Justice For Families

Does anyone know where I can find something along these lines in law:

"If the child is not placed for adoption within 12 months then parental responsibly is given back to the parent or that the child should be returned" (sic) - That is in no way exact but roughly to the point.

I was told about this last night by Julie and it did ring a bell with me as I had read it previously but I'm not sure where - I thought "was it in some of the court papers I have? maybe" I looked but only roughly because I have like 14 bundles or then again was it in a 'act' such as the children act 1989 or another?

Do you know what I am getting at? and can you point me to this piece? or give me any idea where to look? - Time is short

I think this relates to Placement Orders, which I think expire if the child has not been placed for adoption 12 months following the making of the Placement Order. My understanding is that if/when the Placement Order lapses, the child would remain on a Care Order, but that the parents would again be able to become party to proceedings (which they are excluded from by the existence of a Placement Order). I'm not a lawyer, so get legal advice on this issue.

Yes it's something a long those lines.

Do you know where this is stated at all? as this will be needed for court, my sister is LIP so no legal aid suckers (aka solicitors) here - Hence I'm trying to track this down...

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/p ... nreg01.htm

LORD BROWNE-WILKINSON


My Lords,

This appeal relates to the power of the court, under section 20 of the Adoption Act 1976 ("the Act of 1976"), to revoke an order made under section 18 of that Act freeing a child for adoption. It is a precondition to the making of an adoption order that the parent has either agreed to the adoption or the court had dispensed with such agreement on one of the statutory grounds mentioned in section 16(2) of the Act of 1976. One of those grounds is that the parent is unreasonably withholding his or her agreement to the adoption. This requirement of agreement or dispensing with such agreement can be dealt with by applying, in advance of the adoption hearing itself, for a freeing order. A freeing order can only be made if the child has been placed with prospective adopters or adoption is likely. If, within a year after the freeing order is made, an adoption has neither taken place nor is pending, the parent can apply under section 20 of the Act of 1976 to revoke the freeing order on the ground that he or she "wishes to resume parental responsibility".

The specific question raised in this appeal is whether, under section 20 of the Act of 1976, the court can revoke the freeing order in circumstances where the parent applying for revocation cannot properly be allowed to have the actual care of the child but accepts that, upon revocation of the freeing order, a care order should be made in favour of the local authority under the Children Act 1989 ("the Act of 1989").

The child in question, M, is now seven years old. His mother was 15 when he was born and was too young and immature properly to care for M. M failed to thrive. He was placed by the local authority on the "at risk register" and was admitted to hospital in November 1991. The local authority having been granted an interim care order under the Act of 1989, in December 1991 M went to his first placement with foster parents. He was returned in August 1992 to his mother's care but, after numerous changes of care arrangements, the local authority obtained an emergency protection order on 30 October 1992 and a full care order was made under section 31 of the Act of 1989 on 19 January 1993.

http://www.herefordshire.gov.uk/adoptio ... d_rev.html


5.7 Where a child has been placed for adoption but not adopted within 12 months, the child’s social worker must present a further report to the Adoption and Permanence Panel identifying the length of the delay, the reasons and the steps being taken to address any difficulties.

5.8 Where an agency decision has been made to place a child for adoption but the child has not been placed within 6 months, which is not due to the Court process, the child’s social worker must present a further report to the Adoption and Permanence Panel identifying the length of the delay, the reasons and the steps being taken to address any difficulties, including consideration of a review of the adoption plan and/or a possible change to long-term fostering/separation of siblings.

Cheers, I forwarded the thread URL to Julie.

If anyone else has knows of similar rules do post them here.

Placement orders have replaced the 1976 freeing orders, the 1976 act is not used as much as it should be, 2002 and 2005 act is more commonly used, also these cases will be useful for you Andrew.

Re T (Children:Placement Order) [2008] 1 FCR 633
S-H (A Child)~v~ Kingston-upon-Hull City Council and MC [2008] EWCA
P (A Child) [2008] EWCA Civ 535
S (A Child) [2008] EWCA Civ 1333

all crutial parts are :-

Re T (Children:Placement Order) [2008] 1 FCR 633

The court of appeal had given its findings and the conclusion was that the placement orders were set aside and substituted an order adjourning the applications to a date to be fixed;
The specific issues and details for the above was the fact that
At Paragraph 18 Lord Justice Hughes Quoted:-.

“But the difference in this unusual case is that is it not simply a matter of potential difficulty of placement, the Boys were, at present, not suitable for placement for adoption. It would not be known whether they ever would be until a particular exercise had been carried out, in the home of the specialised foster placement over several months, and as the guardian in particular explained, it might well turn out that adoption was not simply not achievable, but was not in the boys' best interests, because their needs could be better met by the kind of substitute family only found in long term fostering. The generalised consideration that adoption would be best does not, on these unusual facts, lead automatically to the conclusion that it was yet possible to say whether it was in the best interests of these boys. In those circumstances I am persuaded that the finding that adoption was in their best interests and thus a placement should follow was premature.”

Also with reference to Lord Justice Hughes he made the significant point regarding the children's care plans.
At point 21

“At least one respect the care plans were deficient, because they did not make it clear that the Local Authority's plan was for Adoption, but for long term fostering if either an adoptive placement failed or it proved impossible. It is important that the care plans, now given statutory significance by sec 31a of the children's act 1989, should set out accurately what the plan is, because it travels with the child after the proceedings are over and forms the basis for future reviews”.

S-H (A Child) ~v~ Kingston upon Hull City Council and MC [2008] EWCA Civ 493

The case surrounds M who appealed against refusal to grant leave to apply for revocation of a placement order.

Appeal was Granted and in which Lord Justice Wilson Noted that:-
At point 28.
“ In these circumstances there is a real prospect that the mother can persuade the court that it is not currently appropriate for the placement order to remain in being. It is an insufficient foundation for a placement order that being the long-term aim of the court is that the child should be adopted. The necessary foundation is that -broadly speaking the child is presently in a condition to be adopted and is ready to be adopted, even though in some cases the court has to countenance the possibility of substantial difficulty and thus delay in finding a suitable adoptive placement or even failure to find one at all”.

P (A Child) [2008] EWCA Civ 535

Appeal by mother against placement orders on two children. Appeal dismissed.

The initial case concerned two children who were “Seriously Damaged” had moved through several foster placements.
In this Judgment Lord Justice Wall reviews the statutory provisions and language of ss 1 and 52 of the 2002 act, the article 8 implications and the relevant case law. He concludes that among other things: i) the language of s52 should be interpreted so that the judge has to consider whether the welfare of the child requires their adoption: the language and interpretation is straight forward; ii) although there are profound

differences between adoption and fostering there can be “compelling pragmatic reasons for adopting dual planning in appropriate cases” and the 2002 act was an attempt to move away form sequential planning and iii) a judge should exercise their powers to set any post adoption contact orders and not leave such contact to the discretion of the local authority.

As the case judgment is quite substantial the most crucial point I feel are thus:-

124, In assessing what is proportionate, the court has, of course always to bear in mind that adoption without parental consent is an extreme – indeed the most extreme – interference with family life. Cogent justification must therefore exist if parental consent be dispensed with in accordance with section 52(1)(b). Hence the observations of the Strasbourg court in Johansen v Norway (1996) 23 EHRR 33, that was a case where the court had to consider a permanent placement with a view to adoption. At para [78] it said:

“These measures were particularly far-reaching in that they totally deprived the applicant mother of her family life with the child and were inconsistent with the aim of returning them. Such measures should only be applied in exceptional circumstances and could only be justified if they were motivated by an overriding requirement pertaining to the child's best interests”.

S (A child) [2008] EWCA Civ 1333

Appeal against refusal to allow a mother's application for leave to revoke a placement order. Appeal Allowed.

The Mother had sought leave to revoke on the grounds that circumstances had changed after the failure of an adoption arrangement following which the child was placed in a foster home. However the Trial Judge found that the decision to place the child in the foster home “was a part of the process of preparing him for adoption.
The Child in question was 7 years old.

Lord Justice Thorpe reviewed the judge's approach and found that he had erred as the child was placed with the carer under the fostering rather than placement regulations.

The significant and relevance to this Judgment is this point being :-

5.The Judge, When the case had been listed before him in march was concerned to establish the current position and accordingly required further evidence from the Local Authority. The Social Worker in his statement of 17th April 2008 stated:

“As far as the Local Authority is concerned, the plan continues to be place [L] for adoption..... The minutes make it clear that the decision to place [L] in a therapeutic foster home was part of the process of preparing him for adoption”


The Judge also took from the statement the assessment of the foster carer to this effect:

“she does not feel that [L] is emotionally strong enough to face the adoption issue at this time, she should not preclude the possibility of her family adopting [L] in the future, but was not willing to make specific commitment at this time”


Hope these help a little Andrew