An argument for a shift in narrative around modern adoption
Recent coverage of adoption has shone a light on a stark truth: as a country, we are still talking about adoption as if it were a fairytale ending, not a complex response to profound loss and trauma. The gap between the story and the reality is huge. That gap is being held open by the language used by government, by Adoption England, and by much of the media. Until that shifts, meaningful change will remain an uphill battle made unnecessarily harder.
This is not a side issue. Language shapes policy. Language shapes recruitment. Language shapes how adopted and kinship children are seen by schools, services, neighbours and even by their own families. When the language is dishonest, everyone loses, especially the children whose lives are at the centre of all this.
Modern adoption is not a happy ending
Children are not removed from their first families on a whim. Separation and loss sit at the heart of every adoption story. On top of that, in the vast majority of cases there is significant early life trauma. Many children have been abused or neglected. Many have been exposed to alcohol in utero, with more than 30% estimated to have fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). The evidence on developmental trauma in adopted children is overwhelming.
Adoption itself involves further loss. A familiar world is left behind, even when that earlier world was unsafe or harmful, followed by the upheaval of moving through the care system. Being adopted does not bring about a neat ending, it is a very difficult next step on an already difficult path.
To present adoption as a simple happily ever after, with adopters cast as heroes and children as âluckyâ, is not just naĂŻve. It distorts public understanding, sets prospective adopters up with unrealistic expectations and leaves parents carrying the blame when reality collides with the fantasy.
The evidence is clear, the rhetoric is not
We do not lack evidence about what adopted and kinship children need. We lack honesty about that evidence from those in positions of power.
The most recent Adoption UK Barometer shows that 42% of families are facing severe challenges or are in crisis. A huge majority of adoptive parents have reduced their working hours, changed jobs or left employment altogether in attempts to meet their childrenâs needs.
Research from The POTATO Groupâs 2025 study, Far, Far Beyond the Adoption Order, found that, of their families who participated:
- 75% families have experienced child to parent violence
- 66% cannot safely leave siblings unsupervised because of the risk of violence
- 56% have faced fixed term or permanent exclusions from school
More broadly, care experienced young people are four times more likely to have a criminal conviction by their mid-twenties, are twice as likely to be not in education, employment, or training (NEET), and are at higher risk of dying prematurely, including by suicide.
None of this sits comfortably with recruitment messaging about âforever familiesâ, âsparkly blue eyesâ or âresilient babiesâ. It certainly does not fit with the repeated claim from government and Adoption England that only a minority of children require specialist support. That claim is not evidence based. It is a line.
What support actually needs to look like
The legacy of early life trauma is often lifelong. Support therefore needs to be substantial, specialist and available across the life course. It needs to be multi-modal and delivered by properly qualified therapists: occupational therapists, psychotherapists, psychologists and others with relevant expertise. Support must also be rooted in evidence, which means interventions need to be properly studied, evaluated and refined.
Social workers, parent courses, peer support groups and good quality education about trauma are important. They can enhance and complement specialist therapy. They cannot be the main offer. The needs of many adopted and kinship children are simply too complex for that.
We need a system that can offer the right type and level of support at the right time, with enough flexibility to meet the wide range of needs that exist. Instead, with the cuts to the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF), practice is being dragged backwards by more than a decade. There was no proper evidence base for those cuts, no robust evaluation of impact, and no serious attempt to engage with families and the wider sector at the scale required.
That is not reform. It is vandalism.
Recruitment and support cannot be separated
One of the most damaging habits in current government and Adoption England rhetoric is the attempt to talk about recruitment in isolation from support. It is unethical to recruit new adopters into a system that is not resourced to support them and their children.
We are already in a recruitment crisis. Children are waiting longer for permanence, and some are not being matched at all. To then reduce the very fund that families repeatedly say is one of the few things that actually helps is reckless.
There is also a dilemma that nobody in power seems willing to say out loud. If you tell the truth about the level of need and the fragility of the support system, you may worry that fewer people will come forward. Instead of fixing the support, the instinct has been to manage the message. Our campaign has been accused of harming recruitment simply by stating that there have been cuts to post-adoption support. We have been asked not to mention those cuts to prospective adopters.
If your strategy depends on withholding the truth from the very people you are asking to step forward, something has gone badly wrong.
Recruitment that presents only the picture-book moments
Recruitment advertising has become another place where language slides away from reality. Recent campaigns have focused on âbusting mythsâ about who can adopt: you can be single, partnered, LGBTQ+, without a garden and so on. That information has its place, but it is not the barrier that matters most for children.
At the same time, we see children described with phrases like âsparkly blue eyesâ or âresilient babiesâ, we hear talk of âmagic matchingâ, and we watch glossy pieces that glide over the complexity of the childâs history and needs.
These are not lifestyle choices or commodities in need of better branding. These are highly vulnerable children whose early lives have involved profound adversity and disruption. They are not goods for sale. If your recruitment model treats them as such, you are failing them.
Recent reporting shows how far the language lags behind the reality
Recent coverage has shown that public understanding, reflected in the way stories are reported, has not caught up with the reality either. In one BBC piece, the presenter stated that âsome children come with traumaâ. Children do not âcome withâ trauma like an accessory, they are traumatised by what has been done to them. Elsewhere children have been described as âstruggling to live with their biological parentsâ, âtroubledâ or âdamagedâ.
This kind of framing quietly shifts responsibility from the systems who have failed these children onto the children themselves. It positions them as the problem, rather than as people living with the consequences of what has happened to them.
There are also references to children âfitting into the routinesâ of adults, as if the main difficulty is a matter of convenience for grown-ups. For children whose nervous systems have been shaped by terror, loss and chaos, the idea that they should simply glide into a new familyâs routine without intensive scaffolding is absurd.
Leadership that recites government lines rather than representing families
Leadership matters. In her role as national adoption strategic lead, Sarah Johal MBE carries significant influence over how the public understands adoption and what the sector believes is possible. In her recent BBC Breakfast appearance, she described the ASGSF cuts as an issue primarily for âchildren who have the most complex needsâ, implying that the impact is limited to a small minority and that reducing individual allocations is simply a way of ensuring more children âcan get access to the fundâ. She went on to frame the challenge as part of the wider difficulties facing child mental health services, suggesting that only some children will face compounded barriers to support.
This framing mirrors government rhetoric since the cuts were announced, and it is misleading. The evidence is unequivocal that specialist need among adopted and kinship children is widespread, not exceptional. The Adoption UK Barometer shows large numbers of families experiencing severe challenges, and it is well established that children with early life trauma should be expected to require specialist therapeutic input as part of their care. Presenting the issue as one that affects only a small group obscures the scale of need and downplays the consequences of the cuts.
Trust is damaged when public statements understate what families are living and what the evidence shows. If Adoption England is to retain credibility with families, the wider sector and, most importantly, with adopted and kinship children themselves, those in positions of influence must be willing to speak plainly about the level of need, the impact of reduced support and the reality faced by families. Only then can leadership claim to be centred on childrenâs needs rather than on managing a narrative.
We also have serious concerns about the new ASGSF pilots. According to the pilot documentation, they were only formally agreed in late April 2025 and have, at the time of writing, only just begun . Their aims are exploratory rather than evidence of established benefit, yet they sit alongside significant cuts to the central fund. With so little time for learning or evaluation, we fear the timeline makes proper appraisal impossible before major policy decisions are locked in. Families deserve changes that are grounded in evidence, not assumptions.
What an honest message could sound like
None of this is about talking adoption down. When children need safe, permanent families, we are firmly committed to adoption and kinship care. We see the courage and love in our families daily. That is precisely why we cannot tolerate a system built on half-truths.
Government and Adoption England could choose a different path. They could say, openly:
These are children who need and deserve safety, love and permanence, alongside substantial, specialist support. Many have experienced unimaginable trauma, loss, abuse and neglect. Many have been exposed to alcohol in utero. They deserve every chance to feel safe, to heal and to thrive.
Therapeutic parenting will be needed. Specialist therapeutic support will be needed in most cases. We will provide that support at the right level and at the right time, without forcing families into endless battles for help.
That would be honest. It would be humane. It would also be financially sensible, given the long-term costs of failing these children in education, health, social care and the criminal justice system.
Confronting the evidence
We are long past the point where warm words and recruitment drives can mask the reality. We cannot go on ignoring the data, minimising the testimony of established adoptive and kinship families, and brushing aside the warnings of experts. You cannot continue to strip away support and then continue to promote glossy narratives about âforever homesâ that bear little resemblance to the realities families are living.
Our childrenâs lives, health and futures depend on a system that is rooted in truth, not in comforting stories. Until government and Adoption England are prepared to change their language, confront the evidence and rebuild support around the real needs of adopted and kinship children, we will keep naming the gap between rhetoric and reality.
We owe that to the children for whom it is already too late, and to every child still waiting for a family that is promised the earth while the scaffolding they will rely on is quietly kicked away.