Support for New Adoptive Parents

Nusrat Ghani Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2022 Westminster Hall

[Elliot Colburn]

As ever, my hon. Friend is amazing in his psychic abilities, having seen ahead to where I will make that very point further on in my contributions. It is a very important point, and he makes it even more eloquently than I will.

In the Government’s response to our Committee’s report on this issue and to the petition, they restated that local authorities can already provide discretionary financial support to self-employed adoptive parents where affordability is a barrier to them taking time away from work. It is also noted that

“Prospective adopters…are also entitled to an assessment of their family’s needs”,

which could result in further offers of support including

“discretionary means-tested financial support, advice, information, counselling, and support services.”

In response to this petition, as well as a written parliamentary question tabled by the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell)—who is in her place—the Government also stated that support for employed parents have been prioritised, as they

“do not generally have the same level of flexibility and autonomy over how and when they work as self-employed parents do.”

However, there are a number of concerns about this approach that need to be better understood, and in my view, the approach should be rethought. First, while local authorities should consider making payments equivalent to the maternity allowance to self-employed adopters, there is no legal requirement for them to do so—it is merely guidance. This creates inconsistencies across the country, because a particular problem for prospective adopters is that many search for an adopted child through national agencies rather than local ones, and indeed many local authorities are combining their adoption pathways. I have also heard from multiple adoptive parents that the guidance is unclear and confusing, including unhelpful signposting on the gov.uk website. That is not a surprise, considering the issue of departmental responsibility that I touched on earlier.

Secondly, linked to the first concern, inconsistencies in funding create uncertainty for families hoping to adopt. Conversations with social workers and agency staff are limited to ifs, buts and maybes, and financial planning therefore becomes difficult, if not impossible. There was agreement among the majority of respondents to the Petitions Committee’s survey that access to adoption support needs to be simplified, with multiple complaints about the role of local authorities. Of course, the very nature of the process of adoption is uncertain, but adding further stress and uncertainty to that process may not be the best policy to ensure stability for the newly adopted child and their new family.

Thirdly, the Government’s understanding of self-employment when it comes to adoption seems outdated and unrealistic in many cases. As part of my research for this debate, I heard from a prospective adopter who is self-employed. Unfortunately, like so many others, that individual is unable to hit the pause button on their work whenever they feel like it and press play again when they are free. The individual in question works full time, teaching in a school, and has the same amount of flexibility as an employed teacher. One of the key takeaways from the Petitions Committee’s survey on this issue was that adoptive parents feel they need more time to bond with and care for their child than the average birth parent. That is, of course, understandable, because adopted children have often suffered trauma from years of neglect and loss.

The survey found that just 61% of self-employed adopters were able to take time off work following adoption, compared with 78% of employed workers. Furthermore, 95% of self-employed adoptive parents agreed that more financial support would allow them to take the time off they needed to support their new child’s adjustment to their new family and new life. Contracts and work patterns have changed a lot in recent years, but adoption support has not reflected that. Self-employed adopters need support to take leave from work, so they can put time into ensuring their new child is safe and settled.

Fourthly, coming at this from a Conservative point of view, I feel the Government should be supporting and encouraging entrepreneurialism rather than repelling people from it. There are currently 4.8 million self-employed people in the UK, making up to 15% of the workforce. That is a 12% increase since 2001 and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter) said, we are doing much to encourage people to become self-employed.

The self-employed are our country’s business owners, job creators and wealth creators. They are the backbone of our economy, and we need them. We have debated support for the self-employed many times, and I led debates in this place on support for the self-employed and business owners during the covid-19 pandemic. Throughout the peak of the pandemic, like many Members of this House, I was contacted by dozens of constituents who were unable to receive substantial financial support, many of whom were self-employed.

Finally, the Government’s position on support for the self-employed is not consistent with the aims of the national adoption strategy. One responder to a Petitions Committee survey on this issue explained how they had changed jobs shortly before adopting and, as a result, could not adopt a child for the first six months that they were in their new post. Self-employed adopters are penalised and children are waiting longer in care.

I absolutely support the aims of the Government’s national adoption strategy, which states that prospective adopters from every walk of life should be supported, including the self-employed. The vision is to ensure that all adoptive children are found permanent, loving families as quickly as possible—unless, of course, their prospective parent is self-employed, or so it seems.

It is difficult to gauge the full extent of how many individuals, children and families are impacted by this disparity. Nevertheless, I hope this debate will highlight the need to address it and pave a path that will ultimately unlock future adopters and support the creation of safe, loving and happy families.

In my research for this debate, it sounded very much like this is a loophole that no one had noticed. I seriously hope the Government see things in the same way and will look to close this loophole as soon as possible. I draw my remarks to a close, as I know other Members are eager to contribute. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s comments and hope he is able to address the five concerns I have raised, as well as the many other concerns that will doubtless be raised by other Members.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (in the Chair)]

If people wish to contribute with a speech, they must stand at the appropriate times so we can see that they wish to speak. Thank you so much.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rachael Maskell]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Normally it is the parent who does the joining up, and that is clearly not right. The Government need to make sure that the adoption strategy looks at every aspect of an adoptive parent’s journey and ensures that the facilities, support and services are in place to give the child the best possible start in life. It is exhausting for parents, who find themselves having to negotiate—this is where the law stands at the moment—with a local authority to see if they fit any of the criteria, on which there is no guidance. We know that cash-strapped local authorities may not be minded to pay specific attention to what is a very small cohort of parents.

The Government recognise how necessary statutory maternity entitlements are for parents to bond with their child, and they must recognise how much more important such support is for a child who has experienced multiple forms of trauma and who could have complex needs that need addressing. Life is often exhausting for an adoptive parent who is trying to form a new family and working to give their child the safest home possible. The services need to be there in a timely way to support and nurture that child, and to ensure they have the best start in life when perhaps their first start was not the right one.

The “Good Work” review does not accept that there should be a differentiation in the support received. On statutory adoption pay for the self-employed, we are not talking about a lot of people. It is not a high cost to the Government in the scale of things and, as well as the savings to the Government from ensuring that self-employed parents have the support around them, statutory adoption pay would be immeasurable for parents and for the child. Now is the time to act, and I trust that the Minister agrees.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (in the Chair)]

Mr Jones, you arrived a tad late. If you wish to contribute, I am sure we can find time to accommodate you.

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

That is kind, but I assumed that I would not be called. I am here just to listen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

I am delighted to be here and hon. Members will realise why shortly. I congratulate the hon. Member for Colchester on his speech, his presentation and the case he made. I hope we hear a similar speech from the Minister in a moment or two, and that the Minister accepts everything his hon. Friend said; I did not find anything that I disagreed with. I also agreed with the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Holly Mumby-Croft).

As always, my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) made an impassioned case in support of adoption. She knows, even if others do not, why the issue means so much to me. I say to the hon. Member for Colchester that it is not just the Conservatives who think that we should support our self-employed people; that is what the Labour party thinks, too. I speak from personal experience, because I was self-employed and started and grew small businesses for many years.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (in the Chair)]

Order. Mr Esterson, I do not wish to stop your flow, but I think you are getting the constituency name wrong, as Mr Colburn represents Carshalton and Wallington.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lee Rowley)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the debate and for the contributions of my hon. Friends the Members for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn), for Scunthorpe (Holly Mumby-Croft) and for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter)—who is no longer present—and from the hon. Members for York Central (Rachael Maskell), for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) and for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson). This is an important debate that should be treated with the seriousness that colleagues have shown this evening, in accordance with the importance it clearly holds for those in the Public Gallery.

As many other hon. Members have already done, I pay tribute to the incredible work that adoptive parents do every single day. I am utterly and completely in awe of those who take on that responsibility and do so for a lifetime. It is incredible to see people’s willingness to do that and to support vulnerable young people in very difficult circumstances to ensure that they build a better life.

I have never spoken about it in this Chamber, but this is something that my partner and I have looked at on a personal level. I have not done it; I have not taken the leap from the springboard that some in the Gallery have done. I am trepidatious—it is very challenging, and we are still working it through. From looking at it, I know how difficult it can be and how much it impacts on people’s lives. The Government are immensely grateful for all the work done on a daily basis by adoptive parents up and down the country, whether in my constituency or any other represented here today.

The Government recognise that it is also a big endeavour for someone to be willing to go out and set up their own business, be an entrepreneur and think about how to support individuals and undertake private enterprise. It is another leap in the dark and another thing that takes time to do. We want to be supportive of self-employed people—those who want to set up their own businesses and who have the desire to go out there and innovate.

The debate covers two very important areas of policy. It is important that the Government think through the potential implications and the challenges that have been highlighted through the petition and by hon. Members today. Before I come to the substantive point, I want to say one more thing. I think the creator of the petition is in the Public Gallery. I was looking at their blog in preparation for this debate, and I read a post they wrote in December, when they were talking about why they had created the petition and why it was so important to them that Parliament consider the issue. At the time, the person was talking about how they had got 4,000 signatures—obviously it went much higher than that. In their blog they said:

“We want to have our voices…heard. To be visible, accepted, recognised and supported. In a nutshell, we want…rights…I don’t think we are asking for all that much. Although I know next to nothing about politics…I’ve managed to work out an e petition”.

I want to say to that person, who might be in the room, that although I cannot speak for my colleagues, I think most of us here did not come from political backgrounds. I certainly did not. My dad was a self-employed milkman, so I did not expect to be here, either.

This place is often very difficult for people who have no experience of it, as most of us did not before we came here. It is hard to understand and work out. We have weird, very strange approaches to things. We say things that we would never say down the pub. Most of us are quite normal people. We are not properly normal—we are in politics—but we are not far off. Ultimately, we understand the challenges and we recognise that there are issues out there. We know that parts of our broad legislative canon are sometimes challenging and do not make immediate sense, and are sometimes in tension with each other. If nothing else, I hope that from coming to Westminster Hall today you will recognise that and feel that you are being heard—

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Member must speak through the Chair and not say “you”.

[Lee Rowley]

I apologise for saying “you”.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (in the Chair)]

It is noted, Minister. You may continue.

[Lee Rowley]

I am grateful to you for pulling me up on that, Ms Ghani.

Moving on to the substantive point, as hon. Members will note, the Government have responded to the petition. It is on the website and those who take an interest in the issue will have seen it. No doubt there will still be a continuing conversation and people will continue to push the Government, but I want to spend a few minutes explaining the reasons behind the response. There will be people in the Chamber, and people watching, who have different views, but I hope at the very least to be able to explain the rationale for why we are here. The Government should always listen and always think through such issues in detail. They should always try to understand the tensions between different policies, and I will take a few moments to outline the situation.

The Government want to support all adopters, including new adoptive parents, to ensure that they can access the support that their children and family need at the early stages of adoption. As has been mentioned by hon. Members already, in July 2021 we published our national adoption strategy, which highlights the key improvements that we expect to see in the adoption system. There is an incredible amount in it and an incredible amount of ambition, and it will take time to get there, but that is the direction that the Government and my colleagues in the Department for Education want to go in.

The strategy sets out commitments to improve services in three main areas, the first of which is the recruitment of sufficient adopters. Hon. Members have already highlighted the importance of ensuring that children who need adoptive parents can be matched with them, and we also have commitments both to match approved adopters with waiting children and to provide support to adopted children and their families, which is exactly what we are talking about today.

Earlier this month, we announced that the adoption support fund will continue to offer important support to adoptive and eligible special guardianship order families up to March 2025—to the end of the spending review period that we are in at the moment—through providing access to therapeutic services. When that was launched in 2015, it was a unique programme that provided funding to local authorities and regional adoption agencies so that they could access a range of support for families and tailor it, including psychotherapy and creative therapies following a review of locally assessed needs.

Supporting and ensuring permanency for children is a priority. I hope that it has been demonstrated that since 2015, through measures such as the support fund, we have been able to offer support to nearly 40,000 children. The additional funding just announced will take that to 10 consecutive years of funding. It is £144 million between next month and March 2025. I hope that demonstrates that the Government are committed to stabilising placements. It recognises the importance of the Government in that approach.

Today’s debate has been very reasonable and important, and the level of cross-party support, interest and gentle pushing—quite rightly—of the Government on such important issues demonstrates the willingness of Members from all parties to take the issue seriously and move it outside the normal bounds of party political knockabout that we often fall into in this place. I hope hon. Members and those in the Gallery recognise that there has been progress in recent years in trying to create a more level playing field for adoption and on making the processes easier and simpler, although there is still much to do in the future.

Let me turn to the specifics on maternity allowance. As colleagues know, there are two types of maternity pay available to pregnant working women and new mothers: statutory maternity pay and maternity allowance. Historically, both were primarily health and safety provisions that related specifically to people being in the workforce but needing safety and support for pregnancy prior to giving birth, for childbirth itself, and for breastfeeding. I recognise that the area is in tension, and I understand the clear arguments that have been made by Members from all parties, but because that support is based on the original principle the challenge is in recognising how we apply it. I am not saying, I would not dare to say, that there are not different challenges. The hon. Member for Sefton Central highlighted the challenges that adoptive parents go through at different times, but the principle behind the benefit that the petition seeks to equalise starts from a different proposition and a different perspective. That is why the Government are not coming forward at this time with the change that is being proposed.