Monthly Archives: March 2014

How long does a Provisional Adoption Order last?

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In a recent telephone conversation with the General Records Office (GRO) I was told very clearly that the solution to my situation was to approach the authorities in the country that I was living in.  All that needed to happen was to convince the authorities to ‘formalise’ the Provisional Adoption Order (PAO) that had merely lain dormant since it had been issued.  This was the advice that the GRO expert had to give me and it seems to be very sensible and reasonable as well.

Having read that the PAO might in actual fact have a short legal lifespan I asked if this was actually true.  The answer was emphatic, once a PAO is given by the County Court they are active until they are formalised. This would of course be a fantastic option, but it is not quite true.

In my initial writing of this post in April 2014, I had read the article published in the ‘The Modern Law Review‘ Sept. 1959, Volume 22, Issue 5, on page 503.  In it the statement was made that As before the Act was passed, interim orders may be made for a maximum of two years, but now where the original interim order is for a lesser period, it may be extended to a maximum of two years in all.  I had read this to apply to the case of the PAO and in hindsight it is easy to see how you might link the word interim  and provisional, as they are very close in meaning.  In actual fact they are two very different and distinct types of processes and I made a honest mistake in confusing these two and I apologise for not double checking my facts.  The fact is that the PAO is not limited like interim adoptions to a two year period.

Does this mean that the GRO was correct?  While they were correct in saying that there was no legal restriction placed on the time frame inside of which a PAO could be enacted, there is another time frame for adoption in general.  The answer to the question ‘who can be adopted?’ is that to be eligible for adoption a child must be under the age of 18 years. A child who is married or has been married cannot be adopted.  In this framework as the last PAO was issued in the early 1970s, a child provisionally adopted would now be a minimum of 40 years old and so if they have not been formally adopted they would now be ineligible for adoption.

Link

I need to take a step back and answer some questions at the heart of my adoption.  I have been told that when I was adopted the process “was fairly simple and straight forward.  There is no doubt that many more regulations are in place now and hind sight is a great thing but at the time of [my] adoption, the whole process went smoothly.”

To answer this we need to look at a few facts. 1) a definition of what adoption is 2) what were the rules that were in place in the 1960’s to deal with adoption 3) is there any way that there could have been a misunderstanding in what a provisional adoption order was.

1) a definition of adoption

Adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting for another and, in so doing, permanently transfers all rights and responsibilities, along with filiation, from the biological parent or parents. Unlike guardianship or other systems designed for the care of the young, adoption is intended to effect a permanent change in status and as such requires societal recognition, either through legal or religious sanction. Adoption – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Every culture has their own way of dealing with the issue of adoption.  Many answer the challenges of the permanent change in status through legal processes.  In recent times the Hague Adoption Convention has become an internationally recognised convention dealing with the issue of international adoption.  Whatever the name of the process or convention the underlining idea is the safeguarding and protection of the child that is to be adopted.  In this regard there is little that is ‘simple’ it is in fact incredibly complex, as it should be.

2) What rules were in place in the UK that governed adoption in the 1960s & early 1970s

While there were early regulations governing adoption in the UK, the first modern regulations were known as the Adoption Act 1958 and came into force on 1 April 1959.  This was the result of the report of the Hurst Committee, delivered in September 1954.  On the basis of the Committee’s findings new laws were put into place governing the consent of the natural parents, qualifications of adopters, adoption procedure and the procedure used in cases where the adoption is disputed.  In addition to the regulations put in place by the UK government, the government also accepted the European Convention for the Adoption of Children in 1968.  This placed further requirements on the process of adoption that all involved with adoption in the UK had to adhere to.

Some today will look back at this period as a simpler time in the development of adoption, the reality is very different.  The basis of much of today’s adoption law is based upon the developments following the Adoption Acts 1958.  The one thing that the Adoption Act 1958 cannot be accused of was being simple, it was a very complex piece of legislature that was attempting to ensure the safety of the child facing adoption.  It may not have been successful in all that it attempted to do, but in the development of adoption law it was a landmark.

3) Could there have been a misunderstanding of what a provisional adoption order was?

Given that:

1) this was the focus of a number of Commons debates and was discussed in the papers, this was not a piece of legislature that the public were unaware of.

2) there were only two options available, adoption order for those who were resident in the UK and provisional adoption order if you were not.  The requirements for gaining one of these were slightly different from the other.

3) the adoption agencies were concious of the change of legislation required of them for international adoption

4) the solicitors involved with preparing the paperwork for the County Court would have known the difference

5) the process for gaining a provisional adoption order took double the time than a regular adoption order, it is highly unlikely that someone at some point would not have mentioned the two options needed.

6) In my case I have letters from lawyers in the USA vouching for my ‘adopted parents’ and offering their services to complete the adoption in the USA.

Given all of these factors I think that it is a long stretch of the imagination to believe that someone either did not know or misunderstood what it was that they were getting when the applied for a provisional adoption order.

 

Some new directions

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Since my initial discover of the words Provisional Adoption Order on my birth certificate eight weeks ago I have been on a very steep learning curve.  I have had many a break-through but also suffered a number of set backs.  While I am working on a proper post which I hope to post later on this week I needed to post this.

After a wait of seven weeks the General Records Office have finally responded to my initial question.  That question was ‘what is my status now that I have discovered that I was not adopted?’  The earth shattering response that I have received is……’we are not able to give legal advice’  Thanks A. (who was too busy to even speak to me) and to D. for giving me some advice that was  wrong.  That answer was really worth waiting seven weeks for, especially as this does not answer the question.

The only bit of information that I was able to gain from the General Records Office was about the last person that they dealt with who had been provisionally adopted.  It turns out that he had been living in the USA with his adopted American family, had served in their armed forces and was established there.  When the truth of his provisional adoption was discovered, the American government started the process of deporting him as an illegal alien.  So there are others like me out there!

If you are someone that has experienced a ‘Provisional Adoption Order’ get in contact, I would love to hear from you.