Adoption Statistics

16th March 2004

Statistics on the number of adoption and freeing order applications in Scotland in 2003 have been published today.

The main findings of the Scottish Executive National Statistics publication are:

There were 373 adoption applications for which an outcome was reached in 2003. This was four per cent higher than in 2002 when there were 360 applications. Over the past twenty years, there has been an overall decline in the number of adoption applications - there were almost three times as many adoptions applications in 1983 as in 2003.
In 2003, 99 per cent of applications were granted. Since 1983, at least 95 per cent of adoption applications have been granted each year, and of the remainder, the majority were withdrawn, not refused.
There were 15 adoptions from overseas, accounting for 4 per cent of all adoptions in 2003, which was broadly similar to previous years.
80 per cent of adoption applications were for children aged between one and eleven. The number of adoption applications for children in all age groups has declined since 1983, with the biggest decrease being in adoptions for children under the age of one, which decreased from 280 in 1983 to 20 in 2003. Since 1997 however, the number of adoptions applications for children under the age of five has been stable, while adoptions of children aged 5-17 have continued to decline.
The majority of adoption applications for children under the age of five were made by non-relatives, while children aged between five and eighteen are more likely to be adopted by relatives. Most of the decline in adoptions applications since the mid-1990s can be explained by a reduction in adoptions by relatives of the child, e.g., step-parents; adoptions by non-relatives have remained fairly stable over this period.
Adoption agencies identify children in need of adoption and bring together potential adopters with those children. They also provide care for children waiting to be adopted. Just over half of adoption applications were made through Local Authority adoption agencies, and almost one in ten were made via voluntary agencies. The majority of adoptions by non-relatives were made through agencies. Forty per cent of adoption applications were made without an agency, which were mainly applications made by relatives.
There were 27 adoption applications by non-relatives, made without an agency. Non-relatives can apply to adopt without an agency after a child has lived with them for more than a year, for example adoptions by long term foster carers.
The average number of days taken for adoption applications to reach an outcome decreased from 161 in 1994 to 109 in 1999. Since then, the average number of days has increased to 140 days in 2003.
When a child is freed for adoption, birth parents relinquish their responsibilities to the child and are not involved in any subsequent adoption proceedings. The number of applications for the making of freeing orders reached a peak of 116 in 2000, and has fallen since then to 98 in 2003. As in previous years, the majority of these (85) were granted, with 12 being withdrawn and one being refused. The average age of children freed for adoption was four years and three months.

European Comparisons

Over the past five years, between one and four per cent of adoptions in Scotland were from overseas. Foreign adoptions in the UK as a whole are slightly higher (five to six per cent of the total), but they are much higher in the other EU countries studied, from 34 per cent of adoptions in Germany to 81 per cent of adoptions in Norway in 2002.
The number of adoptions per 1,000 children in Scotland (0.3) is similar to the figure for most of the countries studied, though Norway and Denmark have higher figures of 0.9 and 1.0 adoptions per thousand children, respectively.
Scotland, Ireland, Norway, Denmark and Germany have seen declines in the number of children adopted over the five years to 2002, but England and Wales and the Netherlands have seen increases of nearly one third of the same period.
In most of the selected countries (including Scotland), there is very little difference in the number of boys and girls adopted, but in Norway and Denmark, slightly more girls than boys are adopted. In both countries, a large proportion of the adoptions are of girls adopted from China.
Adoption applications are made to the Sheriff Courts in Scotland and are also considered by the Court of Session.
There is now a single website providing access to all regular statistics collected on children in Scotland: the Scottish Children's Statistics Gateway.

This is the last time that this data collection will take place.

Statistics on the overall number of adoptions, including the gender and age of the child and relationship of adopters, are available from the General Register Office for Scotland vital event statistics.