Sir, – Reading Rosita Boland's brave and moving account of how Ireland's continued failure to put in place bilateral agreements with Hague Convention-compliant countries has put her own hopes to adopt in serious jeopardy has struck a very deep chord ("Changes to adoption law shattered my hopes of becoming a parent", Weekend Review, March 8th). Because the system has ground to a virtual standstill since the change in the law, my husband and I are facing the prospect that we will have to leave Ireland if we ever want a family.
This is not an issue about whether those with a sense of entitlement want to flout a law put in place to protect children – this situation means that couples who could provide a loving and stable home for children who desperately need one are unable to do so. Because of the complicated attitude to adoption in this country – linked so strongly in the public mind to various adoption scandals over the years – domestic adoption in Ireland is a rarity. There are thousands of children stuck in orphanages around the world who need and deserve a loving home. No parent would wish to uproot a child from the land they know but for prospective Irish adoptive parents this is what they must do.
We have had many reservations about the adoptive process here since we entered the system six years ago. We learned at our introductory meeting that things would move at a snail’s pace because no additional social workers had been hired in 10 years, despite more couples wishing to adopt. We were dismayed at the costs involved, something that smacked of buying and selling children rather than facilitating what should only be considered as a humanitarian act. We sincerely hoped that the ratification of the Hague Convention would make things better, firstly for the children, but also for us as prospective parents.
In fact, the situation has only become worse. It is impossible to see it as anything other than another example of the Government’s blindness to those who fall outside an extremely narrow definition of family. It is a heartbreaking fact that only the wealthy can afford to remedy their childlessness here if a traditional biological route is not an option.
We do not view parenthood as a right but we know that we can provide a loving and stable home to a child. All we want is the opportunity to be parents, and sadly that opportunity is not open to us in Ireland. – Yours, etc,
ABIGAIL RIELEY
and MICHAEL STAMP,
Oxmantown Road,
Stoneybatter, Dublin 7.
Sir, – I am writing to you regarding Rosita Boland’s article on adoption, which I found shocking but not surprising. I have a number of close friends in the process and they have been so for several years. To me it seems incredible that the Adoption Authority of Ireland seems to lack any urgency. I have witnessed the stress, upset, highs and lows of the prospective adoptive parents as they board the “rollercoaster of the adoption process”, which I can tell you, and as your reporter described in her article, is not for the faint-hearted.
What the Adoption Authority of Ireland and the Minister for Children seem to have lost sight of is the human tragedy that they are letting happen on their watch. Here we have prospective adoptive parents who want nothing more than to provide a lovely and caring environment for a child to grow up in, and where they can reach their full potential. It breaks my heart to think of the thousands of children who have missed out on this start in life already because of the lack of progress. What will become of them, who will hold them, love them, cherish them, and nurse them, where are they now, the lost children that we will never see, who have been denied this opportunity because of a lack of urgency in relation to this matter?
I urge the Minister to make this her number one priority and I thank your reporter for highlighting this tragedy. – Yours, etc,
MAURICE WHELAN,
Scholartown Park,
Rathfarnham, Dublin 16.