Adoption

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The Children and Families Act 2014 (CFA 2014) made changes to adoption, in particular as to post-adoption contact, the emphasis to be placed on ethnicity (in England) and fostering to adopt. The Public Law Outline (PLO) as set out in Family Procedure Rules 2010, PD 12A will be relevant to adoption proceedings, including where there are concurrent or proposed placement order proceedings, see Practice Notes: Public law children procedure—Public Law Outline: overview and key principles, Public law children procedure—commencing proceedings under the Public Law Outline, Public law children procedure—case management under the Public Law Outline and Public law children procedure—extensions to the timetable and withdrawal of proceedings.

General principles

The Adoption and Children Act 2002 (ACA 2002) embodies the law on adoption and was aimed at improving adoption support to encourage more people to come forward to adopt. It places a duty on local authorities to make arrangements for the provision of adoption support services to promote adoption as a means of giving looked after children the chance to live in permanent homes.

The framework of ACA 2002 is intended to:

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