B (Adoption Assessment), Re

For a non-agency adoption application, the requirement in section 42(7)(b) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 that the local authority have sufficient opportunities to see the applicants and child together in their home environment requires the home environment to be in England and Wales. Video observation of an overseas home, supplemented by in-person observation in a hotel and the community, does not satisfy that requirement. The requirement is substantive rather than merely procedural. The court must consider welfare and Convention rights, but cannot read down the statutory requirement where the consequence is delay rather than permanent refusal. The application was adjourned to enable an assessment in a home in England to take place.

The applicants, who had lived with the child in the UAE for about five years, applied for an English adoption order in respect of a child adopted by them in Sierra Leone. The foreign adoption was not automatically recognised in England and Wales. The local authority prepared an Annex A report after assessing the family by video link in the UAE and in person at a hotel and in the community in England. The central issue was whether that assessment satisfied section 42(7)(b) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, which required sufficient opportunities for the local authority to see the family together in their home environment.

1. Statutory requirement. Section 42(7)(b) of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 applied because the child had not been placed with the applicants by an adoption agency. Following Re SL [2004] EWHC 1283 and Re A (Adoption: Removal) [2009] EWCA Civ 41; [2009] 2 FLR 597, the home environment referred to in the provision had to be in England and Wales.
2. The family’s video-linked assessment in the UAE, although useful, did not satisfy the statutory requirement. There was a qualitative difference between observing the family through a screen and being physically present in the home. In-person observation in a hotel and in the community could not cure the omission.
3. The requirement was not merely procedural. It served the protective purpose of ensuring an adequate assessment before an adoption order, which has lifelong consequences. The positive views of the social worker and Guardian were important but not decisive.
4. The court considered the purposive and Convention-rights approach discussed in Re X (Adoption Application: Gateway Requirements) [2013] EWHC 689 (Fam), Re TY (Preliminaries to Intercountry Adoption) [2020] 1 FLR 793, Re A and B (Adoption: Section 83 ACA 2002) [2024] EWHC 2837 (Fam) and RR and Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2019] UKSC 52. That approach did not justify reading down section 42(7)(b) on these facts. The applicants had acted in good faith, but the delay would not make adoption impossible and there was no evidence that the child’s position required an immediate order.
5. The requirements of section 42(7)(b) had not been met. The application was adjourned for a number of months so that the applicants could arrange an assessment in a home in England, after which the hearing could resume. They could alternatively seek permission to withdraw and apply again after moving permanently to England.

This was a first-instance application in the High Court (Family Division). An earlier hearing before Her Honour Judge Tucker raised the section 42(7)(b) issue, after which the matter was transferred to Mrs Justice Judd for determination.