Caregiver and adoptive applicant assessment and approval

Assessing and approving caregivers and adoptive parents

Policy: Caring for children and young people — Approved independent living arrangements

We must consider their ability to:

• provide an appropriate standard of care for te tamaiti or rangatahi
• provide a safe, stable, and loving home for te tamaiti or rangatahi
• respond to the needs and advance the wellbeing of te tamaiti or rangatahi
• value te tamaiti or rangatahi for who they are and promote and support their identity and aspirations
• support te tamaiti or rangatahi to maintain and strengthen their whakapapa connections
• recognise and support the practice of whanaungatanga in relation to te tamaiti or rangatahi
• provide a new family for a tamaiti or rangatahi in need of adoption.

In urgent situations, this may be a provisional assessment.

Policy: Caregiver and adoptive applicant assessment and approval — provisional assessment for urgent placements 

Adoptive applicants must be assessed and approved before a social worker can:

• offer their profile to birth parents considering adoption
• issue a placement approval that enables the lawful placement of a tamaiti or rangatahi in a home for the purposes of adoption – this includes where a private adoption arrangement is proposed with people who don't meet the definition of close whānau or family as described in section 2 of the Adoption Act 1955
• assemble an intercountry adoption dossier.

Facilitating the adoption of a tamaiti from overseas

Approving intercountry adoptive applicants

If the assessment is for an adoptive applicant who has made direct application to the court for an adoption order

Adoptive applicants who make a direct application to the court for an adoption order must be assessed in order to provide a report to the Family Court pursuant to the Adoption Act 1955.

The special consideration of approval process does not apply to these applicants. If circumstances are identified during an applicant’s assessment that meet the criteria for special consideration of approval, the social worker should use the child/young person and family consult tool to explore any concerns with the applicant. The social worker retains the ultimate responsibility for their decision on the recommendation in their court report.

For direct applicants, the social worker provides a report to the court with their analysis, rationale and recommendation to the court as to whether the applicants meet the criteria in the Adoption Act. The decision to grant or decline the adoption application is made by the court.

This will enable them and their household to understand:

• the criteria and process for the assessment and approval of caregivers
• the level of care expected from the caregiver and what will happen if it’s not provided
• the impact that caregiving may have on the caregiver’s life and household, including their tamariki
• the support, training and resources that will be available to the caregiver, including information about what financial support and respite care is available
• why they must inform us whenever there is a significant change in their circumstances or their household
• that the best interests of te tamaiti or rangatahi are our primary focus when we make decisions that affect them
• the need for connection between te tamaiti or rangatahi and their family, whānau, hapū, iwi and family group and how this will be facilitated
• the effects of trauma on the behaviour and development of te tamaiti or rangatahi
• appropriate ways to respond to difficult and challenging behaviours
• available services or other means to support recovery and prevent further trauma
• the effects of trauma on family/whānau, hapū, iwi
• the importance of the views of te tamaiti or rangatahi and their participation in making decisions that affect them
• the decisions a caregiver can and can’t make and the decisions te tamaiti can and can’t make, about day-to-day care arrangements
• the right of te tamaiti or rangatahi to keep personal belongings and have somewhere safe to store them
• the rights of legal guardians and how we uphold them
• the feedback and complaints process including:
  • how te tamaiti or rangatahi can make a complaint
  • how the caregiver can support te tamaiti or rangatahi to make a complaint
  • what support is available to the caregiver if a complaint is made against them by te tamaiti or rangatahi
  • how a caregiver can make a complaint.

For detail about information about the caregiver that we must provide te tamaiti or rangatahi prior to placement, refer to the Transitions within care policy.

Policy: Transitions within care

We must assess:

• the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant’s experience, skills (including understanding trauma) and attitudes relevant to their ability to provide safe, stable, loving care
• the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant’s ability to respond to the needs, and advance the wellbeing of a tamaiti or rangatahi
• the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant’s cultural competency, including their ability and willingness to promote and support cultural identity and connections for te tamaiti or rangatahi and ability to foster and support whanaungatanga
• the needs, strengths and circumstances of the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant and their household
• the safety, adequacy and appropriateness of the physical caregiving environment – their willingness and capacity to provide a smoke and vape free environment must be included in a home visit
• what support and capability building the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant and their household might need to help them provide care.

Trauma-informed theory

Assessing the home environment of applicants

Caregiver and adoption assessment framework

Policy: Caregiver support

The assessment must also consider:

• the types of care the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant is seeking to provide
• the needs of the particular tamaiti or rangatahi being placed or considered for adoption — if there is an identified tamaiti or rangatahi in mind
• the likely effects on te tamaiti or rangatahi and the household if te tamaiti or rangatahi is placed with a particular household, including the effect on other tamariki within the home.

Types of care

If the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant is in a different area from te tamaiti or rangatahi, we must work together to ensure that the caregiver assessment is completed.

Policy: Casework responsibilities when our work involves more than 1 site

A suitability check is required for:

• the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant
• members of the caregiver’s or adoptive applicant’s household who are 18 years or older.

We must also consider carrying out a CYRAS check and police vet for household members aged 14 to 17 years.

We have discretion about a suitability check for people aged 18 years or older who:

• have connections to the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant or their household and
• are likely to have regular unsupervised or overnight contact with tamariki in custody or care or the adopted tamaiti or rangatahi.

If we decide not to carry out a suitability check on a person who is not a household member but meets the criteria above, we must record our rationale for not completing the suitability check. This decision must be made in consultation with a supervisor.

You must have the consent of the person you’re suitability checking to carry out a police vet or check of CYRAS and TRIM. If a person declines to give their consent for these checks consult with your supervisor and Oranga Tamariki Legal Services.

As part of a suitability check we must gather and consider the following information:

• identity confirmation
• police vet information and a risk assessment of the information obtained
• residential addresses from the previous 5 years
• referee checks
• medical report – for the prospective caregiver or adoptive parent only
• immigration status – of the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant only
• CYRAS and TRIM records.

We must also consider any information from other sources that’s relevant to the assessment — for example, information about previous caregiving for another agency, or a volunteer role they perform in the community. This could be information we seek or information that is volunteered to us.

Assessing information from suitability checks

If concerns are identified during our assessment, we use the child/young person and family consult tool. This helps us explore with whānau or family the identified concerns, and consider whether the assessment should continue and, if so, what safety plans may be required for te tamaiti or rangatahi.

Child/young person and family consult tool

Identity confirmation

A person undergoing a suitability check must confirm their identity.

For inter-country adoption applicants, we must view and photocopy pages 2 and 3 of their passport.

Police vetting

We must obtain a New Zealand Police vet from the New Zealand Police Vetting Service for all individuals undergoing a suitability check. Consent of the individual is required.

We may also require police vetting:

• from overseas jurisdictions
• of other individuals, such as a rangatahi who is aged under 18 who resides in the home.

Information obtained from a police vet must be taken into account in the assessment of the suitability of a prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant.

Completing police vetting

Addresses

All individuals undergoing a suitability check must provide a list of their residential addresses for the previous 5 years.

Referees

All individuals undergoing a suitability check must provide the names of at least 2 referees (referees can be shared) who have known them at least 2 years including:

• 1 referee who is not related to the person and not part of the person’s extended family, and
• 1 referee who is a member of the person’s extended family.

Prospective caregiver and adoptive applicants must name at least 1 referee who knows them as a group and can comment on their interactions with one another. For example, a referee who knows the prospective caregivers as a couple or a family unit.

We must contact at least 2 referees named by each person to request information to assist our assessment.

Medical reports

Prospective caregivers or adoptive applicants must provide a medical report from their doctor.

Oranga Tamariki will pay the fee for this report and reasonable fees for any associated consultation, investigation or examination for prospective caregivers and joint prospective caregivers and adoptive applicants.

People applying only to be adoptive applicants pay these expenses themselves.

Immigration status

The prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant must provide evidence of their citizenship, permanent residency or other immigration status.

Prospective permanent caregivers, short-term caregivers (was known as transition caregivers) and adoptive applicants must have New Zealand citizenship or a New Zealand permanent resident status with no travel restrictions.

For New Zealand citizens, evidence of their citizenship should be gained through their identity confirmation check. No further evidence of immigration status is required.

Search CYRAS and TRIM records

We must search CYRAS and TRIM records for information about all individuals undergoing a suitability check.

We must seek each person’s consent to:

• search our records for information about them
• share their information contained in our records with others as relevant to the assessment and approval of the applicant.

If concerns are identified through suitability checking and a decision is made to continue with our assessment, special considerations apply for approval.

Where concerns identified through suitability checking would prohibit approval, stop the assessment and tell the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant about the intention not to complete a full assessment.

Prospective adoptive applicants can request that a full assessment is completed even if issues are identified, but approval remains discretionary.

Writing the assessment report

If the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant is in a different area from te tamaiti or rangatahi

We must work together to ensure that the caregiver assessment is completed.

Policy: Casework responsibilities when our work involves more than 1 site

Assessment of an Oranga Tamariki staff member who is a prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant must be completed by someone who works at a different site or, where appropriate, an NGO may be commissioned to complete the assessment.

Oranga Tamariki staff cannot be considered for any caregiving or adoptive roles involving tamariki they are directly working with.

The social worker must take steps to be satisfied that the proposed carer can provide safe and suitable care and meet the needs of te tamaiti or rangatahi.

The social worker will:

• complete identity checks, police vetting and CYRAS and TRIM checks for all members of the household
• interview the proposed carer to ensure they can provide safe and suitable care and meet the needs of te tamaiti or rangatahi
• visit the home to check the safety of the environment.

Custody of child or young person pending hearing — section 238(1)(c) of Oranga Tamariki Act 1989

Provisional approval is not available in this situation.

In addition to the usual requirements of a caregiver assessment, assessment for a prospective caregiver for a section 238(1)(d) community placement must include assessment of their capacity to ensure that the requirements of detention are met.

In particular, the community placement must be appropriate to avoid:

• absconding
• further offending
• loss or destruction of evidence
• interference with any witness.

You must ensure that a tamaiti or rangatahi subject to a section 238(1)(d) order knows that they’re not free to roam and that they may be charged with a criminal offence if they abscond. 

Custody of child or young person pending hearing — section 238 (1)(d) of Oranga Tamariki Act 1989

At a minimum, a social worker will:

• visit the home to check the safety and suitability of the environment
• meet with the parents and proposed carers together (where possible) to clarify the details of the care arrangement
• complete identity checks, police vetting and CYRAS checks (with consent) for all members of the household aged 18 years or older.

Completing police vetting

Assessing information from suitability checks

Policy: Family group conferences for care and/or protection concerns

It may be appropriate for the person being proposed as a carer to seek legal advice in these circumstances.

We must help proposed carers to understand:

• their authority to make decisions and carry out responsibilities for te tamaiti or rangatahi for whom they don’t have custody or guardianship
• the impacts on future entitlements to support from Oranga Tamariki if they take on the care of te tamaiti or rangatahi without them first being in the custody of the chief executive.

If it has been agreed that the carer will apply for an Unsupported Child Benefit, we must also offer to support their application to Work and Income.

Before agreeing to place te tamaiti or rangatahi with someone who lives overseas, a recognised social service agency in the placement country must complete an assessment of the prospective caregiver to ensure the placement is viable and in the best interests of te tamaiti or rangatahi.

Policy: When children and young people move (including overseas)

If a request is received from the Family Court to report on an adoption application for an applicant who is habitually resident overseas, contact the Central Authority for Inter-country Adoption at National Office to discuss how to get independent information about the applicant’s circumstances.

For further information, you can enquire with the NZ Central Authority.

Email: NZCA_Adoptions@ot.govt.nz

The report will include:

• analysis of the prospective caregiver’s or adoptive applicant’s strengths
• areas that would require development or support if approved, including any risks and how these would be mitigated
• their cultural identity and connections
• their willingness and ability to promote and support cultural identity and connection for tamariki
• the safety, adequacy and appropriateness of the caregiving environment
• a recommendation as to whether or not the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant should be approved.

If the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant has been assessed to provide care for or adopt a specific tamaiti or rangatahi, the report will focus on:

• the assessed needs of te tamaiti or rangatahi
• the prospective caregiver’s or adoptive applicant’s ability to meet those needs.

The report template is in CYRAS.

Writing the assessment report

Policy: Caregiver support

The decision to decline a prospective caregiver for any other reasons, such as health issues, sits with the supervisor.

The decision to decline an adoptive applicant always sits with the supervisor.

If you reach a preliminary decision to decline a prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant you must:

• tell the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant of your preliminary decision and the reasons why in a personal interview, with a supervisor present
• give the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant a letter advising the reasons for the decision to decline them
• give the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant 10 working days to comment on or correct information that they believe is incorrect before the assessment decision is finalised.

If, after considering the revised and/or additional information the decision to decline the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant stands, the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant must receive:

• written advice of the decision from the decision-maker
• information about the Oranga Tamariki feedback and complaints process.

Templates for the interim decision letter and the decision to decline letter are on CYRAS.

Special considerations apply for approval if the prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant or any other individual who has undergone a suitability check:

• is an Oranga Tamariki staff member (prospective caregiver or adoptive applicant only)
• is being considered as a prospective Family Home caregiver (prospective caregiver only)
• has a conviction
• has had tamariki removed from their care through an Oranga Tamariki intervention in the past (family group conference decision or court order)
• has a finding in CYRAS that they have abused, neglected or harmed a tamaiti or rangatahi.

Approval of intercountry adoptive applicants is done by the New Zealand Central Authority for Intercountry Adoption at National Office.

Approving intercountry adoptive applicants

If a caregiver is approved to provide more than 1 type of care, for example respite and transition, the decision to place an approval condition must be made separately for each care type and recorded on CYRAS.

The approval conditions may be varied and new approval granted through the caregiver review process.

Policy: Review of caregiver approval

Inter-country adoptive applicants can only be approved to apply to adopt from 1 specific country and the approval must identify the age and nature of special needs of the tamariki that the applicants have been approved to adopt.

When the decision is made to progress the assessment, advise the person with the relevant delegation that a request for special consideration approval is pending.

Only under extraordinary circumstances will special consideration for serious offences involving the harm or exploitation of others be granted.

Policy: Caregiver support

Policy: Transitions within care

Following the approval of adoptive applicants:

• domestic adoptive applicants are invited to complete a family profile that can be shown to expectant parents proposing to place their tamaiti or rangatahi for adoption
• inter-country adoptive applicants are required to provide information for the home study completed by a social worker for the consideration of the relevant authority in the country they are making application to.

Before provisional approval is granted, we must carry out a provisional assessment of the prospective caregiver’s suitability to provide care.

The provisional assessment must include:

• confirmation of identity of the prospective caregiver and other household members 18 years or older
• police vet of the prospective caregiver and other household members 18 years or older who consent to be checked
• a CYRAS check of the prospective caregiver and other household members aged 18 years or older
• an interview with the prospective caregiver, which may be in person, by phone, or by audio-visual link such as Skype
• a visit to the caregiver’s home, unless we aren’t reasonably able to visit, which should only occur in exceptional circumstances — if a home visit doesn’t take place, a conversation must occur about the condition and safety of the home and a visit must occur within 48 hours of placement
• a risk assessment based on the information provided
• any other steps we consider necessary to ensure we’re satisfied that the prospective caregiver can provide the required level of safety for te tamaiti or rangatahi.

Provisional approval won’t be given if the prospective caregiver or a household member aged 18 years or older has:

• a conviction requiring higher approval than CGRS Manager – refer to
  Delegated approval for special considerations
• had tamariki removed from their care through an Oranga Tamariki intervention in the past, for example through a family group conference decision or court order
• a finding in CYRAS that they have abused, neglected or harmed a tamaiti or rangatahi.

Giving provisional approval

The close monitoring arrangements and the rationale for them must be recorded in the All About Me plan for te tamaiti or rangatahi and the caregiver support plan.

If full assessment is to be pursued, it is the responsibility of the social worker for te tamaiti or rangatahi to arrange for the full assessment by liaising with the caregiver social worker.

All About Me plan to meet the needs of tamariki

Support for caregivers

The full assessment must include all steps, including completion of application documents, suitability checks, and information provision.

If a full assessment isn’t completed within 25 working days, the provisional approval ceases to be valid and the placement becomes unapproved.

If a full assessment isn’t completed because the placement is no longer needed, this should be recorded and the caregiver record closed.