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Two leading adoption organisations have issued urgent calls for a full, cross-government review of support for adopted children and their families, following a BBC investigation highlighting rising numbers of adoptions breaking down and families in crisis.
The BBC’s Adoption: The Blame Game revealed deeply distressing accounts from adoptive parents struggling to access the specialist help their children desperately need. Freedom of Information findings show that the number of adopted children leaving their family homes prematurely has more than doubled since before the pandemic.
CoramBAAF and Adoption UK say the investigation shines a stark light on a system that is failing some of the country’s most vulnerable children - those who have already experienced profound trauma, loss and disruption before entering adoption.
CoramBAAF said the stories shared by adoptive families “illustrate how challenging this can be, even when adopters do everything they can to get the right support”. Many of the children involved have highly complex needs, requiring not only committed parents but properly resourced schools, mental health services, and wider support networks.
Both charities warn that cuts to the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF), despite a government manifesto commitment to improve adoption support, have made access to specialist therapeutic help increasingly difficult - putting more families at risk of crisis and breakdown.
Adoption UK reports a record number of families reaching breaking point. The charity notes that despite “huge investment in wider children’s social care”, adopted and kinship children are not receiving matching levels of support.
It says England should follow the example of Northern Ireland, where the law already requires proper assessments of need and a commitment to deliver the support recommended.
Both organisations are united in calling for:
A full review of adoption support across all services, including schools, mental health providers and social care
Proper, trauma-informed assessments of need, with guaranteed delivery of the support identified
Specialist training for professionals across public services to better understand trauma and the needs of care-experienced children
Urgent restoration and protection of funding for therapeutic support, including the ASGSF
They stress that while adoption can remain a highly positive outcome for children when the right support is in place, families must be able to trust that help will be available when they need it.
CoramBAAF warned that at a time when more adoptive families are needed, confidence in the system is being undermined. “We must get this right for the children at the heart of this,” the organisation said.
Adoption UK added: “These situations are devastating for everyone involved, not least the child, who will already have faced trauma and disruption in their earliest years of life.”
Both charities say the government must act urgently to ensure that no family is left struggling alone - and that every child who has experienced early adversity receives the consistent, specialist support they need to thrive.
