PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Adoption (19 February 2024)

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the report entitled Ministry of Justice Annual Report and Accounts 2022-23, published on 28 November 2023, for what reason (a) there was a change in the scope of the Adoption project and (b) the asset being developed for that project was no longer required.

Asked by:
Alex Davies-Jones (Labour)

The changes to the scope of reform of Adoption were made in March last year, as part of a wider adjustment to the court and tribunal Reform Programme. There was a need to reduce the scope of the programme, in part due to challenging operational conditions caused by the pandemic, in order to be able to ensure successful delivery.

For Adoption, we reduced the scope to focus on the front-end digital application for cases where a child has been through care proceedings and placed for adoption. This is where the benefits for users - adoptive parents and local authorities – from having an accessible digital form were greatest. It will allow for a large percentage of adoption applications to be submitted digitally.

The change of scope in the Adoption project meant that some of the development work on the asset was no longer required for use. The cost of this development work was £873,000, which was disclosed as a constructive loss in the Ministry of Justice’s Annual Report and Accounts 2022-23.

Answered by:
Mike Freer (Conservative)
23 February 2024