Agenda item

The report provides an overview of the work of Adopt London South (ALS) Regional Adoption Agency to achieve permanence for children looked after.

Officers present spoke to the report and informed that the local authority joined the Adopt London South (ALS) as a result of a decision to join regional. In detail they informed that Southwark was the house borough and Croydon was one of four in the region to join.

The report presented covered first full year of adopters and its operation. In summary, the service had transferred of a number of staff. The ALS function was to recruit and provide adoption services of prospective adopters. Children Services however retained the corporate parenting agency and decision making responsibilities for the best interest decision for children who were believed to need a plan of adoption and also the match between adopters and a child. Children’s Services also retained the responsibility for the permanency planning and paying adoption allowances.  Croydon was currently paying 17% of the funding for the next two years of ALS and was the biggest local authority within the ALS.

Officers further provided the Panel with statistics and addressed that the sufficient of adopters had remained the same though targets set were not met. At the time of completion there were:

-       Twenty-one families being assessed, though ALS do prioritise applications for families who met the needs of ALS.

-       Forty-one children waited over a year before ASL started of which some have now been matched. Out of the fifty, thirty-eight were under the age of two which was a significant amount.

-       Babies on average waited one hundred and twelve days, and for all children over six years old waited over one thousand days.

-       There was also a longer average waiting time for the minority ethnicity groups too than for children of white European heritage.

-       The average waiting time has been reduced by four days since ASL was initiated

-       There had been seven early permanence in ALS. This data represented how long it was between children in care and a placement order with those children who were in their permanence placement.

-       There had been over one thousand requests for post adoption support where additional work was undertaken to increase capacity and also the challenges during the pandemic. 

The service worked closely with ASL to ensure high quality plans for support during adoption with the view to improve waiting time for ethnic minority groups and increase ethnic minority group adopters, improve early permanence planning, recruit local adopters for London children, support approved adopters who could not be matched with a child from another local authority, increase significantly the capacity for post adoption support and improve the way data and systems were shared.

Panel Members appreciated the report presented and looked forward to the annual report upon completion. They then discussed the whole report in detail and raised questions and provided comments.

Panel Members noted the partnership agreements indicating the protocols put in place when there was a breakdown in the home. Further, Panel Members requested for information on the procedure and timescales of completion, what the future implications for the budget control in terms of best value, as Croydon were the highest contributors. Officers stated that as the service retained responsibility for the child, and that the procedure in place for breakdown in the placement would remain exactly the same as before though they would be working with the ALS and adoption agency. Officers further informed that they had the biggest numbers of CLA which was why there was a partnership agreement. There was monthly meetings held to consider options, what was found, resources available and how money was best spent. The budget was set as it was reviewed on a yearly basis.

Panel Members discussed the protocol and the importance of the process and was disappointed to hear that there was nothing in place at the moment and it was therefore important for practice. Officers confirmed that the process and procedure of reviews was retained by children’s services, and not by ALS.

The Chair sought for clarification on the post adoption support to adults, with the data showing two hundred and ninety-five adults requesting service in comparison to the ninety people who had received a service and queried whether this was data across all local authorities versus Croydon. Officers confirmed that these numbers had belonged to Croydon, and for clarity that the figures were not separated as it was a report that incorporated all local authorities. It was further said that in December there were 10 adults waiting, though outstanding, it was a significant reduced number. This was partly due to the transfer of a significant numbers of adult to ALS that had not received assistance and additional staff was funded to clear the work. The Chair welcomed the response and requested for future reports to address data relating to Croydon.

Panel Members was interested of the financial spending in adopted adults and queried whether adopted adults had a specific statutory right to services. Officers informed the Panel that there were two categories of service that were provided to adopted adults who were adopted before the year 1975 and adopted after year 1975. The statutory responsibility differs. ALS had provided the same service to everyone, but had now signposted groups and different services which was appropriate to some adults, so there were different tiers of statutory service. ALS was providing six sessions of counselling but this had been reduced to be in line with the funding.

The Panel discussed the ethnicity within the adoption and noted that there was 54% of children from ethnic minority and dual heritage background awaiting placement; also 38% of adopters of ethnic minority and dual heritage; and asked whether there was a matching for children in ethnicity. In matching, officers considered to match children with adopters of the same ethnic background, though there has been matches where a full ethnic background may not be met. Adopters were also used from other agencies and not just from ALS. Recruitment for adopters of ethnic minority remains the focus.

Following this discussion the Chair requested for detailed data on how the 54% and 38% ethnic minority numbers affected children of Croydon, also looking further to the breakdown of the ethnic groups within the percentages; and also reviewing the work around social work with families and early intervention in terms of how children and families were treated, when there was a disproportionate number of black and Asian but predominantly black Caribbean children that are coming into the care system in addition to understanding what was happening with assessments that were taking place when the decision was being made to remove the child permanently for that cohort of children. Officers shared that generally children who had additional health needs or from a sibling group of different ages were often children who had to wait longer particularly if they were from the ethnic minority groups.

Panel Members requested to learn of more on the total budget of contribution made to understand how much money was put in and its value for money, particularly as Croydon was under financial pressure. Officers shared with the Panel that the service had transferred eight staff members to ALS and the current budget of ALS was approximately £3.6 million pounds and Croydon’s contribution this year was around £620,000. There was very little involvement with the Adoption Panel and this was to be reviewed.

Further questions raised by the Panel was asked in regards to the money spent, and Panel Members asked how many of Croydon’s children was adopted, how many were of ethnic minority and was there a set target and was the target met? Officers clarified that the funding provided mainly covered the staffing, and at every Board meeting they were provided with the performance that addressed each local authority with information of activity for a quarter and how many children they had in family funding, placed for adoption, how many adopters there was post adoption and was supporting. With this information there was a detailed understanding of the money paid in.

There was reconsideration of the budget as Croydon had a higher number of children in adoption and other local authorities had lower numbers. This brought out further questions from the Panel who wanted clarity on whether Croydon was subsidising other local authorities in finding placements for children as they had lower numbers to adopt.

ACTION: For questions relating to the percentages of ethnic minority group in adoption for Croydon and the financial implications to be addressed at the next meeting.

The Chair thanked officers of the report provided which was helpful.

The Panel RESOLVED to note the Adopt London South activity during 2019-2020.