New CIS research: To save children, adoption must become a viable option

The federal government should implement a new national framework for child protection in Australia to make adoption a viable option for children that will otherwise spend most of their childhoods in unstable out-of-home care, according to new a Policy Paper from The Centre for Independent Studies.

In A Viable Option: A National Adoption Framework, CIS Senior Research Fellow Dr Jeremy Sammut outlines a data-driven national accountability framework that would create more effective child protection systems nation-wide, and ensure more children find the stable homes they need in order to thrive. “Lack of permanency in care and the pitiful numbers of adoptions each year are a national disgrace that has finally been frankly acknowledged by the new inquiry into local adoption by the Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs,” Dr Sammut says.

“But if we are going to break the ‘taboo’ on adoptions, we need a politically-feasible national approach to guiding state and territory policy makers in the right direction.

“That’s why the national framework I propose is based on the groundbreaking child protection reforms underway in NSW.

“The NSW reforms not only aim to increase adoptions when kids can’t go home safely. They also aim to keep more children living safely with parents by investing in effective early intervention and restoration services.”

Dr Sammut says NSW is “getting the balance right” between promoting family preservation and achieving permanency.

“It’s now time for the federal government to provide overdue leadership on this issue, via the national framework, and encourage all jurisdictions to follow NSW’s lead,” He says.

Dr Jeremy Sammut is Director of the Culture, Prosperity, and Civil Society Program and a Senior Research Fellow at The Centre for Independent Studies. His research has led the national debate about adoption reform, and he is the author of The Madness of the Australian Child Protection, (Connor Court, 2015). Dr Sammut gave evidence last week at a hearing of the inquiry into local adoption based on his submission.