There have been recent changes to how post adoption contact is being considered by the family courts.
Research has proven, in certain situations, that there are long standing benefits to children who have been adopted having contact with their birth families and having contact promoted with their siblings. The President of the Family Division, Sir Andrew McFarlane outlined this ‘new approach’ for post-adoption contact in both his Mayflower lecture last year and more recently in his address to the POTATO conference (Parents of Traumatised Adopted Teens Organisation) in May 2024.
He highlighted that contact for a child who has been subject to care and placement orders should instead be focused on ‘mediating’ and ‘moderating’ interventions, moving away from the outdated notion of letterbox contact.
The Public Law Working Group, adoption sub-group who have recently reported have identified a full range of contact options to be considered, including digitally safe options, to be considered by professionals and the court during care and placement proceedings.
What this means for social workers
During Care and Placement proceedings the local authority and the children’s social workers will need to provide proper analysis as to what contact should take place after adoption. They will need to give specific consideration to all the important people in that child’s life including siblings.
The adoption support plan should also include a contact support plan which should be made available for consideration of the court before the making of an adoption order. The plan for contact should be known at the time the placement order is made.
Lasty, there should also be agreement between social work teams as to who will complete the relevant life story work for the children and the estimated timescale for that to be completed should be identified and made clear at the time the placement order is made.
What is means for the Family Court
The court will no longer accept that letters written and received by birth family is the right contact plan in every case. The court will consider making contact orders in the right cases when placement orders are made (these are the orders that empower the local authority to place a child for adoption). This will set the tone for the contact plan which will be considered again within the adoption application itself.
Within the placement proceedings the court will expect to see the assessed needs of the child to stay in touch with the relevant family members beyond the making of the placement order.
It is right to recognise that the law as it currently stands does not expect a contact order to be made if the adopters oppose one being made. But it is hoped that through contact orders being made at the time of the placement order and with better training as to the advantages of contact being provided there will be less resistance to post adoption contact.
It is clear that the current shift in post-adoption contact will take time and will at this stage be considered with caution. The courts will be focused on identifying characteristics where parents are able to clearly demonstrate the ability to support the adoptive placement of the child, promote the relationship of that child and their adoptive parents and be able to commit to contact.