Adoption - 1993

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This page lists 6 cases, and was prepared on 15 November 2008.

Re C (a Minor) (Adoption: Parental Agreement: Contact) [1993] 2 FLR 260
1993 CA Steyn and Hoffmann LJJ	Children, Adoption	Casemap 1 Cites 1 Citers
	Where adoption is to be considered against the will of the parent, the court should recognise when asking whether the opposition was unreasonable that the test is objective and supposes that this person is endowed with a mind and temperament capable of making reasonable decisions: ". . . making the freeing order, the judge had to decide that the mother was 'withholding her agreement unreasonably'. This question had to be answered according to an objective standard. In other words, it required the judge to assume that the mother was not, as she in fact was, a person of limited intelligence and inadequate grasp of the emotional and other needs of a lively little girl of 4. Instead she had to be assumed to be a woman with a full perception of her own deficiencies and an ability to evaluate dispassionately the evidence and opinions of the experts. She was also to be endowed with the intelligence and altruism needed to appreciate, if such were the case, that her child's welfare would be so much better served by adoption that her own maternal feelings should take second place. Such a paragon does not of course exist: she shares with the 'reasonable man' the quality of being, as Lord Radcliffe once said, an 'anthropomorphic conception of justice'. The law conjures the imaginary parent into existence to give expression to what it considers that justice requires as between the welfare of the child as perceived by the judge on the one hand and the legitimate views and interests of the natural parents on the other. The characteristics of the notional reasonable parent have been expounded on many occasions: see for example Lord Wilberforce in In re D (Adoption: Parent's Consent) [1977] AC 602, 625 ('endowed with a mind and temperament capable of making reasonable decisions'). The views of such a parent will not necessarily coincide with the judge's views as to what the child's welfare requires."

In Re B (Minors) (Contact) [1994] 2 FLR 1
3 Feb 1993 CA Butler-Sloss LJ	Adoption	Casemap 1 Citers
	The Judge had a discretion to look again at the natural mother's case before making an adoption order. In order to minimise delay in any case, and to facilitate efficient decision-making, the court could, exercising its wide judicial discretion, consider the application for leave to apply for an order revoking the placement order on a reasonably limited evidential basis.
	Statute References omitted

In Re A (A Minor) (Adoption: Contact Order) [1993] 2 FLR 645
24 Jun 1993 CA Butler-Sloss LJ	Adoption	Casemap 1 Citers
	A contact order had been properly granted with an order freeing the child for adoption. Butler-Sloss LJ: "The effect of an order freeing a child for adoption is to extinguish parental responsibility of those previously endowed with it and thus to bring to an end the relationship between the child and his natural family (see Adoption Act 1976, section 12(3)). The child is in a sort of adoptive limbo and parental responsibility is assumed by the adoption agency, in this case, the local authority (section 18(5)). The parents become former parents, sections 18(5), 19 and have no right to make an application under section 8 of the Children Act 1989."

Re A (A Minor)
2 Jul 1993 CA	Adoption
	Adoption judge should also hear application for contact after adoption.

Re R (A Minor)
1 Sep 1993 CA	Children, Adoption
	A contact order was not inconsistent with a freeing order.

Practice Direction (Inter-Country Adoptions: Transfer of Proceedings)
8 Dec 1993 FD	Adoption
	Transfer of adoption proceedings to High Court limited to complex cases.
	Statute References omitted