Overseas adoption and child trafficking

Tue, 2nd September 2008
Overseas adoption and child trafficking
Senator Marise Payne
Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs
Chair of the Senate Select Committee on Housing Affordability (to 22 September 2008)

Senator the Hon George Brandis SC
Shadow Attorney-General
The Attorney-General has failed to articulate a clear policy in outlining the Australian Government’s response to distressing claims that children adopted by Australian families were abducted in India.
In making a Ministerial Statement today on the matter of children adopted from India, who had allegedly been kidnapped from the parents, the Attorney-General failed to make it clear how the Government would deal with such cases.
In particular, the Attorney-General failed:
to assure Australian parents that they will not face the expense and uncertainty of proceedings in the Courts of their adoptive children’s country of origin?
to commit the Australian Government to providing assistance to either the birth parents or the natural parents in circumstances such as those reported on?
to advise whether it is a condition of the granting of an adoption visa that the Immigration Department carry out checks as regards to the legitimacy of the adoption agency before the adoption is granted?
to advise whether there are plans for legislation to deal with the determination of the appropriate parenting orders where there is a dispute, either as to the validity of the adoption or the antecedent circumstances in which the adoption occurred?
to advise parents concerned about the status of their adopted children whether there are resources available to answer any questions or specific concerns that they might have?
Mr McClelland acknowledged that if the allegations of child trafficking are proven, then the birth parents may be able to bring a case in the Family Court for the removal of children to India.
The absence of any clear policy guidance from the Australian Government leaves families reliant on the Family Court’s wisdom in determining the best interests of the child in question.
All the Attorney-General is doing in reality is deferring the matter to the courts and hoping for the best.