Recent data published by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare show a continued drop in adoption rates in Australia.
Director of the Children and Families Research Centre at the University of Sydney, Amy Wright said that while there was an increase in adoptions a few years ago, numbers have since steadily declined.
“We have seen that the numbers have dropped, with less expressions of interest in adoptions at this point in time,” Mrs Wright said.
“We may see some impacts where there could be adoptions that haven’t been filed since the pandemic, which is a flow on that those adoptions may not have been approved a couple of years later.”
Mrs Wright said that traditionally, single parents were not provided with government funded financial support, up until social norms began to change and payments were made accessible.
“Previously there was an era of forced adoption, where women who became pregnant out of wedlock particularly, were under a lot of social pressures to relinquish their child for adoption to a married couple,” Mrs Wright said.
The correlation of declining adoption rates has been falling since the 1990’s.
“Adoption rates declined as social norms changed through the years, as it became more socially acceptable to be a single parent, where payments were then made available through Centrelink,” she said.
While there is a decline in overall adoption rates within Australia, there are specific points and differences to be noted when discussing explicit adoption statistics relating to that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children.
Although data relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children contradicts the declining trend in overall adoptions in Australia, Mrs Wright says the important part of adopting children of this descent is that they are under the care of a “known” person, such as a close relative.
“There is a lot of concern now with adoption in what may be considered ethical, especially in relation to the history of the stolen generation where children were forcibly taken from families and placed in adoption with white families,” Mrs White said.
Results show that while the overall adoption rates have increased since 1998, there has been a positive upward progression in “known” child adoptions relating to that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children.
While acknowledging the complexities of adoption, Mrs White said that an increase in adoption rates is not a necessity and that it was more important to think about the needs of the child and how those needs are best met.
“Adoption may be one route but there are other options to be considered like the possibility of rehoming with family,” she said.
Additional reporting: Jack Rothfield
