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Adoption reform - let's not apportion blame for the "bloat"

Adoption reform - lets not apportion blame for the "bloat"

24 February 2012

Government plans to launch a national adoption plan reform in the current system has met with mixed views. Last month it was announced that a record number of care applications had been issued in the family courts. If Michael Gove’s proposals that:-

social workers should intervene “early and energetically” more readily, and
adoption support is beefed up

are to be effected then that has an impact on resources. I wonder whether it is sensible to be imposing new performance indicators at the same time. Precious resources might better be applied to implementing the new adoption system rather than demonstrating how regional variation makes improvement in social care difficult to measure.

Remember the courts have to be convinced that a child should be the subject of a Care Order. Parents who successfully resist such applications may simply refuse to work with social workers into the future, feeling themselves exonerated by the court, and thereby exposing their children to avoidable risk.

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