Every prospective adopter will be allocated a ‘key worker’ to support them through the adoption process, under draft regulations unveiled by the government, writes Derren Hayes.
Local authorities will be given responsibility for appointing the key worker when prospective adopters are matched with a child; a child has been placed with a parent while awaiting an adoption order; or an adoption support plan has been set.
While councils can arrange for adoption support services to be provided by other organisations they must still arrange for a key worker to be appointed.
The proposal is included in the first phase of regulations to come out of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, which was given royal assent six weeks ago. Consultation is to take place until February before a final version of the regulations is to be drawn up and implemented in April.
The draft regulations say key workers will "act as the first port of call to the family, encouraging them to access relevant support services, including tax and benefit assistance".
While the regulations acknowledge many authorities will already have adoption professionals fulfilling the key worker role, it aims to make practice more consistent nationally.
The draft regulations also require local authorities to provide counselling, information and advice services for existing and prospective adopters and establish support plans for prospective adopters setting out objectives, key services, and a timescale for delivery. Service users will be consulted on development of the plan.
Councils must make arrangements for adoptive parents and adopted children support groups are to be set up to offer therapeutic services to them. The financial support system is to be modernised and extra assistance is to be introduced to facilitate contact between adopted children and birth relatives.
In October, the government announced it would ring-fence £70 million of council funding over the next three years to pay for the new requirements.
'Draft Adoption Support Services Regulations 2003' available here
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