Setting the Scene for Openness and Transparency in Adoption from Care

The Find-a-Family program of Barnardos Australia has been finalising open adoptions for children in out-of-home care in New South Wales, Australia (NSW) since becoming an adoption agency in 1985. Since this time, the program... [ view full abstract ]

The Find-a-Family program of Barnardos Australia has been finalising open adoptions for children in out-of-home care in New South Wales, Australia (NSW) since becoming an adoption agency in 1985. Since this time, the program has secured adoption orders for over 260 children.

Underpinning this commitment to adoption is a strong belief in adoption as providing secure family placements for children where the court has determined it is not safe for the child to return home. Adoption provides a child with a family for life; however the work required to achieve this is complex and detailed.

Our experience in the area of open adoption has shown us that the early work undertaken by the case manager and the agency can significantly impact on the way the relationships between the child, their birth family and their adoptive parent/s develop and which, in turn, will influence the nature and quality of openness in future years. Therefore our objective in this context is to facilitate the development of relationships and lay the foundations for a successful working relationship necessary for open adoption.

The method we use to achieve this objective is to provide case managers with the level of skill required to undertake the complexities of adoption work. Significant challenges are likely when working with birth families, but our experience is that birth parents are most likely to make decisions to benefit their children if they receive honest and complete information from the very beginning.

Recent amendments to NSW child protection legislation require the court to give priority to the child’s return to birth family if safe, followed by guardianship (usually with kin). If neither of these placement options is viable, the court must consider the option of open adoption for non-Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander children, prior to making an order that will place a child in long-term care. This legislation obliges child protection workers to have early and honest discussions with a child’s birth family about the option of adoption if the child cannot be placed with family or kin.

Case managers need to assist birth parents and adoptive parents to work together to achieve stability and security for the child as it is this that will support the child through life. Case managers are exposed to a wide range of situations, encountering birth parents who have had their child removed at birth as well as parents who may have spent some years caring for their child. Additionally the birth parents will have had trauma of their own and may have ongoing drug dependency, volatile and abusive relationships and ongoing experience of poverty. This presentation will outline the framework within which our case managers operate, highlighting that by providing clear and transparent practices, processes and timeframes, appropriate and workable relationships between birth parents and adoptive parents can be achieved.

The presentation will report on the success of early work in achieving ongoing workable relationships between birth parents and adoptive parents, despite the pressure of the adoption process. We will highlight both contested and uncontested matters and demonstrate that, while many of our adoption applications do not have the consent of the birth parent, positive relationships can be maintained. The conclusions from our experience can assist case managers in facilitating healthy relationships between birth and adoptive families, based on honesty and trust.