First adult adoptee delegation meets with Secretary of State
Founding members of the Adult Adoptee Movement met with Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson and members of her team on Thursday 4th December. We presented our briefing document to the Secretary of State and explained that our priorities are: mental health support for adult adoptees; representation in policy discussions; improved access to records; research on adoptee outcomes; and an apology for the State’s role in historic forced adoptions, with mitigations.
Other topics raised include international adoptions, health inequalities, adoptee rights, abuse in adoption placements, adoption marketing and the use of social media by adopters, and the need to review the legal framework of adoption as well as how it is practised.
We have shared our recent blog and the statement from the Chief Archivists in Local Government Group on creating an accurate and up to date database for adoption records.
We are encouraged by the Department for Education’s current focus on measures to help keep families together, along with increased funding. We would now like to see the government go further in reforming adoption itself.
We thank the Secretary of State for taking the time to listen to us, for engaging constructively, for agreeing to further discussions with ministers and for passing on our requests for meetings with colleagues.