No legal aid = baby adopted

[CFSKate]

I saw this on Channel 4 News yesterday, I only saw it part way through, but it went something like this, there was a couple who were accused of abusing their child, they couldn't get legal aid, the court had the child adopted, and then it went to court again and new evidence said there was a medical condition and the parents weren't guilty of abuse, but the adoption is final, they can't get their baby back.

If you're in Ireland, you must have noticed that past British Courts have allowed some horrific miscarriages of justice.
And those were trials held in public.

I'm getting my facts about the case from several sources, all easily found using an amazing new search engine called Google.

The chambers that the defence barrister is from and some of the family law sites have posted material since yesterday.

The fact that the prosecution's own expert witness provided evidence in support of the defence's claim that there as been no abuse is is almost all the articles - Guardian, BBC, Telegraph, etc etc.

I never said it was irrefutable. But they do seem to be the facts.

Unfortunately not maryz. Rare perhaps but not impossible. It only takes getting the one useless professional, or one with preconceived ideas to get the wrong end of the stick, or just judge by their standards and you're screwed. Even if there is still not enough evidence for a care order, once there is a threat of your child being taken, and every breath you take is subject to scrutiny, and you live in fear of perfectly good parenting being misinterpreted you'd need to be in an exceptionally rare and strong position not to crack under that pressure. Which of course will provide more evidence.

It really doesn't take much. You could be feeding your kids meals I don't feed mine. Most of us would say 'well, they are healthy and happy and never gone hungry so who cares'. Someone else might say you aren't meeting their nutritional needs. Likewise if your house is scruffy from age, untidy from kids toys/ busy life and the garden is overgrown. I or anyone else might say 'who cares, doesn't effect the kids, it's clean and safe and the scruffiness is probably because they maybe don't have the ability/ time to spruce it up on the cheap'. Someone else might judge it against their idea of a home and decide you can't cope/ your standards aren't good enough. And so on for every other unimportant aspect of what makes a good parent, till the pressure causes you to start doing slightly more important things wrong and so on. You might just have a hammer and nails out of dcs reach hanging pictures up. It can be reported as 'mum had hammer and nails in the room with dc, I reminded her to make sure they were out of reach'. And make any of the minor and daft mistakes most of us have, or even have a small child that comes out with some incriminating comment 'my mummy drinks wine' 'I'm very helpful and big I help mummy mind baby ds' and it can be blown out of context

I'm a firm believer in the cockup theory rather than in conspiracies to take away kids. Arrogance and bias confirmation.

Seeing how much this scares some parents here (and in rl too) I think we need a system to correct clear miscarriages of justice, just to reassure them,
i.e. if we cockup, you will get your kid back eventually.

Is it practical to say that before an adoption is finalised, parents need to have been charged with a criminal offence and to have gone through a committal hearing ? That would ensure evidence is examined by defence and magistrates.
Maybe not relevant for this case, but for others, it can be a reality check for incompetent parents actually to be faced with a charge of, say neglect, instead of never being charged.

Yes, lots of facts out there. I don't think there are conspiracies to take away children even frmo parents who hate social workers and refuse to play ball with them or know they are suprerior to them but the system can fairly easily remove a child even from well educated professional parents if it wants to and remember Cameron has a huge pledge to increase speed and number of adoption numbers at present, something I am very much against. Let us do very slow long term fostering instead as it is not so hard to return children to parents when things go wrong. it's a bit like death penalty arguments for me - I'm against the death penalty because when we get it wrong it is impossible to undo. Ditto adoptions - they are usually final and given how very very slow the courts and cash strapped local authorities are all it takes is one miscarriage of justice and children hvae had 4 years with new parents and bonded and it because in the child's interest to allow the miscarriage to go ahead. Thankfully in this case the parents have been allowed to keep up contact and their bonding with the child so there may be hope the child can be returned to its parents.

Long term fostering so it's the equivalent of adoption as stability for the child- so I suppose something inbetween what is available, more investment at low level to offer support before care is even on the horizon and a shit load more accountability when mistakes are made is what I'd like to see. But won't because all that costs.

I agree barring perhaps the odd individual nut job covering their back conspiracy or pro's deciding on adoption because it's cheap isn't the reality. But lack of money to provide help when it's needed early on is certainly part of why some children end up adopted instead of with birth parents. A teen mum that's come through the care system herself is in my opinion every bit of capable of being an excellent mother as anyone else. But throw in pnd and no support network and the chances of them getting the support to ever demonstrate that are much smaller than for the rest of us, because it does come down to money for that help early on.

Grazia

There is so much wrong with your statement that I don't even know where to begin " superior" , " easily remove a child", " long slow fostering", " children can easily be returned".

Do you honestly think sw are desperate to remove kids and that it can happen to anyone? If this was the case very few people would still have their children. It is actually difficult to remove a child and is done when there is a significant risk of harm, in this case, at the time, all the evidence pointed in that direction. What were they supposed to do? Leave the child until a fatal injury had happened?

Perhaps if people stopped demonising social work and the government committed to resources tragic mistakes like this wouldn't happen

Lurked

Exactly, so is all about fire fighting now than than prevention

Social work, not so!

Is it practical to say that before an adoption is finalised, parents need to have been charged with a criminal offence and to have gone through a committal hearing ?

I think a lot of children who are rightfully removed from families and adopted into new families would miss out on adoption if you did that.

There isn't always a criminal case taken, and there are lots of reasons for that, including that you wouldn't win a criminal case even though there is abuse/neglect taking place.

I would age thought that things like

• accepting council of Europe recommendations about irreversibility of adoption orders in all circumstances

• reducing the pressure to conclude all hearings within a certain timeframe, regardless of the complexity of the case

• an absolute bar on cynical manoeuvres intended to advance the cause of the parents you hope to adopt the child, such as concluding an AO "moments" before crucial evidence is presented

• recognition that people involved in social services will form their own attachments to children and prospective adopters and are not neutral, disinterested observers with special access to divining the "best interests of the child"

• recognition that "the best interests of the child" is not an objective measure and that it is massively open to manipulation by people with their own agenda, which most people involved for any time will have

I would say that the last two statements should have a "may" in them

It's also important to remember that the decision is not made by one person

The whole situation is a nightmare and I can only imagine the pain involved for all of them, I also don't agree that the bond between a birth parent is automatically stronger than that of an adoptive parent. However, these parents parental rights were wrongly removed , the fact that the adoptive parents now have these rights is based upon the premise that the birth parents posed a threat to the child, however this isn't the case

I think part of the problem is sometimes a lack of time/ ability to look at the full picture, including the mental needs of a child. Take a preteen with parental neglect. Sw number 1 might think the physical regularity of the care system and a care leaver package is the least of two evils. Sw 2 might think as the physical needs are being met in a haphazard way by mum buying pot noodles and neighbours, friends parents etc, the mental stability of an incompetent parent and the wider network of support which comes from being part of the community is the lesser of two evils as a long term outcome.
I'd go with number 2 myself, but either way ss get it in the neck. All those nice mums at school wonder why the child hasn't been taken, or if sw1 prevails, both child, mum and the locals object to the fact the care system resulted in a worse long term outcome mentally for the child.

I would go with 2 also, some parenting classes would help. I once had to show a young mum how to sing to her baby, it just hadn't occurred to her because she had never had a role model in her life

That's what I mean by prevention , working with families to stop a situation arising

I would imagine long term fostering is a nightmare for kids, no security what so ever

I also don't agree that the bond between a birth parent is automatically stronger than that of an adoptive parent.

I don't think anyone on the thread has argued that.

You could take out "automatically", and that would still stand.

Some people have discussed how the bonding processes differ, which they must to a certain extent.

But then again, I can only imagine that my friend who adopted a newborn had a reasonably similar bonding experience to mine - "here's your baby. You're in charge now!" Arhghghghbghghghh.

Except TBH she was way, way better prepared mentally.

This isn't really about who does or might or can best display that they love the child more.

Parents who shouldn't have children and can't look after them can really love those children and be very bonded to them.

I suppose something like a foster to adopt scheme that allows for a longer time frame between going into care and adoption being granted. And definitely where the child is still with the birth parent because it's long term prospects, rather than daily needs prompting adoption the time span should be longer. I believe the care system does a fine job of making victims and unstable adults, who in turn often produce the next generation of kids in care. So I do agree a stable family home is essential to break that cycle and for the individual. But I don't think we should be going the other way and thinking adoption is always the best and only solution. Fwiw when dd is independent and I can afford it, I'd like to adopt or long term foster, but older kids or teens that have played musical homes all their lives.

Yy on the support christina. Except by the time those basic skills are offered the parents mh from their feelings of inadequacy, fear of losing their child and the childs needs have gone past the point cheap short term help is much use.

Lurked I think you might struggle to find people who would be willing to do 'foster-to-adopt' in a long term fostering arrangement. The people that do such schemes are altruistic of course but essentially they do want to be parents and that level of uncertainty would be hard to live with when you are bonding with a baby. The trouble with all the talk of more fostering is that almost all LAs struggle to find enough foster carers as it is.

Well, this is pretty timely. Family Justice Council are debating the issue of adoption without parental consent on November 28th in London.

I have just emailed to ask for a ticket.
www.judiciary.gov.uk/related-offices-and-bodies/advisory-bodies/fjc/conference-debates/debates/family-justice-council-9th-annual-debate/

Sorry! November 24 NOT 28th. Its a good list of speakers - Louise Tickle is one of the few journalists who is trying to report responsibly about this issue.

Ooh report back, Spero - I'd love to hear about it.

It's going to be MASSIVE in light of recent events so I may not get a ticket. But I have emailed. They say they want representatives from as many different interested people as possible. So I hope its not just lawyers. Martin Narey should be interesting - he is very bullish about adoption. Which I think is part of the problem.

desm yes but that shouldn't outweigh the fact so do the birth parents in many cases. It is usually only the babies and toddlers though where there is doubt over whether adoption will come off, so while I understand it's far more complicated than potential parents simply wanting 'the cute undamaged ones' anyone in a position to take on the harder task of an older child/ siblings/ complex sn etc can easily satisfy that desire to be a parent with a child or children where adoption is already a definite option.
And while I'm reforming the system sibling relationships want an overhaul too. Established ones should not be broken because one meets the easy to place with adopters criteria and the other doesn't. And I bet the adoptive parents aren't always told the full truth about that either. I know somebody who was in the process of adopting a young child and purely by chance found out the harder to place disturbed older sibling was in a care home, probably permanent, despite the fact till months ago the elder had all but raised the nice adoptable little one for the first few years. Nobody had deliberately lied, just the assumption they wouldn't want the elder anyway. Of course like anyone decent they were horrified at the idea of splitting them, and able to take both on. Yet often people aren't told incase the adoptive parents can't take the sibling/s and yet won't be responsible for splitting them.

As to foster carers, I have spoken to lots of people who would like to and yet won't. Often because the need for a spare room whether or not a child is with you and the whole joke of how funding is implemented means whole swathes of the population are financially excluded from fostering. Plus because foster carers are in short supply they don't always get the full facts about any child, and protocol about area etc can't be followed so horror stories appear more likely to happen than they really are. Sort out the funding and there would be more coming forward. Then again sort out the funding so care wasn't as common and we wouldn't need as many foster carers.

I don't think that grazia's idea of "child abuse" is really what most CP cases are about though, and scaring people on the internet is a stupid thing to do

With the utmost respect intended Maryz, whilst I haven't been a practising SW for a few years as part of my job I do come into contact with lots and lots of people involved with the service.
There are good and bad in every single job being a SW is not an indication that someone is honest trustworthy or decent.

My ex best friend is a senior SW who boasts openly that her team is so well trained they could make a threshold case against any family in the UK, she made this boast in a professional meeting I was part of and we fell out after I put in a formal complaint about it.

I've been sat in CIN meetings and watched them do the run round the room of attendees and heard with my own ears every body say things like problem solved NFA and then seen the notes and they have said something totally different.

I've seen some shocking case file notes that have had no resemblance to the actual meeting.

I've been present at a meeting with a service user whose children were nicely playing with back playdoh other than their hands they were very clean and tidy the SW then phoned up after she left the house from the car to tell the mother she had to bath them because they were filthy-this went in the notes as mother lacking in basic hygiene skills and needed to be told to clean the children.

I've been present at a meeting where a allagation of the parent Ea the child by ripping up his clothing and school books was made, mother produced them intact and showed the SW -this allagation was repeated on the threshold doc.

I record all my meetings using a two set recording device and routinely use the transcripts in case notes and reports. And the amount of times They have been supplied to courts to refute dishonest statements and (in very serious disagreements) the recordings have been listened to by the judge and used as evidence.

99% of the other professionals I come into contact with are great decent honest people who just want to do their jobs as best they can, and most of the time it is obvious what the problems are and why they are taking the action they are but since a very well publicised child protection scandal there has been an increase in ones that would meet the stance that Grazia has talked about.

One perticular team in an area I work in is almost famous for not writing notes up at the time it's not unusual to have months worth of case notes written all in the same afternoon from little more than human memory, not providing minutes or notes to anyone that they are meant to, misinterpreting parents and other professionals even amongst the other teams in that county. Nobody wants to complain because this team also has a higher than average LADO referral rate and they run the risk of being accused of undermining the CP process or not understanding child protection fully.

And I can kinda understand why they do it, nobody wants to experance a Sharon shoesmith, and if you genuinely believe a child has been harmed in your gut despite a lack of evidence it's human nature to attempt to bolster your case by slanting things even if the upshot of that is that in the long run it harms more children because it does undermine the process because sometimes it's hard to see the long term result of that.

When you are dealing with so many things that are totally subjective it's easy to forget that we can't and don't deman perfect or even good parenting all we deman is adequate and that's all the law allows us to demand.

This is why people like spero and the great many other CP family law barristers are an invaluable resource that for to long we have disregarded and demoralised and why the system does need closely looking at.