Freeing Order Processes in Northern Ireland: Painfully Slow

Kelly, Greg; McSherry, Dominic

doi:10.1177/030857590102500207

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…Their foster parents then seek to adopt them. A number of smaller studies (Kelly & Ince 2000; Kelly & McSherry 2001) concluded that the freeing order processes were prone to long delays. The purpose of this study was to complete a more extensive review of current practice detailing the timescales involved, and at what points delay was occurring, and to provide a vehicle for discussing practical remedies to reduce delay where possible.…”

Section: The Study In Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adoption from care in Northern Ireland: problems in the process

Kelly

McSherry

2002

Child & Family Social Work

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This is a study of the processes for freeing children for adoption in Northern Ireland. The focus was the time taken from admission to care to adoption order. The findings confirmed that the process is dogged by delay at each stage. In total the average time from the child becoming looked after to the granting of an adoption order was 4.5 years. Most of the time taken was in the stages for which social services had lead responsibility, principally the decision to pursue adoption as the plan for a child. The children were very young when admitted to care – average age 1 year 7 months. Most were admitted to care because they were being neglected. Their parents were well known to social services and had multiple problems. Most parents unsuccessfully contested the social services’ application and this contributed much to the delay. Their former foster parents adopted almost half of the children and these children tended to be placed more quickly with their adopters than those placed with adopters who were not their foster parents prior to the adoption process.

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Section: The Study In Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adoption from care in Northern Ireland: problems in the process

Kelly

McSherry

2002

Child & Family Social Work

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“…The average age of the children on admission to care was 18 months and, as illustrated in Figure 1, less than 20 per cent were over the age of three years. In the Kelly and McSherry (2003) study of a population of children for whom freeing orders were sought, the average age of the children's last admission was 19 months. be dependent on sound and timely decision-making by social services and the courts.…”

Section: The Children's Progress To Permanent Placementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The children also avoided any changes of placement, which can be a feature of the wait for a permanent home. Significantly, over half the children in Kelly and McSherry's (2003) population experienced three or more moves in care before their adoptive placement.…”

Section: The Children's Progress To Permanent Placementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The growth was accompanied by the common problem of delay in achieving permanent placements through adoption. Kelly and McSherry (2003) and the Department of Health and Social Services & Public Safety (2005) reported that the average time from final admission to care to an adoption order was over four years.…”

Section: Introduction: Permanence Planning In Northern Irelandmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Permanence Planning in Northern Ireland: A Development Project

Kelly¹,

Haslett²,

O'Hare

et al. 2007

Adoption & Fostering

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discuss a permanence planning project in a Northern Ireland Health and Social Services Trust. The project recruited and trained dual (foster care/adoption) approved carers and placed children with them before the children were freed for adoption. The carers who were recruited in the first year of the project (1999) are described, as are the early outcomes of the placements. All the children (n = 52) placed with the carers were subsequently adopted and no placements have disrupted in the three to six years since. The children were placed with their permanent carers earlier than in conventional practice. The carers, for the most part, thought the reward of having their child placed earlier and younger compensated for the anxiety and uncertainty generated by the legal proceedings to free the children for adoption. They were essentially people who wanted to adopt (three-quarters were childless couples) and the project provides positive evidence of the capacity of this population to offer 'modern' adoption placements to looked after children.

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Attitudes and factors that influence decision‐making in adoption from care in Northern Ireland

Barr¹

2004

Child Care in Practice

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Freeing Order Processes in Northern Ireland: Painfully Slow

Cited by 4 publications

References 5 publications

Adoption from care in Northern Ireland: problems in the process

Adoption from care in Northern Ireland: problems in the process

Permanence Planning in Northern Ireland: A Development Project

Attitudes and factors that influence decision‐making in adoption from care in Northern Ireland

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