Adoption

Edward Timpson Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

As ever, it is a pleasure to speak in what I think everyone agrees is a profoundly important debate. As chair of the all-party group on adoption and fostering, I join other hon. Members in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Sheryll Murray) on securing this opportunity to debate adoption again. As ever, it would be more useful for those of us who have a passion for adoption if the interest shown by hon. Members in this Chamber were shared more widely when broadcasting what goes on in Parliament. Certainly, the debate that I have come from, which was on professional standards in the banking industries, was in stark contrast with this debate. My hon. Friend made a well-crafted and pertinent speech.

I thank the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) and my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), who made thoughtful contributions. They are more than welcome to join us and to see what we do with around 150 young children who come to the all-party group on looked-after children and care leavers and the professionals who come to the all-party group on adoption and fostering. I am sure their presence would make a great difference to our work.

I must declare an interest as a compassionate Conservative and as someone with two adopted brothers. Last time that we debated adoption back in November 2011, I explained the deep and powerful impact that adoption has had on my family and on me personally, and the hon. Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson) has told us today about his experience as an adopter. It is important that people realise that expertise in Parliament ensures that adoption is understood professionally and personally.

There is no doubt that, irrespective of the many moments of stress, frustration and, yes, on occasion, sheer blind panic, the adoption of Oliver and Henry into our family has been enriching, rewarding, sobering, but, above all, immensely satisfying. Perhaps that is why I subscribe strongly to the notion that adoption should play a vital role in the lives of many more children and families. It could be argued that that has been the settled consensus for some time. In 2000, the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, ordered a major policy review of adoption services for looked-after children throughout the UK, with the primary aim of addressing whether there should be more use of adoption as a permanency option for children in care and whether the process could be improved in the interest of the children.

[Bill Esterson]

The hon. Gentleman’s work on the issue has impressed me and many others since he first arrived here in 2008. Will he address the point of how to get more adopters and whether he accepts my premise that one of our big problems is that fewer people have put themselves forward as potential adoptive parents?

[Mr Timpson]

I will come to that later in my speech, but the hon. Gentleman’s earlier point was about ensuring that people understand that adoption is not an exclusive form of permanency for children; it is not the only one. It is important in every child’s case to make sure that the final decision about where and with whom they will spend the rest of their life is based solely on their personal circumstances and needs, not on statistics. It is also important that we consider whether the opportunity for adoption being available and open to more prospective adopters is used as much as possible. Certainly, the surge in interest during national adoption week from people who had an inkling or a desire to be adopters in the future demonstrated to me that there is an appetite out there for people to come forward as adopters. We must do more to make sure not only that we give them that opportunity, but that we then follow it through, and do not leave them hanging and waiting for a decision to be made on their behalf. That is very much at the heart of what the Government’s action plan on adoption is trying to achieve.

The conclusion of the previous Government’s work in 2000-01 was that we should promote an increase in adoption, and there was scope to increase the number of adoptions from care each year. As we have heard, that led to the Adoption and Children Act 2002, coupled with a drive to improve the effectiveness and delivery of adoption services. Initially, that bore fruit, but within five years of the legislation hitting the statute book, the number of adoptions had begun to fall back, and since then the trend has been downward.

It is fair to say that, despite the previous Government’s best intentions, the 2002 Act has not had the desired effect, and its momentum has been lost. So what can we do? First and foremost, it is crucial to remember that adoption is only one route to permanency for a child in care, as I have alluded to and as the hon. Member for Sefton Central has said. As I have said in previous debates on adoption, it is not the right option for every child, but I am certain that there is still under-representation of adoption in the overall mix of permanency plans for looked-after children.

It is important to note that the Prime Minister has made it clear that improving the lives of children in care is a national priority, and I could not agree more. As part of that commitment, the Prime Minister, the Secretary of State for Education, who was adopted, and the Minister are adamant that the adoption system needs to work much more efficiently and much more effectively. The added determination and doggedness of Martin Narey, the Government’s adoption adviser, to effect change is extremely welcome.

As we have heard, adoption is just one part of an overall child protection and care system that is in need of far-reaching reform, and that is borne out by the excellent Munro review that is being implemented by the Government. Part of the solution for improving the adoption process and service available is to ensure that the care system from which children who are to be adopted emerge is as child-focused, efficient, skilled and professional as possible. By accepting the proposals in Eileen Munro’s report, the Minister has set himself and all those working with children in care the difficult but necessary task of turning those recommendations into real and durable reform of both the culture and the practice on the ground where it really matters.

It is equally important that the adoption system does not get left behind. I therefore welcome wholeheartedly the root-and-branch approach taken by the Minister to improve our adoption system by leaving no stone unturned and by being willing to face the often difficult challenges of bringing about systematic and attitudinal change. The adoption process remains too bureaucratic, exclusive rather than inclusive and liable to set up too many adoptions to fail. In just two years, however, the Government have already made significant progress in confronting those endemic problems.

As a member of the ministerial advisory group on adoption, which has been helping to shape policy, it would be surprising if I did not support the wide-ranging and carefully targeted reform of the system on which the Government are embarking. Much of that has already been touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall and includes “An Action Plan for Adoption”, which was published recently, and new adoption scorecards to hold local authorities to account and help tackle underperformance with swifter interventions. The revised and streamlined six-month approval process for prospective adopters will help deal with many of the problems identified by the hon. Member for Sefton Central in trying to ensure that prospective adopters come forward and do not feel let down by the process or get so frustrated that they walk away and we lose some potentially excellent adopters.

[Bill Esterson]

The hon. Gentleman is making some good points. I am also concerned that, when prospective adopters come forward, they are given information that says, “Come and have a family,” and a rosy picture is painted. Sometimes—not always—the potential difficulties are not explained and people are perhaps given a false perspective in the first place. Does the hon. Gentleman think that, on occasion, a slightly more honest approach would help to achieve what he is setting out?

[Mr Timpson]

The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely important and valid point. Many adopters enter the adoption process with a rose-tinted view of what they are letting themselves in for, and it is important that at as early a stage as possible they are given not only support but information and training from professionals working with them. They must be left under no illusion about the long and often hard road ahead—of which the hon. Gentleman and myself are probably all too aware—and the last thing that we want is to give people a false impression that results in an adoption breakdown. Ultimately, the child is the person who loses out more than anyone else, and they should always be put at the centre of every decision that we make.

The Government are considering the introduction of a national gateway for adoption. That important initiative would provide a first point of contact for anyone interested in adoption. I encourage all Members to read the action plan because it sets out detailed proposals to accelerate the whole adoption process, taking into account the point raised by the hon. Member for Walsall South about the need to qualify and quantify every aspect of that adoption and not view it purely on the basis of time constraints. We must ensure that we always get the right decision.

We must also improve the recruitment of prospective adopters and enhance support to adoptive families before, during and—crucially—after an adoption. I will say a little more about the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North on adoption support, which is critical to the success of an adoption.

I welcome the priority that the Government are placing on adoption, which is backed up by the actions being taken. There is however, as I know the Minister is aware, much more work to do. I should like to mention many areas, but I will touch briefly on two—adoption support and the role of voluntary adoption agencies.

Proposals for adoption support are in their early stages of development, but we know that the day on which the placement or adoption order is made is not the day on which the troubles and traumas that resulted in the child entering care in the first place suddenly dissipate into thin air. As one adopter said:

“we don’t know what impact the children’s history will have on them as they grow and come to terms with their past.”

It is difficult to be precise about adoption breakdown rates. The Department for Education has commissioned Bristol university to dig down into that issue and consider the reasons for adoption breakdown. We know, however, that without meaningful and enduring adoption support, adoption placements have a greater risk of breaking down—that was the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North.

Earlier this year, Adoption UK carried out research into adoption support. Among other things, it found that two thirds of prospective adopters did not feel that they understood the importance of adoption support, and that is troubling in itself. A similar number of people were unaware of their entitlement to adoption support services, and although twice as many adopters said that their adopted child or children had special needs that required greater support services, fewer than half were receiving any form of adoption support, let alone support commensurate with the needs of their child.

Although under the current law all adopters have the right to be assessed for support, they have no right to that need for support being fulfilled in the long term. The current three-year support cut-off point is perhaps too arbitrary—and in many cases too short—and prevents local authorities from committing to the long-term support that may be necessary. That can often lead to an unnecessary breakdown of the placement.

The proposal in the action plan is for an adoption passport, which in essence is a transparent guarantee of the minimum support that adoptive families will receive. That is a step in the right direction, particularly if it ensures priority access to child and adolescent mental health services, for example, or parenting courses to help prospective adopters understand what attachment is and how it may manifest itself with the child placed with them. Potentially, the role of adoptive families may be recognised in the tax and benefits system—that is linked to those areas mentioned with great force by the hon. Member for Walsall South.

One way to improve adoption support would be to enhance the role of voluntary adoption agencies. Their excellent results in delivering successful adoptions with fewer breakdowns is, in large part, due to the greater and more long-standing support given to VAA-approved adoptive families. A report by Dr Julie Selwyn from Bristol university confirmed that VAAs have a better track record in terms of post-adoption support, and VAA-approved adoptive families were found to receive twice as much support from family placement workers as families approved by local authorities.

Local authorities have been reluctant to use VAAs because of their perceived extra cost. That has been shown to be inaccurate, however, and the cost of a VAA sourcing and matching a child is comparable to the cost to the local authority. It also fails to take into account the much lower breakdown rate for placements made through VAAs. With many local authorities feeling the squeeze on their own adoptive support services—a point that the hon. Member for Sefton Central was starting to bring into the debate—there is clearly ample scope for closer partnership working between local authorities and voluntary adoption agencies to improve adoption services, and that includes support, as amply demonstrated by the partnership between the London borough of Harrow and Coram.

Ultimately, this debate is about the need for a child-centred adoption system that we can be confident is delivering for children. The Government have made important commitments and pushed hard to meet that shared objective. There is still a long way to go, but it is a good start.