Press releases
Lifelong implications of being in care must be tackled in Children’s Bill
Issued: 12 June 2008
Campaigners are using the current debate around the Children and Young Persons Bill (2nd reading 16th June 2008) to urge the Government to help people who spent their childhood in care and who wish to discover more about their family and origins.
The British Association for Adoption & Fostering (BAAF) welcomed the Government’s decision to address the importance of young people leaving care receiving high levels of support in their early adult life (Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000’. and Care Matters Oct 2006). However the charity argues that those needs do not disappear at age 21 or 24. The repercussions of a person’s care experiences reverberate throughout their lifespan. Further action is now needed to assist post care adults in gaining access to information about their origins and family history.
Requests for access to information from records held by the local authority currently fall under the Data Protection Act 1998. However the Act restricts the sharing of third party information which causes problems for the thousands of people who grew up in care. As a result they may receive very little or disjointed information from their care records. For example, they may not receive identifying information about a brother or sister they are trying to trace. As one former care adults describes:
“I had been in care for 15 years and found out I could apply for my records, but all I got was 10 sheets of paper with lots of information tipexed out – I wondered why I bothered to access the information as what I got did not make a lot of sense.”
The forthcoming legislation provides an opportunity to address this issue. There is already a legislative framework in place to assist adopted people in accessing information about their origins, family background and circumstances of their adoption. The same opportunities do not extend to post care adults, although they are likely to share the same quest for information about their own personal history and desire to re-establish contact with family members.
Julia Feast, BAAF Policy Research & Development Consultant, says:
“We should not underestimate the importance of information for post care adults. It can assist in resolving issues about their past, provide a sense of personal history and identity, and have a huge positive impact on their own children and family life."
BAAF is calling for:
- A legislative framework that enables post care adults to access information to about their origins and time in care.
- Advice and support services which post care adults can choose from when accessing their childhood records
- Access to a third party expert who can help them locate and contact family members
- An audit of statutory and voluntary sector files that is published to enable post care adults to understand where records may be held
–Ends–
Notes to editors:
- Post care adult case studies available upon request
- For more information, please call BAAF press office on 020 7421 2633 or email
jane.elston@baaf.org.uk. For out of hours enquiries, call the press office mobile on 07767 444 589.
- BAAF is part of the Action on Access group which is a coalition of some of the UK’s leading children’s charities, care leavers organisations and local authorities.
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