There are currently 1,056 Irish applications for inter-country adoptions, according to the latest official figures. The Minister of State for Health and Children, Ms Mary Hanafin, said yesterday that despite the high number on the waiting list, significant progress had been made in all the health board areas to cut down on the waiting period for couples.
"The period for assessing the suitability of adoptive parents has also been reduced considerably. In some areas, it used to take up to three years; now it takes six to nine months."
However, she added that there was a major difficulty in recruiting an adequate number of social workers, despite the allocation of increased resources.
Ms Hanafin was speaking at the publication of a guide on inter-country adoptions aimed at health board social work adoption teams, and a workbook for applicants.
The two publications, she said, were in response to recommendations of a report on adoption assessment procedures published last year.
"An open, transparent and efficient framework for assessment, which is respectful to all the parties in the process, but at the same time is centred on the child's interests, is what we have been seeking to achieve.
"Clarity of purpose on roles and responsibilities is at the core of the new guidance material. I am confident that this will be an aid to both social workers and parents in moving forward together to an inter-country adoption service, which, ultimately, will include a lot more than the assessment of the suitability of prospective adoptive parents."
Ms Hanafin said that in addition to improvements to the inter-country adoption process, funding totalling £1 million was allocated, this year and last, for the recruitment of staff in the health board areas. An additional £200,000 had been allocated in recent weeks.
