Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Thursday 4th September 2025 Westminster Hall

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett) on securing this debate.

I have seen the difference that the adoption and support grant has made locally. I visited the Purple Elephant Project, based in Whitton in my constituency, which supports over 100 children and families in Hounslow and Richmond, including many who have been adopted, are in kinship care or are currently looked-after children in foster care. It provides intense professional therapeutic support.

The Purple Elephant team gave examples of the difference it has made, sometimes after a long period of therapeutic support, to benefit those children and families. I saw the safe and welcoming space it provides and understood the difference it makes. The children it has supported have all had a traumatic start to their life through neglect or abuse, and they have great difficulty building relationships and coping with school, siblings and any social situation.

Due to the close correlation between neglect, abuse and adoption, Purple Elephant and other organisations are heavily dependent on the grant for their sustainability. When I met our kinship care group, I heard that many of them, and the children for whom they are now guardians, gain from the services that the fund supports. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby) cares deeply about this issue and is personally committed, but I ask her to address the problems.

Purple Elephant told me recently that it is not out of the woods yet. It is still being impacted significantly and having to fundraise to bridge the gap in funding and ensure that therapy sessions do not stop. Let us remember that it is not just the children and families who lose out because of the uncertainty and the cuts resulting from these decisions, but the therapists themselves, who have a living to make. Most of them are freelancers. They want to work with these damaged children and do not want their whole practice to be paid for privately by families who can afford it.

There must be equality here. Purple Elephant has told me that families are anxious, stressed and disillusioned about the loss of support and worried about how they will cope if these services—

[Emma Lewell (in the Chair)]

Order.

--- Later in debate ---

[Josh Newbury (Cannock Chase) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett) for securing the debate.

I begin by declaring that as a family, we will begin using the adoption and special guardianship support fund from next week, so this is current and personal for me. As I am about to find out, the ASGSF is a lifeline for thousands of families like mine up and down the country. Education is where this matters so much. Despite changing attitudes, better training and awareness in schools, and innovations such as the pupil premium, too many adopted children and children in special guardianships still fall behind. If we give them the right support early, however, we can give them an equal start in school and the same opportunity to learn, make friends and feel comfortable in the classroom.

It is important to give that view on how much difference this £50 million, and many other sources of support, make for families like mine, because if we listened only to Liberal Democrat MPs today, we might, regrettably, lose sight of that. I very much welcome the Minister’s statement today that the ASGSF will continue for another year. However, I hope that the Department will still consider multi-year certainty, which would benefit families, providers and local authorities hugely.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Is my hon. Friend as concerned as I am that we are hearing that some adopters, or potential adopters, are being put off going even through the process because of concerns about a lack of post-adoption support, which of course has to be long term, as he just mentioned?

[Josh Newbury]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. When my husband and I were going through the adoption journey and had our training and information evenings, the post-adoption support offer was very much part of that. If families feel that they cannot take that step because they fear they will be unable to get support, that is a great concern. I know that the Minister is also concerned about that.

I also know that the Minister will be carefully considering the impact of changes made to the ASGSF in April this year. The £3,000 fair access limit will, for some, be enough, but last year, almost half of children received more than that, reflecting the often complex needs assisted by the fund.

As we look ahead, I urge the Minister to see what can be done to build in flexibility. I hear that families often cannot access the fund quickly enough, so they reach crisis point and sadly, in some cases, placements break down. Quite apart from the devastating impact of breakdowns on families, the cost to local authorities is immense.

The ASGSF must be part of a holistic, early-help model, not crisis care. If at all possible, we also need look at how assessment costs are funded, particularly for complex cases where need is greater and for families in financial hardship. This House has always been united on one thing: children deserve stable, loving homes and the support to make sure that those remain their forever homes. By building on what we have now, we can ensure that the fund continues to support families and remains fit for the future.