Redbridge Adoption Charter

Introduction

This charter is a statement of Redbridge Adoption Service’s commitment and ambition to improve the outcomes for children being adopted and for adopters.

The Adopters’ Charter is designed to be a working agreement between Redbridge Adoption Service – as an adoption agency – and potential adoptive parents. It forms a basis for adopters to engage with, and to question planning and decision making regarding the services we provide.

Adoption of children is built on the life-long commitment and determination of adoptive parents. We value and respect the opportunity you provide to transform a child’s life and your views will always be welcomed.

The Adopters’ Charter

Children come first

Adoption is first and foremost a service for children who cannot live with their birth family. Children should be helped to understand what adoption means and supported throughout the adoption journey and beyond.

Adoption is a life-changing decision that affects the child, and his or her birth and adoptive families. It must be made with the child’s best interests, wishes, feelings and needs at its heart and on the basis of sound evidence and high quality assessments.

Adoption agencies must:

• Ensure that children are placed, with siblings wherever possible, within a timescale that is best for them and without unnecessary delay.
• Treat prospective adopters and adopters with openness, fairness and respect.
• Make prospective adopters’ first points of contact informative and welcoming.
• Approach adopter recruitment in the spirit of inclusiveness with a view to identifying potential and opportunity
• Recruit prospective adopters who can meet all or most of the needs of children waiting for, or likely to need, adoption and signpost prospective adopters to other agencies if there is insufficient local demand.
• Explain to prospective adopters the needs and profiles of the children waiting to be adopted.
• Ensure preparation and training, the home study assessment and approval process are explained and proceed in a transparent and efficient way and are completed within agreed timescales
• Regularly review progress on matching with prospective adopters, and inform them about the Adoption Register and refer them to this within required timescales.
• Provide adopters and prospective adopters with information, counselling and support, as and when needed, throughout the adoption journey and beyond.
• Provide prospective adopters with information about the Independent Review Mechanism.
• Work in partnership, and with other agencies and the Courts, to ensure that all decisions are timely and joined-up.

Prospective and approved adoptive parents must:

• Be aware that adoption often brings challenges as well as joy, be realistic about the needs of children awaiting adoption, and accept that with support they may be able to consider adopting a child with a different profile to the child they originally envisaged adopting.
• Be fully committed to and engage in the preparation and assessment process working in an open and transparent way with the adoption service to complete their assessment within agreed timescales
• Take responsibility for their own learning and development through the adoption process and at any point in the process share any concerns so that appropriate support can be identified
• Make the most of opportunities to develop their parenting skills, and seek support when needed at the earliest stage.
• Do all they can to enable their adopted child to feel loved and secure, and to reach their potential .

In signing this Charter the adoption agency and adoptive parent agrees to reflect the spirit and intentions of the Charter in their actions.

The adoption agency

The following section is for adoption agencies and adoptive parents to make any additional comments as to how they will implement the commitments in the Charter and any additional commitment/s particularly important to their own local context.

Agency

Full and current information regarding our local adoption services can be found on the Redbridge adoption page.

The Adoption Service will seek the views of all adopters during the period of the assessment, and again after approval as adopters at annual reviews of approval, after the placement of children for adoption and on the making of an Adoption Order regarding the services and support provided by Redbridge Adoption Service. The aim of this is to check that the charter is being adhered to and to inform future developments of the Redbridge Adoption Charter.

The following organisations have worked to develop the Charter and have pledged to support the Adopters’ Charter and help make it a reality in all areas:

• Department for Education
• BAAF - Adoption and Fostering
• adoption uk
• ADCS - Leading  Children's Services
• cvaa uk - consortium of voluntary adoption agencies