In the recent case of Re X & Y, Sir Andrew MacFarlane, President of the Family Division has said that the Court does not have jurisdiction to approve an application from an adoptive mother to revoke an adoption order made on welfare grounds even though the application was supported by the children now ages 16 and 17 and their birth mother.
The Court of Appeal accepted that the children would be profoundly upset by the outcome and admitted that if the Court had had a welfare-based jurisdiction that it would likely have made a different decision. He added, adoption orders are transformative, have a peculiar finality and are intended to be irreversible, lasting throughout life as if the child had been born to the adopter. That high degree of permanence from which the benefits to the child of long-term security and stability would flow is the unique feature that marks adoption out from all other orders made for children. It is at its core what adoption is all about.
The adoptive mother had allowed the birth mother and her younger children to move in with her during lockdown. After lockdown was lifted the adopted children left the home to live with their birth mother.
The breakdown of adoption orders is by no means unheard of. This is not an isolated case, but the Court held in this case that both the law as passed by Parliament and as previously interpreted by the Court and in the policy underlying the statutory adoption regime, led the Court to uphold the decision that they did in these circumstances.
There is no provision for the revocation of an adoption order other than following when a sole adoptive parent marries or the making of a further adoption order. These orders are designed to be final, to give security to adopters and adopted children.
The children in this case do now live with their birth mother.
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Gill Scales
Gill Scales became a salaried partner in E. Rex Makin & Co in 2005. She is a salaried partner in LLS Limited. Gill has headed up the Family Law Department in E. Rex Makin & Co and now LLS Ltd since 2005 and has continued to deal with all aspects of family law including children, divorce, domestic violence and most particularly financial remedy proceedings. For the last 7 years Gill has dealt exclusively with privately funded children, divorce and financial remedy work in which she specialises.