Hansard

I have friends who were adopted and friends who have adopted children. One of the most selfless acts that any human being can do is to commit to taking on legal responsibility as a parent and to providing a child with a loving home and a secure environment in which to grow up.

I note Labour’s amendment in the name of Monica Lennon—in particular the cognisance that is given to provision of mental health services for adopted children via their education. I am sure that members are already tired of hearing my teacher’s rhetoric, but it is worth emphasising again the centrality of health and wellbeing to curriculum for excellence as one of the eight core curriculum areas, in addition to its overall importance, as underpinned by the getting it right for every child framework. Monica Lennon has been a passionate advocate for the need to work to improve and support mental health education. I welcomed her contribution during my members’ business debate on the topic in September.

Children who have been adopted often experience trauma. Therefore, recognition that their mental health needs must be met in parity with that of their peers is certainly welcome to Scottish National Party members.

As the minister stated in his opening speech, the Scottish Government set up Scotland’s adoption register in 2011. More than 300 families nationally have children after being matched through the register. It is imperative that the Government works to deliver permanence more quickly for looked-after children and young people, and I am delighted to hear the minister commit to doing exactly that. However, permanence is not just about adoption: it can include supported return to the child’s birth parents, if that is the most appropriate way to support them.

For vulnerable children, permanence is vital. They are often marginalised before they even reach the school gates, they live in chaotic households and they may never have known love. They are the children whom schools traditionally sent home because they did not have a tie on, and who were told off by teachers like me for not bringing a pencil to school. Far too often, they are the children whom the system—care or education—failed.

In 2014-15, almost three quarters of looked-after school leavers were aged 16 and under, compared to just more than a quarter of school leavers generally. Moreover, only 35 per cent of looked-after children leave school with one qualification or more at Scottish credit and qualifications framework level 5, compared to 85 per cent of all pupils. The rate of exclusions among looked-after children is also much higher than it is in the general school population, although it should be said that the picture is improving. Nonetheless, the figures show that being able to achieve early permanence is a significant indicator when it comes to attainment and achievement.

Permanence can include remaining at home through a permanence order, a kinship care order or adoption. The legal certainty that permanence brings often cements a home that loves and cares for the child in question.

Last December, the Government announced a strengthening of the partnership with the centre for excellence for looked after children in Scotland—CELCIS—to offer the permanence and care excellence programme. In March this year, the Government committed to funding CELCIS with more than £580,000 a year to support the improvements in helping looked-after children find permanent homes. That has allowed a further six new advisors to be appointed to work on PACE—permanence and care excellence—and to provide support to local authorities. The motion supports the roll-out of the PACE programme so that more children benefit from a secure, permanent and nurturing family environment at the earliest opportunity.

Fife Council has the third-biggest population of looked-after children of any local authority in Scotland. I met its CELCIS team last month. It is already proactively engaged across the authority to support improvement and partnership working with the Scottish Government.

The Government published its “Getting it Right for Looked-after Children and Young People” strategy in November 2015. It builds on existing improvements and calls on the sector to commit to improvement. The strategy’s priorities include early engagement and support for families in order to prevent children from becoming looked after; help for children to have a safe, secure and nurturing permanent home through early permanence; and ensuring that every child receives the best care and support by improving the quality of their care.

The picture is not one of doom and gloom for Scotland’s looked-after children; rather, it is one of improvement. The proportion of looked-after children with at least one qualification at SCQF level 5 has increased from 15 per cent in 2009-10 to 35 per cent, and the proportion of looked-after children in positive destinations has increased from 40 per cent in 2009-10 to 69 per cent.

I encourage members to read the blog by Fiona Aitken on the CELCIS website, which seeks to dispel some of the myths around adoption. It is not all about babies. The people I know who have adopted did not adopt infants. Nonetheless, they gave the children whom they adopted the love, support and nurture that they would not or could not have received from their biological parents.

No two adoption journeys are the same, but for everyone involved, adoption is ultimately about family, compassion, hope, happiness and acceptance. The motion reflects the importance of all of those vital aspects in the adoption process.