terribly sad story about wrongful adoption where the birth parents have been proved innocent

[edam]

Today programme look at 2hrs 10mins in this morning had a segment on the case of parents who were accused of abuse, their children were taken away and adopted. Now it's finally emerged that the parents are innocent but the Court of Appeal says the adoption order is permanent and can't be overturned.

I do understand that adoption has to be solid and safe but surely the courts and social services could promote some form of contact between innocent parents and their children?

In what universe does the 'best interests of the child' = refusing to recognise and address a miscarriage of justice? Surely the child has a human right to a relationship with their birth family?

Just makes me even more fearful of SS after the stream of stories about miscarriages of justice and heavy-handed tactics. I would NEVER ask them for help.

And what a horrible comparison using Madeleine as a comparative. It's nothing like the same and insulting to the adoptive parents who presumably have done nothing but love and do their best for these children.

Nobody said it is the same thing and nobody is insulting the adoptive parents.

The question is simple: Would you agree with a kidnapped child being returned to his parents when he is discovered some years later?

Yes or no will suffice.

The point of comparison, obviously, is that these children have grown up to think their parents are these other adults.

Now that their real parents have found them (if kidnapped) or have been cleared of any accusations of abuse (if forcefully adopted), do we think the children are to be given back to their real parents, or is that somehow too traumatic for them since they consider there other adults to be their parents?

these other adults

Children are kidnapped by people who want a child or who are acting for people who want a child. It doesn't always mean abuse/non-custodial parent.

In those cases the parents who have the child will treat the child as their own and the child will think that they are it's parents (they usually take them younf so they can't remember their old family). OK it's not very common but the same arguments re removing the child and returning it would apply.

Once we agree that the kidnapped child should of course be returned to his real parents, even though he may love those other adults as his real parents, I feel we will have a slightly different debate on this thread.

If in the case of kidnapping, the trauma of adjusting to real parents is not considered important enough to leave them with the new family, why should it be any different in this case?

Maybe even in cases of kidnapping, if the child has no memory of the birth family and the new family are treating the child well, the child should be left there...

I think they just shouldn't be putting children up for adoption in these situations where appeals are still running. I just don't understand at all why they do it, and why they seem to rush it through.

I think cote is making a very valid point...obviously depend on the kind of kidnapping, etc...
but, presuming the child is well cared for at their kidnappers and only treated with love...the effect of removing teh child from them would be similar....however...no one in their right mind would really consider that to be the best option for anyone.
So, why, in a true case of miscarriage of justice is this not considered....

A salient point, Cote. I had not considered this point of view.

It's a valid question - we would consider the trauma of removal from the recent primary carers worth it if those primary carers had kidnapped the child. But if the state kidnaps a child, that trauma is somehow an insurmountable barrier. Why?

It is a tragic case all round for everyone involved. But I don't see why the best interests of the child are necessarily so closely aligned with those of the state and the adoptive parents rather than their birth parents.

Almost everyone would consider that we shouldn't go back to the dark days when women who conceived outside marriage were punished by being forced to give up their babies. Seems to me in some cases current practice is not that far away. It's just different categories of mother who are being persecuted - largely working class people (although not exclusively), people with learning disabilities, those who have children with rare conditions where diagnosis is delayed, or people who themselves have rare conditions and are accused of Munchhausen's (as happened to one MNer - Roy Meadows claimed she was making it up).

I think the reason we'd say 'yes of course the child must be returned' in a case of kidnapping would be that we would (rightly) see the kidnappers as 'bad'. And in a case of forced adoption by the state, we'd see the adoptive parents as innocent.

Yet this isn't supposed to be about the adults, but the child. And for the child, there is little difference between kidnappers who look after them to a reasonable standard and other primary carers who are not their original parents.

Bronze, I suspect you don't like the comparission because you perceive the McCann's to be nice, loving parents and yet by all accounts they have been at least as neglectful as these two but one lost their child to an unknown and we'll all be beside ourselves with joy if Madeleine is returned and in the Websters case it's best they are not reunited from the state.
All seems a bit shite to me.

You have no idea who has little Madeleine, with respect she could be living a far superior life with a Sultan for all any of us know. Are adoptive parents continuously monitored beyond adoption ? Some people on this forum have come across less than loving foster parents for example, nobody knows do we.

Parents do not have to give consent to their children being adopted when the children are removed, and made subjects to care orders. It's not automatic that they become freed for adoption, there are further court proceedings after the original proceedings to grant the care orders, and the parents have the option to fight it. But no, of course they don't need the parents' permission. No children would ever be freed for adoption if that were the case.

Fuck me, adoptive parents =/= kidnappers. Adoptive parents are the parents. They are assessed to the max and supported to parent the children to the best of their abilities. Kidnappers are...not. They are not acting in the best interests of the children, full stop.

This is not SS decision to disallow further contact by the way - once adoption has been finalised the adoptive partents have all the decision making power, as it should be.

edam: "It's just different categories of mother who are being persecuted - largely working class people (although not exclusively), people with learning disabilities, those who have children with rare conditions where diagnosis is delayed, or people who themselves have rare conditions and are accused of Munchhausen's (as happened to one MNer - Roy Meadows claimed she was making it up)."

Edam, to add to your list, with which I agree, mothers who are victims of domestic violence who are made to suffer the double whammy of also having their children removed from them, on flimsy grounds that the children would suffer emotional (not just physical) damage from remaining in that situation. Real life horrific examples from mnetters.

But can anyone tell me why they don't just hold off having the children adopted until all the appeals court things etc are finished?

As this has happened before and will happen again?

Isn't potential miscarriages of justice one of the reasons we don't go in for the death penalty here? Isn;t this just as final? With no room for reversal when miscarriages occur...

Do I get monitored ? Yes probably

This is a terrible case but I can see why they won't reverse the adoption order. It sets far too dangerous a legal precedent for them to return the children to their natural parents I'd imagine (not that I know that much about the law but I know that quoting previous legal decisions that appear to support your POV is pretty fundamental to building a case).

That doesn't help the parents though - it is indeed like some dystopian nightmare bronze

You don't know that adoptive parents in this case are so wonderful, and there are of course kidnappers who become great loving parents (watch "Gone Baby Gone")

But all of that is irrelevant anyway.

The point of discussion on this thread is (and always was) whether it is too much of a trauma to separate a child from "parents" he knows to return him to real parents.

And if that trauma is surmountable in kidnap cases, it is surmountable in forced adoption cases.

Because it's simply not in childrens' interests to keep things hanging on for years. It's better for children to be adopted more swiftly. And by swift I don't mean in a matter of weeks - even a straightforward adoption case from first removal to freeing takes months and months - the last one I was involved in took 2 years to come to a decision re adoption. (after using a parent and baby placement, supervision order, drug treatment, therapy for the mother, parenting support, family therapy for the family members etc etc)

Children do better when the process is quicker. Not to mention children are usually in foster care during proceedings, then once they are freed an adoptive placement is sourced, if possible. If a child is removed at 18 months they have a far greater chance of adoption if it happens sooner, rather than if they are kept in the foster care system for several years and become too old to be adopted, having to stay fostered all they childhood.

You may not think this is fair but believe me, childrens' interests are paramount, and so they should be. I personally wouldn't rest if I were in that position, but that doesn't mean I think the system is flawed of itself.