There's nothing like a good adoption statistic to really get the national media interested in children's social care...even if it is only a fleeting interest and a largely uninformed one.
Don't get me wrong- I think there are lots of stories in adoption and a lot of issues. Why for example are we setting adoptive parents up to fail by not providing enough support for them? Most of them think love will be enough to heal the children they are matched with and it's devastating for all concerned when they find out it's not.
Why are we not even trying to collect statistics on adoption breakdowns? And are we doing enough digging on the impact of the increased use of special guardianship orders?
Following the breaking news of the recent adoption statistics there were a lot of different angles ignored, for the most part, by other media.
I had an email from Steve Miley, assistant director of children's social care for the London borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, saying it was unhelpful to focus on adoption above other permanency options, such as special guardianship orders and residence orders.
"The DfE statistics for all permanency orders show an excellent improvement over the last 5 years - a 27% increase in the number of permanency orders; and in the last year a 9% increase. This is a positive picture. The debate about adoption needs to cover all aspects of permanency"
Natasha Finlayson from the Who Cares Trust also put out a statement pointing out that adoption is not always the answer for all children in care and the real problem was the postcode lottery between councils- why did some have adoption rates of over 20% and others only 2%?
Both of these are valid points. Personally, though I was most surprised, while listening to Jeremy Vine on BBC2, at his surprise that so few babies are given up for adoption these days. As a result there is usually a fierce court battle over whether a child should be adopted which can take up to two years, by which time of course babies have already formed most of their primary attachments.
Perhaps that is what bothers me the most about the current media debate on the adoption figures, it seems to be uninformed about the reality of the types of children who are in the care system these days. It's no longer Victorian orphanages and mother's terrified of how they will cope as a stigmatised, single mother. These are usually very damaged children- even the babies, many of which will suffer some kind of foetal alcohol syndrome or impact of a mother's drug-taking while pregnant. This is the sad reality but nobody seems to want to talk about it. Perhaps because the obvious follow-on conversation is how much it will cost to give them the therapy they need and deserve for the rest of their life?
The wide coverage of adoption seems to contain an underlying misunderstanding – that most children in care could or should be adopted. Adoption is the best option for some children, perhaps even more than are currently placed, but it's not the best route for the majority of children in care. It is frustrating that the 'adoption story', as government and media seem to understand it, fits more neatly with an over-simplified idea of good and bad. In reality, the lives of most children in care are more complicated than that. Most live in foster care and we should be spending more time trying to ensure that good carers continue to provide stable and caring placements. The current spending cuts in the public sector mean that too many decisions are being led by finance, rather than what children really need.