The National Adoption Service was created to improve services for all those affected by adoption in Wales.  

The National Adoption Service for Wales, launched in November 2014, is an innovative collaborative for the provision of adoption services.  It brought together Welsh local authority adoption services into a 3 tier structure which includes partnerships at all levels with Voluntary Adoption Agencies based in Wales, Health and Education Services as well as others.

At local authority level all 22 Welsh councils continue to provide services to all looked after children whilst identifying and working with those children for whom a plan for adoption is appropriate.

Regionally, local authorities work together within five regional collaboratives to provide a range of adoption services.  Each regional collaborative has links with the voluntary adoption agencies, health and education. The services provided differ in each collaborative but all provide the adoption agency functions for children, recruit and assess adopters, offer counselling to birth parents and advice to adopted adults. Some currently directly provide adoption support services whereas in others this remains with their local authorities.

Nationally, the Director of NAS and a small central team, hosted by the City of Cardiff Council on behalf of all local authorities, drive improvement, consistency and co-ordination. The central team are:

Suzanne Griffiths – Director of NAS

Corienne Strange – Head of Policy, Practice & Communication

Nikki Kingham – Head of Business and Enabling

Chris Holmquist – Adoption Support Development Manager

Hannah Jones - Adoption Register Practitioner Manager

Laura Betts - Welsh Early Permanence Project Coordinator

Room 475, County Hall, Atlantic Wharf, Cardiff, CF10 4UW

Tel: 029 2087 3927

E-mail: contact@adoptcymru.com

Since September 2015 the central team has managed the Wales Adoption Register for the Welsh Government.

The aim of the National Adoption Service is to improve services.  Our reports show the progress we are making

Annual Report for 2014/15

Annual Report for 2015/16

Annual Report for 2016/17

Annual Report for 2017/18

Annual Report for 2018/19 

Annual Report for 2019/20

Annual Report for 2020/21

Annual Report for 2021/22

Annual Report for 2022/23

Our current priority is to improve adoption support services as we continue to implement the ‘Framework for Adoption Support’ alongside other initiatives such as Welsh Early Permanence.

The National Adoption Service as a whole is overseen by a Governance Board and an Advisory Group.  At the local level Regional Management Committees oversee the regional services.  The service reports to Welsh Ministers twice a year.

 

Service User Engagement

The voice of the service user is paramount; listening and engaging with adopters, prospective adopters, children and young people and adult adoptees continues to influence and shape the priorities for adoption services in Wales. We are proud of the fact that we are able to continue to create and use opportunities to ‘speak’ directly with our service users and we remain committed to doing so. For details of how we do this: Service User Engagement.

 

If you have any queries about your adoption service, whether from the past, a current service or you are thinking about using an adoption service in the future, please contact your local regional adoption service or voluntary agency.

Similarly, if you are interested in becoming an adoptive parent, you can find out more by looking at these pages.

 

 

Taking the next step

View the FAQs about adoption Frequently asked questions
Speak to an adoption advisor Find your nearest adoption agency

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