Introduction

Adoption is contentious. That is not new but in today's social media cauldron, it is an area of social work and social policy that will generate instant heat. This chapter has been written as the MacAlister Review of Children's Social Care in England delivered its Final Report. For this author, it was somewhat of a surprise to find that in the end the Review was almost silent on adoption, particularly when it has been a central plank and ‘gold standard’ for successive recent governments in England. Adoption UK (2022), in their response to the Final Report of the MacAlister Review, were certainly disappointed:

It is very difficult to work out a reason for the Review's adoption minimalism. Adoption, as this chapter will argue, is complex. Perhaps, as many argued when the Terms of Reference were set out, the scale of the Review was too great for the timeframe and the expertise utilised. Some of the recommendations on Family Network Plans (MacAlister Review Final Report, p 103), delegated authority (p 135) and lifelong guardianship (p 156), plus an overall emphasis on children remaining with families and kinship care, feel like a move away from adoption. It may be a genuine desire to push the benefits of adoption upstream. Or, when faced with the cost of properly resourcing adoption support, it may be another ‘Big Society’ move that leans on kinship and special guardianship to provide a ‘get out of funding free’ card for government, harvesting the goodness and finances of citizens.