Former British Member of Parliament John Hemming is a long-standing and vocal critic of the system and estimates that "over 1,000" of the 1,360 adoptions carried out without the parents' consent in 2010 may have been undertaken "wrongly".
[5] For example, Martin Narey, ministerial adviser on adoption and former chief executive of Barnardo's, disagreed, stating, "Overwhelmingly in all the cases that I have looked at, in all the research I have read I don't think there's anything to suggest that a significant proportion of those are inappropriate".
Julie Haines, of the pressure group Justice for Families, stated in 2012 that "Parliament has given the courts free rein to define the term 'significant harm' within case law authorities and has not deemed it necessary to provide a definitive meaning within the Children Act 1989.
[20] The practice has drawn international criticism, with the Slovakian government, Nigerian parliament and the French High Commissioner raising their concerns.[which?
][21] Every European country has a mechanism which permits adoption without parental consent,[22] but it is clear that England and Wales is the jurisdiction which most frequently resorts to such orders.
[25] From about 2007, a large and growing number of families impacted by the policy have begun to organise against the perceived injustice, often utilizing mass-communications tools such as social media.
[26] Some families have left the United Kingdom to avoid having their children removed; some are aided by advocacy groups which assist parents at risk of losing custody to travel to countries such as Ireland and France.
[27] Families affected by the practice are prohibited by court order from publicly discussing their case[28] on the basis that it is important to protect the child's right to privacy.
[8] The argument made by some that individual social workers receive 'cash bonus' payments for taking children into care does not appear to have any basis in reality.
[32] Former judge Alan Goldsack QC praised the policy calling for the UK Government to go further and to forcibly remove children from 'criminal families' at birth and to place them for adoption.