Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 95: 95: Before Clause 29, insert the following new Clause— ““Adoption targets (1) The Secretary of State shall not impose numerical targets for the number of children in local authority care who are to be adopted. (2) The Secretary of State shall not offer local authorities financial incentives for increasing the rate of children in care who are adopted.”” The noble Baroness said: Adoption is often the solution to much of the difficulty that a child might face in care. It can provide stability, continuity and above all a genuine sense of being part of a family. Yet adoption is not always the solution. Though it is often the best possible scenario in many circumstances, it is not always in the best interests of the child. Numerical adoption targets do not have any regard to these nuances, and they risk sacrificing the interests of the child while also contributing to the creation of a negative impression of social workers. Centrally imposed targets can result in rushing vulnerable children into adoption when it might not be in the best interests of the child. There is a risk that not enough is being done to try to work with families at risk to keep them together. Attaching financial incentives to adoption placements drives up the number of adoptions, but in situations where it might not be appropriate. Therefore, we propose this amendment to scrap centrally imposed adoption targets and the financial incentives attached to them, which are not always in the best interests of the child. I beg to move.