Julia Irwin (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I begin by commending the government for presenting its response to the Standing Committee on Family and Human Services report on overseas adoption in Australia. It has taken almost a year but, by comparison with the wait for response to other reports of the family and human services committee, this response has been about as close as we have seen to being on time. While we now have the Commonwealth government’s response, state governments, which were the subject of a number of recommendations, will not be making any direct response, although as I will mention later we have seen some changes proposed which affect areas dealt with in the committee’s report.

Before moving on to the substance of the government’s response, I should mention some general observations about government responses to committee reports. The first is one that all committees should be aware of when bringing down reports, and that is when recommendations call for action which is outside the authority of the Commonwealth government. While we may recommend that the Commonwealth use its influence at various intergovernmental forums, ultimately it is the states themselves which have the authority to act according to the recommendation or to reject our findings and not implement the recommendation. It is the case that, where the committee recommends action on the part of the states, generally that recommendation relies on the Commonwealth being successful in convincing the states collectively to adopt the proposal. This difficulty is made plain in the response to recommendation No. 3, where the government says:

It is noted that, while doing its best to influence the State and Territory Governments to move to greater harmonisation, the Commonwealth cannot dictate outcomes as the operational aspects of overseas adoption will remain primarily a State and Territory Government responsibility.

That is something that all Commonwealth parliamentary committees should be aware of. When making recommendations which impact on or require the cooperation of the state and territory governments, committees should first satisfy themselves that they have fully investigated the issue from the state and territory perspective and have an appreciation of the resource constraints which state and territory governments must operate under in that program area.

This brings me to the second general remark, where the resource constraints of the Commonwealth are raised. In its response to recommendation 23, which dealt with the establishment of a file ID tracking system, the government makes the statement:

The recommendation is accepted but it is acknowledged that there are resource implications involved in developing and updating such a file tracking system.

I mention these general matters because it is possible for individual committee members to push a very narrow agenda and lose sight of the broader issues.

I move on to the detail of the government’s response. For recommendation 1, the Commonwealth-state agreement dealing with the implementation of the Hague convention, we see the willing but not able response. As the response says:

... implementation may require a long lead time and will have resource implications which will need to be closely examined.

As that response suggests, what may have appeared straightforward to the committee during its inquiry can be far more complex when it comes to implementation—or it could be just another cop-out by the department or agency. What it comes down to is whether the parliament is satisfied that the department has adopted that recommendation and will try to implement it over a period of time. I dealt with recommendation 3 earlier, but it seems that, while the recommendation set out the committee’s wishes, it is left to the government to determine the ways and means of putting the recommendation into practice.

Recommendation No. 4 made a direct request of the government of New South Wales and, as I have already said, it requires action by an agency outside the authority of the Commonwealth government. It is heartening to see that the New South Wales government is currently reviewing this matter, but I doubt that this is solely in response to the committee’s report.

The response to recommendation No. 5, which calls for the establishment of consultative committees, suggests that such mechanisms are already in place, although not in line with the prescriptions of the committee’s report. It leaves me wondering whether our recommendation is too prescriptive in not allowing enough latitude for the states and territories to develop consultative mechanisms that best suit their own situations.

I must say that I am most disappointed with the refusal of the government to accept the committee’s recommendations Nos 6, 7 and 9. We have to remember that this was a bipartisan report; every recommendation was supported by members of both sides of the chamber. The committee’s report drew attention to the very small number of parents adopting children over five years of age. As I have said on earlier occasions regarding the tabling of the report, from the government’s point of view, the amount of money involved is quite small. But, as the committee heard, overseas adoption is a very expensive exercise for individuals and families. Some committee members went to great lengths to stress the high fees charged by state and territory governments. However, we cannot lose sight of the fact that, for a small number of adoptive families, the loss of leave entitlements, as is the case with recommendations Nos 6 and 7, and the loss of maternity payment, which is dealt with by recommendation No. 9, can be seen only as cruel and heartless measures that discriminate—and they definitely discriminate—against a very small number of adoptive parents.

I also note that the committee stressed that the adoption of older children presented special problems. But, for the sake of very minor—and they were very minor—changes and expenditure, these adoptive families face a far greater monetary loss than all the state-imposed fees put together. The government allows for extending the eligibility for the immunisation allowance for children of up to the age of 16 years who have been adopted from overseas. But, even given the smallness of the cost, it refuses to allow the general maternity payment for children over two years of age.

I welcome today the announcement by Tanya Plibersek, our shadow minister for work and family. She has stated that Labor will—and we will—abolish the age restriction on the maternity payment for adoptive parents. So I take this opportunity to again remind the government that this is a bipartisan report—that both sides of the parliament agreed to it. I ask members of the government to take it up with the minister and follow Labor’s lead to abolish the age restriction on the maternity payment for adoptive parents.

Going back to recommendation No. 8, I note the comments regarding workplace agreements being used as a means of obtaining conditions for adoptive parents. While it may be possible for an employee to gain improved conditions, I have to wonder what other conditions, which would otherwise be standard, may be traded away for special arrangements for parents adopting from overseas. Regarding recommendations Nos 11, 13, 14 and 15, the government has agreed to implement procedures to make these small but important changes, while recommendation No. 12 is included in amendments to the Australian Citizenship Bill. The government agrees with recommendation No. 16, which deals with performance information on intercountry adoptions.

I must say that I share the government’s concern about the cost of collecting this information. We all agree that it would be nice to have this information but, unless it can be collected at minimal cost, I have to wonder if the money would be better spent on staffing the agencies responsible for adoption rather than on bean counters who produce reports on performance. The response to recommendation 17 appears to disagree with the committee’s conclusion that states and territories should amend their adoption legislation to include the provisions of the Hague convention. While I can appreciate the need to speed up the adoption process in many ways, I can see why there is reluctance to legislate changes which may impact on other aspects of the adoption process.

A number of the remaining recommendations were accepted by the government and involved varying degrees of administrative and intergovernment collaboration, all of which would improve the process of overseas adoption. The response to the last recommendation leaves me a little bit confused. It calls on the Attorney-General’s Department to establish a program to fund a national peak overseas adoption support group. The government’s response is that the recommendation is accepted in part, and it suggests that the support group represents the interest of the adoptive community. Because funding is required, it seems the Attorney-General’s Department is willing to fund the representative interest of the adoptive community but not other support programs. I can understand that the funding of small support groups is not something that is a responsibility of the Attorney-General’s Department but, in view of other recommendations which seek to centralise parts of the adoption process, it is hard to see how those support functions could be funded. Perhaps it would be better placed under the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs.

Finally, I want to refer to those recommendations which were not included in the formal report but were included as an appendix. The committee was concerned for the fate of the many Australian children in foster care and the low rate of adoption for children in care. The committee’s report was critical of the role of state governments in their handling of this issue. It is timely then to note for the House that, in legislation introduced into the New South Wales parliament last week, changes will be made which reflect a number of the concerns raised by the committee. The New South Wales Minister for Community Services and state member for Cabramatta, Reba Meagher, has indicated that the amendments will allow foster carers wanting to adopt children to do so without the consent of the birth parents. The amendments would appear to go a long way toward implementing the committee’s recommendations.

Having taken part in the intensive inquiry which led to the report on overseas adoption, it is heartening to see this relatively prompt response from the government. It is pleasing to see a number of recommendations implemented, but it is disappointing to me as a member and as deputy chair of that committee—and, I am sure, to a number of adoptive parents I have spoken to since the tabling of the report—to see that the government cannot make the small change to remove the five-year age limit for benefits and conditions for adoptive parents. In closing, I would also like to state again that I congratulate the shadow minister for work and family for announcing today that Labor will abolish the age restriction on the maternity payment for adoptive parents, and I hope that the government will take Labor’s lead on this, because it was a bipartisan report.

Louise Markus (Greenway, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak to the report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Human Services on overseas adoption in Australia. The inquiry began in February 2005. We received over 274 submissions, had about 12 public hearings and had 100 people give formal evidence. I wish to acknowledge and thank the members for Mackellar, Fowler, Throsby, Adelaide, Wakefield, Forde, Franklin, Dobell and, of course, Mitchell for their hard work and the time that they spent trying to understand the challenges that face families, individuals and couples seeking to establish a family through adoption and also some of the challenges that face children seeking to be adopted. The terms of reference of the committee focused on inconsistencies between the states and territories and also inconsistencies between benefits and entitlements provided to families with own-birth children and those provided to families who have adopted children from overseas.

I want to acknowledge the government’s response. Overall the response of the government in accepting a number of the recommendations is very positive. Of the 27 recommendations only a few were not accepted and a couple were accepted only in part. The rest, overall, have been taken on board. I welcome the Attorney-General’s announcement—the Australian government’s response—on 14 September 2006, in which he said:

The Australian Government supports the Committee’s call for reform and has accepted the vast majority of the Committee’s recommendations.

I was also pleased to see that action has already begun, particularly in sending a delegation to Ethiopia in September to discuss, for example, that country’s program. The Commonwealth government’s response, indicating the work of the committee, noted the large number of submissions received and the enormous public interest, which helped to give voice to the concerns of many Australians about the inefficient, costly and often inaccessible process. The government’s response described the recommendations as:

... a blueprint for major reform of Australia’s overseas adoption system.

I am pleased also to see the Attorney-General’s Department having primary carriage of the implementation of the recommendations. I need to note, however, as has already been noted by the member for Fowler, that this range of reforms does require the cooperation of, and indeed collaboration with, the states. It is the states’ and territories’ primary responsibility to administer the adoption process, so they are vitally important. Many of the changes can only happen if this collaboration takes place.

The first and second recommendations really deal with the renegotiation of the Commonwealth-state agreement and the implementation of the Hague convention with respect to intercountry adoption with states and territories. I am pleased to see the Attorney-General’s Department taking greater responsibility on this. The third recommendation asked that the Attorney-General’s Department ensure that, in negotiating the Commonwealth-state agreement, there be greater harmonisation of laws, fees and assessment practices.

During the course of the inquiry we had a number of families that, because of the difficulty in one state—for example, in Queensland—moved to another state where it was more accessible and easier, such as the ACT. Harmonisation of these laws across different states will certainly make it a lot easier for families and for couples and individuals seeking adoption from overseas and will also reduce the need for them to make significant changes.

In recommendation No. 4, the committee requested that the Attorney-General ask the New South Wales Minister for Community Services to insert the eligibility criteria for adoptive parents in legislation and regulation. I note that the New South Wales government has already canvassed this for the current review of the Adoption Act 2000. I also wish to acknowledge, as the member for Fowler has, and to congratulate the state Minister for Community Services on proposing the amendment to begin to address the numbers of children that may be in permanent care and have families that do want to adopt them. I commend her for that.

Contrary to the member for Fowler, I do believe that the committee played a part in contributing towards that movement by the New South Wales Labor government. The response to recommendation No. 10 states:

The Commonwealth accepts this recommendation. The Commonwealth will pursue amendments to legislation to extend the eligibility criteria for the Maternity Immunisation Allowance to cover children adopted from overseas who arrive in Australia before the age of 16 years and who are immunised to an appropriate level within two years of their arrival.

However, I wish to note that I would have liked to see acceptance by the government of the recommendation regarding a change to the maternity payment for children beyond two years of age. In recommendation No. 14, the committee requested:

The Australian Passport Office implement a regular training program for their counter staff and counter staff at post offices so that they can effectively deal with queries and applications from intercountry adoptive parents.

This recommendation was accepted by the government. The government also accepted recommendation No. 15, which requested that the Minister for Human Services encourage Medicare to introduce a policy for children who have been adopted from overseas that would ensure that staff are discrete with adoptive parents; staff receive regular training; and the issue of Medicare cards be expedited and children be included on their parents’ card, as the parents wish. I would acknowledge the Minister for Human Services, the Hon. Joe Hockey, for implementing these practices already. I am pleased to see that already adoptive parents can access greater services through Medicare.

The Attorney-General also endorsed recommendation No. 17, which focused on the importance of moving as quickly as possible to expedite applications whilst complying with The Hague standards. Often there was a delay of several years from the moment families applied for adoption to the day the adoptive child arrived in the country; sometimes it was as long as five years. It is critical that that time of delay is reduced. I will also focus on recommendation No. 19, which was also accepted by the government, which is that the Commonwealth will aim to develop cooperative models, in partnership with state and territory governments, to manage adoption programs. Again, this will require a staged approach and additional resources. Recommendation No. 22 was accepted, but again it is noted that it is in relation to the Victorian legislation.

Recommendation No. 23 was accepted, but it is acknowledged that there are resource implications. The committee asked that the Attorney-General’s Department negotiate with central authorities to coordinate the establishment of a file ID tracking system so that adoptive parents may easily track their files throughout their application. In recommendation No. 24 the committee requested:

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade ... develop protocols with the Australian central authorities to govern the follow up of files in countries of origin by embassy officials when the files become significantly overdue.

Finally, recommendation No. 27 was accepted in part by the government as it relates to facilitating the establishment of a national peak overseas adoption group, particularly for the adoptive community. It was apparent during the inquiry that many members of the adoptive community felt quite unsupported and often were very isolated. In addition, it varied from state to state what support services were available or were funded for.

It is important to note here that, at all times during the inquiry, the committee’s focus was on what was best for the children. So I will finish with a statement by Amy. On the back page is a photo of her and her best friend, and this is what Amy says:

I am thankful to be here because when I went back a couple of years ago to Ethiopia I saw all the poverty over there. It opened my eyes. I am grateful to have an education, and that I am healthy and I can grow up, because over there the life expectancy for women is—only about 38 … I know that here I can live a healthy and prosperous life, so I am grateful for that.

Harry Quick (Franklin, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I, like other members speaking today, welcome this opportunity. This is about our third chance to talk to the committee’s report on overseas adoption in Australia. The previous speaker, the member for Greenway, mentioned the best interests of the children. In our previous report into family separation, the principal motive behind that was the best interests of the children. I think the same is being followed as we talk about the government’s response to our excellent report.

It is interesting to note that in the government’s response it says:

Taken as a whole, the recommendations create a blueprint for systemic change in the way the adoption of children from overseas are handled. The Commonwealth supports the call for reform.

I would like to place on the public record my appreciation for the promptness of the government because it was not just one agency that had to deal with this and bring all of this together; there were a variety of agencies. Sadly the government, in one of our other reports on substance abuse, took three years over two parliaments to respond. But, as I said, it is great to get a very prompt response—not only for us as members who have given up our valuable time to wander around Australia and listen to the wonderful stories of people’s challenges in trying to adopt children from overseas, but also to acknowledge the wonderful work that support groups do to support the families who have taken the step of adopting children from overseas.

I think three noes out of 27 recommendations is pretty good. I am a little bit disappointed that we could not have had 27 out of 27. One of the noes was the issue of an age limit for unpaid adoption leave. Just about everyone who spoke to us said that, the older the children, the greater the difficulty in their blending in not only with their own family but also with society. If you go overseas and visit the orphanages, you will see the fact that there are in excess of 30 children to one carer and these children develop coping mechanisms so that they are able to be independent, even at a very early age—far earlier than any of our children in a normal family make-up. We are not talking about a great deal of money here. We should be talking about and focusing on the best interests of the children. So for goodness sake, in a federal budget of tens of billions of dollars—we are talking about 370 children adopted in 2003-04, and we are not talking about all of those for this unpaid maternity leave—why can’t we have some common sense? As previous speakers have said, this is a bipartisan report. This committee is famous for working through some very sensitive issues and coming up with constructive forward-thinking recommendations.

I congratulate the Commonwealth on deciding to take over the role of overseas adoptions and renegotiating the Commonwealth-state agreement. For too long the states have developed and maintained this rail gauge mentality on a whole range of issues, whether it is registration of nurses or teachers or solicitors; the rail system; adoption; different fees in different states; Queensland locking the whole system up for goodness knows how many years; or Tasmania and the ACT, the favoured state and territory, where families moved to because it was easier to adopt children there. Now that the Commonwealth has taken over the role, let us kick a few heads in some of these state government departments. As members of the committee realised when we tried to speak to some of these state government departments, it was a case of: ‘We are the department. We know what to do. We have been doing it for years. Leave us alone. The interests of the parents and the adoptive parents are secondary to the functioning of the department.’ For goodness sake, we are talking about the best interests of the children—370 of them. There needs to be greater harmonisation of laws, fees and assessment practices so that more families can adopt children.

When I went to China I went to Beijing and visited the agency that had sole responsibility for processing 10,000 Chinese children. Ten thousand! The files in the rooms were enormous. They were huge—almost a couple of feet high. That was 10,000 out of 100,000 that were abandoned each year. There are 10 million babies born every year in China. A hundred thousand are abandoned and they are processing 10,000.

We have wonderful opportunities. We have thousands of parents who would love to be part of the process—who, for a variety of reasons, cannot have their own biological children and would love to adopt. We now have a Commonwealth government that has said, ‘I am going to take charge of it.’ Let us drag the states kicking and screaming into doing whatever needs to be done as quickly as possible so that in the next couple of years we can double the number of children that can come here and take part in what being an Australian is all about.

As I said, it is not a great deal of money. Removing the restriction on unpaid adoption leave for children under the age of five years and introducing amendments to the Maternity Leave (Commonwealth Employees) Act could be done just like a snap of the fingers. Recommendations 6, 7 and 9 could be implemented at minimal cost. I would not hesitate to say that the six members of the government would probably agree with me. When it came to putting this report in place, it seemed sensible and we all agreed. There was no disagreement at all. If we can remove the concerns about the maternity immunisation allowance, why can’t we do the other couple of things? Citizenship, school enrolment, passport applications and Medicare protocols are all ticked off. As I said, there are only three out of 27.

In relation to recommendation 27, the Commonwealth agrees about setting up a national peak overseas adoption support group, but it needs to be not only set up but adequately funded. This is a very big country. If you are adopting Chinese children in Australia and you want to maintain their cultural links to their country—if you want to bring together people from Western Australia, Tasmania or up in the northern parts of Queensland and have some sort of support group—that is going to involve some expense. Once again, we should not be talking about a heap of money within the Commonwealth budget. We are talking about only 370 kids, and if we double that in the next couple of years we are still not talking about a whole heap of money. As I said, it is important that we do this as soon as possible. The Commonwealth’s response says:

... there are significant lead times involved in the implementation of several of the recommendations, especially in renegotiating a new Commonwealth-State Agreement ...

I would hope that, with a forward-looking A-G in Philip Ruddock, with the 10 members of the department—and with the support of the shadow minister here with her enlightened approach to Labor Party policy when we get into government—the lot of us can deal with these issues sooner rather than later, because we are talking about significant lead times. With an election coming up, it could be 2010 before anything changes. As the honourable member opposite knows, when we spoke to these parents—they are wonderful parents who have incurred enormous debts, mortgaged their houses and borrowed money from families and friends to bring children from China, Somalia, Ethiopia, Vietnam or Romania, and I met some of these people this morning—we found they have to pay an arm and a leg and then, until recently, jump through a whole series of hoops. For example, people were going along to the local primary school to enrol their children and being asked humiliating questions. A school might say, ‘We can’t enrol your child unless you give us a birth certificate.’ ‘But my daughter was abandoned in China.’ It does not make any difference: no birth certificate, no enrolment. People were going along to enrol their child for a Medicare card and getting, ‘Oh, your child is adopted, is he?’ So things need to change.

It worries me that we are talking about significant lead times. For goodness sake! The government has said that this is a blueprint for systemic change. For once 10 of us agreed, ‘Here’s the blueprint; let’s drag the states.’ We need to drag them. As the honourable member opposite who is about to speak after me knows, some of the states in their attitudes are absolutely appalling—shameful. We had the minister in Queensland virtually accusing us of falsifying some of our report, yet he would not come along and give evidence in front of us.

Finally, I welcome the opportunity to speak on this, hopefully for the last time. It is a real pleasure to be part of this wonderful committee that has produced this wonderful report, which is a blueprint. I congratulate the parents who have adopted children. I have a family one door up from me in Kingston who adopted two young boys from Thailand. They are just so happy living in Tasmania. They fitted into the local school community and are a credit to their adopted mum and dad. Hopefully, when I leave this place at the next election, those three noes might join the other 24 yeses. I look forward to what the other speakers might say today, and I congratulate the government on its very prompt and in some ways inspiring response to a wonderful issue that we did not know much about when we undertook this whole inquiry. I thank the chamber.

Alan Cadman (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to thank the previous speaker, Mr Harry Quick, for his contribution and to reflect and endorse his comments, because it was an interesting inquiry that we went into not knowing a lot about the topic. Having come through it, we know that it was a thoroughly worthwhile inquiry—not only because we had so much of the report adopted by the government but because in fact we were able to draw out other issues that I believe will be subject to further inquiries.

The issue of fostering alone is worthy of examination in Australia. State departments, we discovered, found it so much easier to look after 105,000 children—I think that was the number in New South Wales—in a fostering process and never find a solution for those children’s lives that was permanent. They were always happy to shift them on and shift them on again and find another family to look after them, so eventually they were too old to be considered for adoption or any other permanent caring relationship. That was one area that came up that I did not expect. The other one that emerged was the anti-adoption attitude in many state departments. The honourable member has mentioned the state of Tasmania, which was quite different. It was just a pleasure to see the relationship between parents and the department, the cooperative arrangements in that state and some beautiful outcomes, I have to say.

I guess part of this whole process has come about because, until Australia took the decision to become a signatory to the Hague convention, this was an area that was basically conducted by the states of Australia because they had the main carriage of the adoption law. The only role the Commonwealth had was to ensure that the immigration processes were properly carried out and were appropriate. Things changed and we became a signatory to the Hague convention, so it became necessary to modify the way in which the relationships between the Commonwealth and the states were carried out. In 1998, an agreement was entered into, but it is time to change that. Nearly 10 years have expired and it is not working satisfactorily. The House of Representatives carried out this inquiry and it produced wonderful results. Only three of the 27 recommendations were not accepted by the government, mainly because there were factors extraneous in some way to the thrust of the report and because some of them dealt with state government issues over which the Commonwealth has no control. But it was a beneficial report.

I have to say that, having looked at the Hague convention and the way in which it operates in Australia, I am delighted that the Commonwealth has decided it is going to take a leading role and that the Attorney-General will approach the states and territories to amend the agreement to commit the states and territories to provide training and resources and bring in the private sector—the not-for-profit agencies which can better relate to the community and, under proper supervision, provide a much more empathetic environment for the adoption of children from overseas. The time is long gone when the derelict and completely unsatisfactory arrangements in each state can be allowed to continue. That must be stopped. We need to change those processes, and evidence that the committee received made it obvious that the permanence and stability of children at risk were criticised by parent groups and academics.

In New South Wales, the Committee on Adoption and Permanent Care advised the Standing Committee on Family and Human Services how foster care drift can affect children. Groups said that the processes that parents are required to go through are extraordinary. In fact, the only effective adoption statistics were provided by parent groups themselves, because none of the departments had any information—or, if they did, they did not provide it to the committee. A table appearing in our report indicates that the total adoptions in Australia were as low as 66 in New South Wales, which was equivalent to one adoption per 101,991 people, which is an extraordinarily low figure. The only figures which closely equate to the international average are those of the ACT and Tasmania. The international standard is within the range of one adoption per 10,000 to 20,000 head of population. And there we have New South Wales, with extremely high fees and total adoptions finalised in one year of 66 only. Of all the parents claiming that they want adoption, only 66 were accommodated in New South Wales.

In Queensland, they closed the books and decided not to process any more because the comment by the public servants involved was that they would process them as they received them. They closed the books for a couple of years, then opened the books and got 800 applications for adoption. They decided they would process 100 a year for the next eight years and that was the way they were going to get rid of that backlog. That is a disgusting arrangement, and I am so pleased that it is going to change. I am delighted that the government has decided to accept the report. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted, debate adjourned.