To think that forced adoption is the best thing for many children

[ReallyTired]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31089412

Clearly taking a child into care or complusory adoption should be a last restort. However I don't think that there is a fundermental right to be a parent. There is a fundermental right for a child to have a decent childhood. Parents should not be numerous chances to get parenting right. Baby P is a prime example of a baby who should have been taken into care at birth.

I feel the secrecy of the family courts is an issue. In many cases there are strong reasons why someone should never be allowed to have care of a child. We need a way that there can be an appeals proceedure that puts the right of the child first.

moan I understand your point regarding openness in a family court but I also wanted to point out the need and right for children's anonymity. My child is adopted and people are naturally curious - I would prefer people couldn't simply access the unpleasant, private details of my son's life and birth family via court reports.

I completely agree with you OP.

For every heartbroken parent who tried hard but couldn't quite get their act together and had their child/ren removed against their will there are probably 100 children who are physically and emotionally damaged for life because no-one had the balls to step in to remove them sooner, in spite of all the signs that they were in a very toxic or chaotic environment.

MrsDV - I was horrified to discover I recognised someone I knew in one of the "anonymised" court reports. The details were horrible and quite upsetting to realise that someone "normal" I knew was capable of such thing. The mistake was in reporting the country of origin of one of the parties and the local authority. It was an unusual combination.

One of the parties who was a minor at the time but would now be about 20 would be absolutely mortified that anyone knew the details which were comprehensively reported. It was bad enough that the mother concerned was jailed for a criminal act.

It really made me think twice about the reporting of family law cases - the only people who were likely to suffer were the children.

Kew- I think that poster is from a different country, not the UK.

Yes I do think that forced adoption is a better option. But I do wonder why it's such a rarity - very very few countries allow it. I'm not sure what the arguments in favour of long- term foster care/ orphanages are, but the UK is unusual in allowing forced adoption

We aren't really a major rarity. I know we hear all the time some hyperbole that the UK is about the only country in the whole wide world which allows for adoption without parental consent, but when you actually look, you can easily find plenty of others, it's just that 'campaigners against injustice' (ahem) like to pretend that any country that isn't Germany or Ireland is automatically a worthless country that must be ignored.

The USA and Canada are the most obvious countries to start with, we hae broadly similar systems, including adoption without parental consent. But then you can go South and find countries in Southern America, a couple more countries in Western Europe*, more in Eastern Europe and Russia of course, I'm not too sure about Asia and Africa. I'll look it up!

*The ECHR have listed cases to do with parental rights which is useful - I quickly found adoption-without-parental-consent cases from Italy, Portugal and Croatia. And another case from Spain which was a bit different in that the father proved his paternity but then the court granted adoption anyway despite his objections because it said he hadn't "discharged the duties inherent in parental authority". Those are obviously just cases which came to the attention of the ECHR.

The reason the uk has forced adoption is because it provides financial and social support to parents who may be vulnerable. Other countries who don't offer this don't need to force adoption: in a sense they force the parents' hands.

I would urge all posters to read the contents of the link that Kew has provided at the top of this page. This should demonstrate to people who are opposed to a child being adopted, when he has been ill treated or abused, just how much consideration goes into the Judge's decision (after hearing all of the evidence and cross examinations) related to the child's future.

These cases often take up approx. 5 days of court time, and oral evidence can take up a fair chunk of time, but cross-examinations can last for 3 or 4 hours at a time. There have in the past been so many similar threads, and many irrational posters, talking nonsense about forced adoption and the fact that Judges merely "rubber stamp" the views of the social workers. I think anyone reading the link, will see that this is absolutely not the case.

This term forced adoption really means a court making the decision that a child's best interests would be met by an adoptive placement, with which the birth-parents are not in agreement. FWIW I have never been involved in a case (and they must run into the hundreds) where the birthparents have agreed that the child should be adopted. As can be seen from the content of the link provided, on occasions members of the extended family often put themselves forward to care for a child removed from birthparents and they are assessed as to their suitability (or otherwise) Indeed it is the duty of the LA when considering his future care to find out if there are any members of the extended family who are suitable. Again if you read the contents of the link you will see that members of the extended family and their suitability to care for the child are given serious and in depth consideration and the Judge at the end of it all, makes a decision based on the written reports, the oral evidence, and cross examinations, and gives in great detail his reasons for making a particular Order. So much for some ludicrous claims that have been made on these threads that Judges merely "rubber stamp" these cases.

I am concerned however that these judgements are available on the internet as I am sure (as others have said) that people could be identified, and this I think is a serious breach of confidentiality.

If anyone is interested, here is the CPR take on forced adoption. I do think there is legtimate concern that there is a 'push' for adoption at the expense of thinking what individual children need.

www.childprotectionresource.org.uk/forced-adoption/

If you are interested in issues of opening up (or not) the family courts, I am also involved in this project which I think is very worthwhile.
transparencyproject.org.uk

You do know that you can read anonymised versions of judgements in these cases at law libraries? Anyone who is saying adoptions against the will of the parents should never happen should just read a few of those.

Support and rebuilding families is obviously the best option, but sometimes simply nothing else than removing the child will do.

I have just posted on a Facebook group the judgment about the women who is going to be sterilised as she has had six children in five years and is at risk of dying if she gets pregnant again.

The response is that the judgement can't be trusted and that crucial details have been kept out of it. People are saying that the SW have acted out of 'spite' and the woman could have been supported to keep her child. Even a quick read of the judgment shows you that, sadly, just isn't true.

a lot of people believe what they want to believe. It doesn't matter how much I argue and how many judgements I post (and believe me I post a lot)

This is the judgement about the forced sterilisation.
www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCOP/2015/4.html

it is a very sad case. But I am bewildered as to why people are arguing that this decision hasn't been very carefully analysed and made on evidence. Most of them in fact won't read the judgment but just keep posting that the SW are Nazis.

I've no idea who they are but interestingly, the council rung me a few hours later asking me to send them the logs we were asked to make of the stuff we heard and whether we wanted the recording equipment (someone has rung them asking for hard evidence, I suspect - fair enough. I'm sure we can provide it). And no mention of them coming out today. So I doubt it was housing. I doubt they employ that many people in the ASB team.

Bloke in Jag wasn't a social worker. Too well dressed. ;o) And car way too expensive. As my husband said, probably a bailiff. I have a mate who used to be a bailiff. She dressed to the nines. She said it gave her the advantage when she knocked on doors.

Ehric, no 'parroting'. That word implies it is someone else's story. It's not. It happened to a child I taught. The time I worked in schools made me dislike social workers as I saw them let kids down again and again. (Not turning up to meetings even though we paid £150 for a supply teacher so I could have non-contact time to meet with them... that happened to me several times, as well. Or that woman who was positively joyful at the thought of finding a 'better fit' for a child who she barely knew, who was very happy where she was). And if you read it ore carefully, you'd see I said clearly it was years ago and I would hope things have changed. But I suspect they haven't. We once had social services dump a child back IN a house where abuse was going on. Despite the mother dumping the child at SS, saying she couldn't cope.

I mentioned what happened to the little girl whose mum killed dad, because it was an experience that made me realise how great foster parents can be - and how children's lives are (or were in those days) devastated on the whim of a person who barely remembered their name or knew truly who they were.

Repeat: I hope things are better now. But as the kids next door to me seem to have been left in an horrendous situation, I suspect not.

Spero - I could understand if people had tried to read judgments but gave up. They are detailed and include lots of references to laws and past cases, and so on, and maybe people unfamiliar with how judgments are written can find the style is not one that sits well with their literary experience, IYSWIM.

A good judge will always make sure that all the relevant details are included in their judgment, because their decision is life-changing for the child, and also because they all know that the judgment will be meticulously scrutinised in any appeal.

But to not even try to read the judgment yet still comment about it is infuriating. There is so much information on the internet these days, instantly available while sitting comfortably on the sofa, yet some people don't want to make the effort to educate themselves even if they're pointed in the right direction.

A relatively well-known saying popped into my mind when reading your last couple of posts: "The answers are there. You just have to know where to look." That's from the first episode of the X-Files, and some people prefer believing the conspiracy theories rather than putting in the hard work to really understand.

I appreciate the judgments can be quite dense and use technical legal and medical terms.

BUT the judges are really trying to make them more accessible. If you read Cobb J's judgment on the sterilisation case he sets it out with lots of different headings. he summarises his main findings.

the people calling the SW 'nazis' haven't even bothered to read it - its not like they tried to read it and gave up.

Sorry Wanda, my post reads as if I haven't read yours! I agree with what you say. It is infuriating.

I don't know what else we can do. Even if every sordid detail of every case is published with pictures, some people will refuse to accept anything that goes against their narrative.

Having read the news about the forced sterilization, it did fill me with alarm.

However reading the judgement it's clear that the decision was taken weighing up facts in a very thoughtful and reasonable manner, and that the circumstances are unique and very sad.

Not the scenario the newspapers were reporting.

I was particularly reassured by the fact that the judge had refused forced entry previously and was very aware of the increasing levels of distress. It was a good sign that this judge was making fair decisions which on occasion went against social service requests. I know that isn't a perfectly logical reason for trusting the judge, as that means a judge looks less reliable if the social services are making really good decisions all the time... But in the light of lack of transparency and trust in social services or individuals in the judiary service, it's qualitative evidence that that judge is using their position to put in place all the checks and balances that ensure correct decision making.

My conclusion: I wish judgements were more widely read...

This is a very interesting report from the Council of Europe about adoption without parental consent in Europe.
website-pace.net/documents/10643/1127812/EDOC_Social+services+in+Europe.pdf/dc06054e-2051-49f5-bfbd-31c9c0144a32

It comments that the UK's refusal to reverse adoption orders is a 'misunderstanding' of the rights of the child, who has a right to return to his/her birth family if an adoption order is found to have been made on the wrong basis for e.g. after a decision that a child has been harmed when in fact had a medical condition.

Now that is very interesting.

It's interesting that adoption per se was not possible in the UK until the 1920s (?). So it was designed in the era when eugenics were fashionable and repression was normal.

I wonder whether the ideas of 'finality' and 'permenance' are just too bound up in the design of the legislation for flexibility? Although the finality was tempered later, wasn't it? It must have been because it's now possible to search for birth families and see adoption records. When was that? 70s? 80s?

That's just a top-of-the-head musing about the history of the social policy BTW, not a fully thought out view of any kind.

Personally, I was put off of the idea of adoption when I realised that open adoption was all but impossible in the UK, or at least that the system doesn't support it. Long-term fostering seemed to have its drawbacks too (to us).

Clearly the current system works for many people, though...

Eugenics was^ fashionable.....

Mmm, and what about the childs right to stay with perhaps the only parent/s they can remember and love fiercely? It's really frustrating that people assume that the home with birth family is automatically far superior to that of the adoptive family which is established. Or that the adoptive family have less rights with regard to having their children removed - other families have to pass a bar of serious harm before removal, but you could be a 'perfect' parent and lose your precious child?

Mind you, I completely agree with him(?) that everyone should collect more data. It's really obvious, and I know we have a lot of data already, but I think we could have more.

I meant it's difficult to adopt in my country ( not UK, or Ireland), so people tend to adopt from abroad, Kew

That's just what I was thinking Lilka - could also mean fewer adopters coming forward. Tis a tricky business.......I assume if it ever does become law that there will still be a need to consider the best interests of the child, and this term "forced adoption" really frustrates me. It's adoption without the consent of the birthparents, nothing more, nothing less.