were both born abroad and have passports from their birth country in their new names as they were issued after their adoption in their country of birth.

When their adoption order equivalent came through in their country of birth the agency (not our UK approving agency - the overseas agency) applied for the Hague order, proved that all the Hague procedures had applied to them etc. etc. and we got a Hague Certificate.

Once the Hague Certificate is issued then the other countries in the Hague Convention have to acknowledge that the adoption is legal, and no further re-adoption needs to take place. In our case, this meant that we then got the Adoption Certificate in the UK and following on from that we took their overseas passports, Hague certificate and UK long form adoption certificate to the passport office to get their UK passports issued.

They needed to see their overseas passports but these were in the same name (however had they not been e.g. had the overseas adoption agency applied for them in their birth names like LAs sometimes do for LAC, they would have had the adoption order/court order from overseas to show that they had been adopted and changed their names).

In your case you'll need to do the reverse. You need to get a Hague Certificate from the UK I would imagine. A family law specialist in the UK should be able to help with that. We have had some dealings with a specialist and I can PM you a name/firm.

Then you need to get that recognised in the courts/bureaucracy in the overseas country. If the country of origin is one that deals with overseas adoption e.g. there are children adopted from Romania, Bulgaria etc. then an agency that deals with adoption from those countries should be able to recommend a lawyer that deals with overseas families. It shouldn't be a court matter but rather a birth certificate matter but it may mean court.

At that point he will have a new registration document (which may look exactly like a birth certificate, our two's do) from the country of origin which will enable you to get a new passport in the new name (we only got this one, nothing pre-adoption, but we could have gone along and got a new passport if we'd had an old one).