For the first time the government has published data in the form of adoption and special guardianship national statistics. The information is broken down into volumes, speed of decision making, and the age and background of children being adopted.
The headline figures are :-
· Adoptions reduced from 2,700 to 2,300 in 2009-10
· Black children aged under 5 take on average some 1,300 days before adoption takes place whereas it’s around 950 days for white or Asian children.
· It is 3 times more difficult to find suitable adoption for black children than white.
· Guidelines suggest that adoption should be achieved within 12 months of a decision being made that a child should be adopted but only 5 of 47 local authorities managed to meet that target
· On average it took approximately 20 months for adoption to be achieved after a child is taken into care
The adoption guidance makes clear that local authorities need to be flexible and receptive to the possibility of adoptions of different ethnicity children and no person should be turned away on the grounds of race, age or social background.
Family law solicitors can assist further with this issue.