New call for overhaul of UK adoption policy
Professor Brid Featherstone of the University of Huddersfield says adopted children denied contact with their birth families can experience identity issues team interviewed large numbers of social workers, birth family members, adoptive parents and adopted people plus lawyers and other professionals to compile their 44-page report.
They discovered that in England, Scotland and Wales, direct contact – which is more commonly allowed in Northern Ireland – is rarely an option and that the standard alternative of “letterbox contact” is often poorly supported.
As a consequence, Professor Featherstone and her colleagues have made several key recommendations including that the current model of adoption should be reviewed and a more open approach considered.
This led the BASW to call for “a review of adoption law in all countries of the UK, into whether the assumptions about severance of connection to families of origin is ethical.”
The report also questioned whether the “assumption of severance” is sustainable in the age of internet and social media, making it much easier for adopted children to trace birth families.
Professor Featherstone, who worked alongside Professor Anna Gupta of Royal Holloway University of London, with Sue Mills of Leeds University as research assistant, says that the debate about more open adoption is very important.
However she would prefer to see a change in culture and a case-bycase approach involving social workers rather than legislative change.
She said: “You should start from the assumption that direct contact with birth parents ought to be considered.
“Usually, adopted children go searching when they get to 18 and it can store up trouble if they haven’t had previous contact, enabling them to see their birth parents for good or ill.
“They can stop having fantasies about these wonderful parents that they were stolen away from, or equally that they were absolutely terrible people.
“It’s about their identities. Adopted people told us that identity is a lifelong issue for them: ‘Where do I come from? Who do I belong to?’”
Around 5,000 children are currently adopted annually from care across the UK. This nonconsensual adoption has sparked disagreements between judiciary and government, criticism from many birth parents whose children have been adopted against their wishes, and ethical debate within the social work profession itself.
The background to the report and the BASW response is that adoption has been promoted strongly by governments across the UK, particularly in England, as a “gold standard” approach to children who are considered at risk within their families of origin and who have been taken into care.
Professor Featherstone and her team launched their report, entitled The Role of the Social Worker in Adoption – Ethics and Human Rights, in London. They plan to hold similar events around the UK, including Huddersfield, so that interested parties throughout the country have a chance to hear and discuss the issues.
In addition to the launch of the BASW report, Professor Featherstone has joined her University of Huddersfield colleague Professor Paul Bywaters in giving evidence to the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Children, discussing research on the impact that cutbacks in local government expenditure have made on child protection services in deprived areas.