Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent estimate her Department has made of the number of children in the UK who are waiting to be adopted.

The adoption leadership board quarterly data reports at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/adoption-leadership-board-quarterly-data-reports-2016-to-2017 show that there were 2,030 children in England who were waiting to be placed for adoption with a placement order at 30 September 2016. This is interpreted to be the number of looked after children in England at 30 September 2016 who had an active adoption decision and were the subject of a placement order but had not yet been placed with their adoptive family at that time.

Equivalent information for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is not available in the Department.