Budget 2015: £30m fund a 'shot in the arm' for sector, say adoption experts

The funding, announced by the Prime Minister earlier this week and confirmed by Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne in today’s Budget, will cover the £27,000 "inter-agency fee” a council incurs when placing a child with a parent registered with another local authority or voluntary adoption agency.

The government hopes the funding will meet the cost for around 1,000 children to be placed with new parents, and in doing so overcome one of the major reasons for delays in adoptions being made.

Andy Leary-May, chief executive of Adoption Link, said the funding is a “shot in the arm” for voluntary adoption agencies whose parents may otherwise be overlooked because of the cost of placing children with them.

He said: "The inter-agency fee is one of the reasons that adoption has been so fragmented, and the fund will help around 1,000 children to find the right matches.”

However, Leary-May said the measure was only a “short-term fix” because it does not address the flaws in the adoption payments system.

Barnardo’s chief executive Javed Khan said the measure should help make it easier to find the best matches more quickly for the children who wait the longest to find a carer.

“We look forward to working closely with local authorities and the government to ensure that these extra resources reduce the time children wait and ensure that they find the right families first-time round,” he said.

Meanwhile, David Simmonds, chair of the Local Government Association’s children and young people board, said the inter-agency fee is a “significant burden” for cash-strapped councils.

“With government confirming that this is new money, the opportunity to recover these costs through this new funding arrangement should help our overstretched children’s services departments,” Simmonds said.
 
“Councils now need government support in ensuring that court proceedings, which are the most time-consuming part of the adoption process, become a thing of the past.”