Further funding to support adoptive families

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has announced more funding to support adopted children and their families, through the Adoption Support Fund.

The commitment builds on the £130 million already invested through the fund, which has benefitted over 40,000 families, to ensure that every family that needs therapeutic support will be able to receive it until 2021.

The Education Secretary also announced almost £650,000 investment into Regional Adoption Agencies, who will coordinate work to find more adopters across the country, especially for harder to place children, such as siblings, older children and those from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds.

Williamson said: “This government will do everything we can to help support young people into an adoptive home and we’re tapping into the expertise of the wonderful people that work in this sector. In recent years, the trend that concerns us all is the disparity between numbers of children awaiting adoption and adoptive families ready to take them. This is a trend that must change and I want to do everything I can to help you do that.

“We have cut the average time between a child entering care and being placed with a family by seven months since 2012. It’s now down to 14 months. Obviously there is still substantial room for improvement. It still takes too long and not all adoptive families receive the support they need. But we’re definitely going in the right direction.

“Our adoption support fund which was set up in 2015, has provided a range of therapeutic support for nearly 50,000 children who have been through traumatic times before adoption. I am delighted to announce that we are going to extend this fund through to 2021, so families can now continue to access therapy support.”

Judith Blake, chair of the Local Government Association’s Children and Young People Board, said: “Finding permanent, loving homes for children in care is a key priority for all councils, whether through adoption or through other routes, and this new funding is a positive step in helping them to achieve that. We know that some children need extra help after adoption to help them to recover from earlier trauma or to cope with additional needs.

“The Adoption Support Fund (ASF) has been invaluable in supporting these children and their families, and extending it for a further year will bring relief to many.  We urge the government to make the ASF permanent in next year’s Spending Review, to continue giving adoptive families the help they need to thrive together and to get the very best outcomes for children.”