Children and Adoption Bill [HL]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, for his clear introduction of the Bill. We appreciate the meeting we had last week   with Ministers. It enabled the Bill team to give us an overview of its thinking, sprinkled with the characteristic enthusiasm of the noble Baroness, Lady   Ashton. I should hate noble Lords to think that just because only my noble friend Lord Howe and I are batting for Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition today we are the only ones interested in the Bill. Other noble friends who are interested could not take part in the debate today but will take part later in Committee. Everyone in the House is searching for the most practical, effective and, above all, compassionate arrangements for contact and adoption. Child contact and international adoption are two immensely sensitive areas that are often highly charged. Someone who works in the family law world said to me last week, ““Across my desk each day goes the heartache of Britain””. We are dealing not only with matters of law but with people’s feelings and lives. The sentiment behind the Bill has driven many debates in your Lordships’ House. There can be no doubt of the political will on all Benches to support the best interests of the child—support that stretches back   well before the arrival of the UN and Hague conventions on the rights of the child. I am particularly pleased, therefore, that the Bill has started in our House. But what a missed opportunity. I do not doubt for one minute Ministers’ determination to find the best possible solutions to a problem that has been too long recognised—a determination that we share—but I regret to say that the Bill will not deliver those vital solutions. It will not solve the problems of so many broken families who depend on our goodwill and on our wisdom to offer them a better future, a future with real hope. So I hope that Ministers will be able to put politics aside and accept our constructive criticism in the way it is intended. Together, we can build acceptable legislation to deliver those necessary solutions. The introduction of Part 1 proves that the Government continue to recognise the premise set out in the Green Paper that,"““the current way in which courts intervene in disputed contact cases does not work well””." But the Government then fail to address the intrinsic problems devastating thousands of families across the country. Up to 200,000 children each year experience the emotional distress of their parents’ separation or divorce. Two out of three of those children are under 10 and one in four is under five. One in every five children is likely to have to go through their parents’ separation or divorce before they reach the age of 16. Parents who cannot resolve their issues outside court are faced with a long battle in which the child is often used as a pawn, with 40 per cent of children losing all contact with the non-resident parent within two years. Where the safety of the child is not an issue, the best parent for a child is both parents. We will seek to amend the Bill to include the legal presumption of co-parenting where it should be a given that all fit parents will have the right to substantial parenting time to build up and sustain a loving relationship with their child. This should be backed up with compulsory mediation. If a parent is considered a fit parent when they are married or living together, there is no reason in a normal case why this assumption should change just because they separate or divorce. I have great sympathy with the situation in which many CAFCASS officers must find themselves. They have to report on two people who, but for the break up of their relationship, would probably never come to the attention of the state; two reasonable people in all other respects but each facing a time of emotional crisis for which none of us would be well equipped. So the challenge for the CAFCASS officer is to see the real person. I am very lucky—I have been married for 26 years—but I mused on what a CAFCASS report might say about me if I ever found myself in the position of countless of our fellow citizens. It would probably say, ““Works away from home, involving long and anti-social hours; appears more interested in everyone else’s children than her own; and spends long, hot, summer week-ends indoors writing speeches””. I see the Ministers nodding. They would probably get the same report. It would not be a good report and yet I am not a bad parent. The truth is that very few of us could withstand the close scrutiny of the report writers. We have a system which, by its very nature, turns the normal into the abnormal. The whole argument revolves around the understanding of the word ““contact””. Within a family law dispute, it means any contact at all, no matter how short or infrequent. It could in theory be just a postcard, not even face-to-face contact. Case law provides the presumption of contact but it does not provide for presumption of reasonable contact. We believe that where there are no child safety or other legal issues, a separated or divorced parent is not just entitled to contact with his or her child; he or she is entitled to reasonable and substantial contact. We propose that this be given legal power with a presumption of reasonable contact. The interests of the child are paramount, of course—no one disagrees with that principle, given its legal force in the Children Act 1989. But we believe the interests of the child are best served when they have substantial access to both parents. Of course there are those parents at one extreme who will simply abandon their responsibilities after separation or divorce. There are others whose circumstances will not permit other than a less than ideal level of contact. All this is the way of a hard world—the realities for so many of us. However, a presumption of reasonable contact will set the agenda for those so often in raw emotional turmoil who are brought fearfully into the legal process—anxious beyond measure that, with their failed relationship, their children too will be lost to them. They will at least be given a reassurance by a presumption of reasonable contact that the courts will do all that is humanly possible to maintain and nurture that precious link with their children. And with access through both parents comes access to the extended family. Grandparents deserve a special mention. They are often unpaid childminder, cook, taxi driver, nurse, marriage guidance counsellor and overdraft facility. And yet, overnight, their relationship with a much cherished grandchild can be ended. They are the innocent party in all of this. Another benefit of the presumption of co-parenting is that they will not lose all contact with the grandchild they love so much simply because a son or daughter’s relationship breaks down. We had hoped, along with many others, that following the Green Paper Parental Separation: Children’s Needs and Parents’ Responsibilities, and the overwhelming evidence from other countries, the Government would have adopted, or at least run a pilot scheme on early interventions. Instead, we have had the costly and flawed Family Resolutions Project. Now we have a Bill that simply looks at ways of enforcing what already happens and seeks to deal with the process and not the problem. We will seek, during the course of the Bill’s proceedings, to persuade the Government of the merits of the early intervention scheme and to look at setting up an independent pilot. To run such a pilot would not require primary legislation—just a different starting point and a leap of faith. We would like to discuss those foundation principles in more detail during the later stages of the Bill. We will also want to discuss the proposals on mediation and enforcements, although we were glad to see that the Government removed the option of electronically tagging errant parents. We want to discuss some of the issues raised by the Joint Committee’s excellent report, and we would like to look at an area not covered in the Bill—that of child abduction. I am conscious of time and will save detailed debate until Committee. I would, however, like to highlight our main concern with regard to Part 2 of the Bill. We broadly welcome the main provisions in Clauses 9 to 11 and accept the need for a clear and transparent procedure to be in place if adoptions from other countries into the UK have to be suspended. But we are concerned that this does not in any way seek to deter inter-country adoptions. Of course we must be constantly vigilant about the horrors of child trafficking. However, the foundations put in place by these clauses are completely undermined by the fact that restrictions on inter-country adoption can be circumvented by private fostering. We share the concern of the British Association for Adoption and Fostering about the powers in Clause 12 enabling the Secretary of State to impose a charge for work done in connection with inter-country adoption cases, especially as it was not a matter raised in consultation on the draft Bill. I understand from the Minister that these costs could be around £800 or so and would be ““administrative””. Considerable financial costs are already incurred by parents who want to adopt children from other countries. It would be tragic if this provision led to a decline in adoptions. We also agree with BAAF that this,"““additional financial burden . . .  may run the risk of a minority seeking to circumvent procedures, thereby putting children at risk””." There is an acute shortage of UK-born children available for adoption. At the same time, hundreds of thousands of displaced children in eastern Europe, Africa and elsewhere are crying out for a home. We should not deprive them of a chance of a new life in Britain because we have established what is effectively a tax on compassion. In conclusion, I should like to return to the issue of child contact. So many of those who come unwillingly before the family courts—unable to resolve the many consequences of their fractured relationships, and, with their issues between one another, unable to compromise over their children—are thoroughly decent people. They are people crying out for and deserving—each one of them—all the help that can be given to them. The state has an important role to play, but it should not be the overriding one. A parent’s role in bringing up their children is paramount. Courts and mediators must bend to allow parents to exercise their responsibilities for their children. And the state must be ever vigilant, lest the state needlessly takes those responsibilities to itself. It is part of the easy currency of today’s politics to talk about discipline or the lack of respect in our young. The remedy, we are told, is to ban hoodies and target potential criminals from the age of three. But where do our children learn discipline? Where do they learn respect? Above all, it is from their parents, from within their families. Families are the very foundation for the good and just society which we all desire. We are all familiar with the uncomfortable statistics on the problems posed for children without proper parental structure and without a role for their father. The current arrangements risk the downgrading of the family and above all of fatherhood. We allow that at peril to future generations. It is our job in opposition to highlight all the concerns and issues surrounding proposed legislation. This is of particular importance when dealing with the sensitive issue of children and their welfare. I hope throughout the course of this Bill that we can work from our cross-party wish to protect the child’s benefits, to help families and to form a workable piece of effective and efficient legislation, anchored in common sense. Perhaps then we can help mend at least some of the heartache of Britain.