In his judgment on the baby Ann case, Mr Justice Adrian Hardiman mentions, without further elaboration, 1 Kings 3:16-28. The scripture passage concerns a judgment made by Solomon, in a situation where a woman had stolen a baby in the night from another mother, leaving her own dead baby in his place. Solomon discerned who the real mother was by her horrified reaction to his suggestion that they cut the baby in half and give half to each woman. The real mother immediately offered to hand over her baby.
Yet reading the judgments, it is clear that the wisdom of Solomon would not have been required by judges if the case had been handled differently in the first place. The birth parents of baby Ann, given the names Brian and Catherine to protect anonymity, could have kept the child from birth or shortly after if they had been given more support. A key motive in placing the child first for fostering, and later for adoption, was the feeling that they could not guarantee her a stable two-parent family. These were laudable and unselfish motives. However, the birth mother in particular experienced ambivalence from the very beginning, an ambivalence that should have been explored more deeply.
It is surprising, to say the least, to see the degree to which the main social worker seems to have set aside his own considerable reservations about the adoption. He noted that the mother had chosen to breast feed for the first 24 hours, highly unusual in someone contemplating adoption. Also, the couple asked for and received a great degree of access to baby Ann, including two overnight stays, when she was in pre-adoptive foster care. On professional advice, this contact ceased, except for once-yearly visits when the child was placed with potential adoptive parents, known as David and Eileen for the purposes of the case.
The social worker also appears to have known the potential adoptive parents, which is highly unusual. Mr Justice MacMenamin of the High Court accepts it did not cloud the social worker's judgment, but Mr Justice Hardiman goes so far as to say that there is a marked change of tone in the notes made by him when the birth mother decided to reclaim her child.
That may have been due to the fact that the social worker knew the potential adoptive parents, but also because Ann had bonded so thoroughly with them. The expert reports that describe Ann's small secure world, complete with loving parental figures, and an extended family which included a grandmother, aunts and cousins, are heartbreaking.
Whatever the social worker's motives, Mr Justice Hardiman declares that the birth parents' feelings that they were being "stalled" were justified. Given that every moment that passed damaged still further any chances of a successful reunion between birth parents and child, if true, it is hard to understand how any experienced social worker could have been involved in "stalling". Catherine formally requested the return of her child in September 2005, when baby Ann was 10 months, which she was entitled to do, given that the final adoption order had not been signed. The adoptive parents were entitled to challenge this, which they did once Brian initiated High Court proceedings, but in reality had no hope of success.
It should never have reached this stage in the first place, given the extraordinary degree of doubt the birth mother in particular displayed from the beginning. The testimony of expert witnesses is bleak, describing how a child who has bonded securely with primary care-givers, if parted from them will at first protest, then despair, and then enter into denial. Contrary to the reassuring stories adults tell themselves, very young children are not resilient, but fragile, and lasting damage is more than likely. The despair stage is often mistaken for adjustment, but in fact, simply signals that all hope has died in the child's heart.
Catherine and Brian, in their decision to give up their baby for adoption, were initially influenced by an ideal, that of married parents. However, when it comes to the transmission of values there is an analogy between the difficult task facing parents, and that facing society. Parents who wish, for very good reasons, to pass on strong values on issues like pre-marital sex and extra-marital pregnancy, have to balance that with acknowledging human frailty, and reassuring children of the constancy of parental love, whether or not they live up to ideals. Likewise, society needs to maintain the ideal of loving married parents, while acknowledging and supporting people when life is not that neat or tidy. When people become unexpectedly pregnant, the most important thing for the child is constant, ongoing, loving commitment from his or her parents. It is easiest to provide in a committed married family, but that does not mean that people not in that situation cannot parent successfully. Yes, Brian and Catherine were students, but were not teenagers. With better advice, they could have acted as parents to their daughter from the beginning.
Had that happened, the hearts of another couple would not have been pulverised, possibly beyond recovery. David and Eileen obviously fell in love with Ann, and Eileen took 11 months off work to ensure the best start for her. They are now bereaved, as is Ann's "almost" grandmother and other relations. It is clear that the adoption law needs revisiting. There should be a strict time-limit of six months during which the birth mother can withdraw consent. Also, birth parents need to be fully informed of the significance of the passage of time for their child, a point made strongly by Mr Justice Geoghegan in his judgment.
Greater support, training and monitoring of the professionals involved in each case is also required. Irish adoptions outside family contexts have become so uncommon that a valuable pool of knowledge and expertise has been all but lost. Better law and better supervision of professionals might prevent other such tragedies, but it is too late for baby Ann. I suspect that even Solomon would be at a loss to know how to dry the tears of the small and fragile person at the centre of this case.