With adoption, it's not who you are – it's how you parent

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/nov/28/adoption-too-many-obstacles-matching

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The Rotherham case, in which children were moved from foster carers, apparently because of the carers' membership of Ukip is atypical. But on hearing the facts, my only surprise was that this was a fostering case, because matching in fostering is often welcomingly pragmatic, as speed is frequently the priority.

In my capacity as adoption adviser to the government, however, I come across too many instances where would-be adopters find themselves inappropriately rejected by local authorities and voluntary adoption agencies. Even when they are approved as adopters, they wait and wait while a process called "matching" takes place.

The matching of children to adopters has become quite a science but not one which has an evidential base which can stand up to too much scrutiny. Some local authorities use complex matrices to try and match the apparent skills of some adopters with the identified needs of children waiting for adoption. It's very time consuming. Despite recent improvements, approved adopters who may have already waited for many months before being admitted to the Adoption Register, wait on average, a further nine and a half months before being matched with a child.

The effort and time, which goes into matching, is well intentioned and many practitioners believe in it passionately. But the truth is that there is very little evidence to support the belief that matching specific adopters to specific children can be done with any real confidence. As Professors Julie Selwyn and David Quinton from the University of Bristol's Hadley centre for adoption and foster care studies have concluded:

<blockquote>"Given the effort that goes into matching, it might be thought that there is good evidence that we know how often matching is achieved and that a good match makes a difference. Such research evidence is lacking: not just sparse, but virtually absent."</blockquote>

Meanwhile, children wait unnecessarily long for adoption because available adopters do not fit a social worker's sometimes idealistic view of the type of family a particular child needs.

It is often said that about a fifth of adoptions break down, but I have argued for some time that many fewer are unsuccessful, and I hope that yet to be completed research from Selwyn will support that assertion. But although disruptions are relatively few in number, we know which sort of children are more vulnerable. The age of the child (the older the child the greater the risk); a history of placement disruption; the number of prior foster placements and the time already spent in placements; and a history of maltreatment (particularly sexual abuse) are all factors linked to adoption breakdown.

At the same time, we know quite a lot about which adopters are more likely to be successful. The evidence here is often counter to deeply established views. Frequently emphasised demographic characteristics including parental age, single status, ethnicity, occupation, sexual orientation, income or education are not linked to success in adoption. So, for example, younger adopters are not likely to be more successful adopters: increased parental age is actually correlated with greater stability. Single adopters are no less likely to be successful in adoption than couples. And, significantly – in the light of the fatuous comments from the Ukip parliamentary candidate in Croydon last week – adoptions by gay parents do not struggle disproportionately. When I recently spoke out in favour of gay adoption I was congratulated for being "gay friendly". I was being nothing of the sort. I was simply responding to the reality that gay couples and gay individuals are every bit as successful in adoption, even though they may often take on older and more challenging children. What seems to matter in adoptive parenting is not the sort of people adopters are but the quality of their parenting. As Quinton has said, successful adopters are simply likely to be committed, flexible, open communicators and willing to listen to advice.

If we are to find the adopters we need to give homes to the 7,000 children with placement orders who are waiting for adoption, we need to be much more open-minded about those we approve and then give the adopters themselves a much greater role in finding the right child for them. Evidence from the US ,and supported by emerging evidence from pilots being run by the British Association for Adoption and Fostering in England, is compelling. Matching works best not when it is something done to the adopters and child but involves them and trusts some of the chemistry in relationships.