My Lords, pendulums do swing; it is very difficult to find a middle way. We are all agreed that it was wrong that for a period of time there was too much emphasis given to a child’s racial and religious background, as the noble and learned Baroness has said. That has resulted in appalling waiting times for children of some ethnic-minority backgrounds, who wait to be adopted for three or four times longer than white children—their contemporaries—do. That is not acceptable in our society. But we are in danger of swinging the pendulum a little bit back in the wrong direction by trying to put in the words of,
“religious persuasion, racial origin and cultural and linguistic background”.
I am of the view, which I understand is also the Minister’s view, that any sensible person trying to interpret the “background” would include racial, religious, cultural and linguistic origins. There is no way that you can look at someone’s background without taking those into account, otherwise the word “background” is meaningless. What else could it possibly mean?
I turn to the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. I have a lot of sympathy with her wishing to take out the racial, cultural and linguistic
elements as put forward by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, but I wonder whether we have not taken too much out there. It is a question of the pendulum swinging in all directions. Given all the various views that there are here, it seems to me that we all want the same thing: we want children of ethnic-minority backgrounds to be able to be adopted as quickly as their contemporaries; and we also want all their background to be taken fully into account. Given the efforts we are making to get the pendulum to hang in the middle, I think the Government have got it just about right.
4.30 pm