Can birth parents successfully contend AO?

[user1479136681]

We've waited 7 months to submit our AO. The delay was for various reasons:

• We struggled at first and didn't want to lose our very helpful social worker
• We spent ages waiting for documents like birth cert, various court documents etc from social services.
• Also we wanted to get things in writing to ensure contact with LO's multiple siblings before proceeding, as social workers were variously helpful and unsure about even doing postbox contact
• Honestly the form is just so time-consuming and complicated that it's taken us a long time to finish :(

I've heard from LO's social worker (who probably shouldn't be telling us this much) that his birth mum seems to be turning her life around really. She's split up with dad, whose violent tendencies were the main reason they lost custody, and she's been able to see some of her older kids again. I'm now really panicking she might successfully contest! After all this time I can't imagine being without him, then I feel guilty because that's how she must feel all the time.

There have been a couple of threads on this lately but I feel like I want to reply anyway! Someone else may have more knowledge about this......I’m not a social worker....

Each child has to get a placement order (I think) which would mean they are able to be placed for adoption. That has go through the courts and they are very careful to approve this. I believe that if the birth parents were going to be able to have their children back, the decision for them to go back would be made then. I am currently going through the process to adopt a biological sibling, and essentially we are waiting for the court proceedings to be finished. Whilst I’m sure there are cases of it being done quicker, our future child will be about 7-8 months by the time they will come to us, so effectively the birth parents would have had that long to make the changes necessary.

Fantastic that they are making the changes now - as that may mean they can keep future children which would be amazing (although confusing for your child/children but I can’t see how a judge would say that it would be beneficial to the child to return now.

Also, the changes that someone can actually make in 7-8 months even a year, aren’t necessarily going to be long enough to prove the change is sustained - how does the judge know that they won’t simply revert?

I said on the other thread I do think it’s a bit cruel as realistically they don’t have a chance of getting their children back. I do understand the idea of wanting the records to reflect that they fought, but I feel this isn’t always explained to birth parents properly.

There may be multiple court hearings and I have heard that currently judges are reluctant to approve things, as with covid most are online and so therefore they have to give birth parents more chances to get online and allow for the fact that they may say they couldn’t get onto the zoom call or whatever format they use.

I hope you can manage to stay calm as I know it’s very stressful - but please do stay calm as there really are no cases of children going back after being settled in an adoptive home. That said I do remember making plans of moving far away and changing our names...........

I was the approved family for a match to a little one early this year then told the birth mum was attesting the process as she had made significant changes to behaviour (for over 2 years) so sadly had to withdraw as was told by social worker that 2years change would go in her favour. I'm guessing the length of time the change has taken place and continuing does matter.

@HIPPYCHICK74

That must have been very disappointing for you.But its a very different situation to children who are in settled adoptive families. Its unheard of for a child to be removed from an adoptive family

My DD's BP sound like they are in a similar position to yours. When I applied for the adoption order her BM announced at the first hearing that she had left BD and wanted DD back. She then made a formal statement seeking leave to oppose the making of the AO. I have been v stressed about this but it went back to court today and leave was refused. BD has said he will appeal so no AO yet but I feel far less worried. It is v v rare for leave to be granted and even rarer for the AO to be granted. During the stressful worrying time I read a lot of case law and I think that the only times the adopters were unsuccessful was when another birth family member came into the picture, e.g. in one birth father had been incorrectly identified. So in cases like ours the BP have a mountain to climb in terms of proving sustained, significant changes and also it being in the child's best interests to be moved. Good luck