Social workers who
demonstrate reluctance to place vulnerable children for adoption are guilty of a
“tick box 
mentality” according to British Prime Minister David Cameron (pictured).
Speaking at the
launch of a national drive to encourage more couples to consider adopting
children in care, Mr Cameron called for a “culture change” in social services.
Earlier this year,
Education Secretary Michael Gove put new guidelines in place to ensure ethnicity
was no longer a barrier to parents adopting children. However, it is believed
that many councils are ignoring these guidelines.
Ministers publicly
have “named and shamed” the English councils with the worst records on finding
permanent new homes for children in care.
According to the
Department for Education’s league tables, Hackney, in east London, had the worst
record in the country for failing to ensure that children were adopted within a
year of a decision being take to place a children
for adoption.
Just 43pc of children
in the borough, which is one of the most deprived in London, were placed with
adoptive parents within 12 months.
Other poor performing
councils included Brent, north London, Nottinghamshire Derby and the East Riding
of Yorkshire.
In York, however,
100pc of children judged to be suitable for adoption were placed with new
families within the target time.
According to
government figures, one in four adopted children was forced to wait more than a
year before they moved in with their new parents. On average it takes more than
two and a half years for a child to be adopted.
Mr Cameron called for
sweeping reforms to speed up the system. Mr Cameron warned that councils and
courts were taking too long and asking “pointless questions” about the past
smoking habits of adoptive parents.
“We need a real
culture change in this country to be more pro-adoption,” he said. “For many
children it is the right answer. But there are far too many stories today about
pointless questions, very intrusive questions and also, a sort of tick-box
mentality that means people are looking at things – how long ago you gave up
smoking, the age of your youngest natural child?
“There’s too much
ticking of boxes and not enough discretion, judgment and
responsibility.”
Martin Narey, the
government’s adoption adviser, said the number of adoptions would start to rise
“very significantly” over the next few months. The former Chief Executive of
Barnado’s said: “The argument is being won.”
Introducing the new
guidelines in February, Mr Gove said that thousands of children were being left
in care because social workers were trying to find the ‘perfect match’ rather
than a loving family.
Mr Gove said that
social workers must allow white couples to adopt black and ethnic minority
children and that they should not turn willing adults away on the grounds they
are too old.
The Education
Secretary, himself adopted, made the move against a background of a significant
fall in adoption rates in the UK over the past 30 years.
Last year just 70
babies under the age of one were found homes, a decline from 5,174 in
1974.
In Ireland, the most
recent figures show that, in 2008, 200 domestic adoption orders were madw. Of
these 200 minors, 133 were adopted by family members, for example, the husband
of the mother or a grandparent.
Only 67 non-family adoptions
took place. Foster parents fall into this category and only 16 minors
were adopted by foster parents in 2008. This compares to the more than 6,000 children who are in State care, mostly in foster homes.