According to a report published on 7^th November 2024, "wholesale reform to the adoption process is needed". The adoption sub group of Public Law Working Group published a report setting out their recommendations for best practice in the process of adoption as a result of the adoption model changing over the years. According to the Courts and Tribunals judiciary, the original model for adoption was of children who were born illegitimate, or to impoverished or young parents, and being ‘relinquished’ at birth to be placed with more financially and socially secure childless married couples. Now, most children are adopted from care, although there remains a small number of cases where babies are relinquished for adoption. The number of adoptions in England and Wales has significantly changed, peaking at around 25,000 in the late 1960s and falling to around 2,950 in 2022.

The report recommends:

• Contact between adopted children and their birth families needs to be changed. There should be greater support and counselling for birth parents, greater training for prospective adopters about the importance of open communication and birth family contact, ongoing training for social worker practitioners and lawyers as to the benefits of open adoption. The variety of contact options should be actively considered by professionals and the court in care proceedings. Face to face contact between adopted children and their birth family and people significant to them needs to be given greater consideration throughout their minority.
• There should be a National Protocol for those applying to court to access their records. Being able to access records in a timely way is of huge significance to adopted people and their families.
• Adoptions with an international element are extremely complex, and the statutory framework should be contained within a single Act of Parliament. In the meantime, written guidance is urgently needed.
• There should be development of a national strategy for adoption by consent, including training , consideration of early permanence placements, better access to legal advice for parents, and issue of proceedings straight away by Local Authorities and urgent listing of the cases by the court.

Legal practitioners often have limited involvement in the adoption process beyond when the court has agreed that a child can be placed for adoption. While the finality of adoption and the lasting impact upon birth families and children is well understood, there are clearly a wide range of issues that need to be understood and recommendations that need to be acted upon in the best interests of the children at the centre of the adoption process.

Will this report guide a revolution in how legal practitioners think about our role in the processes leading up to adoption, the advice given to parents about adoption before and during court proceedings, and how we can advocate for birth parents and children to have greater contact post-adoption?

If you wish to read the full report, you can find it at  Wholesale reform to adoption process is needed, says Public Law Working Group - Courts and Tribunals Judiciary.