This is reported by Minister Weerwind of Legal Protection. “Efforts will be made to have the activities of the four different private license holders brought together in one organization, whereby government authority will remain with the minister and be strengthened,” says Weerwind. “It is certain that the current system cannot remain unchanged.” According to the minister, two scenarios have been worked out: stop foreign adoptions altogether or continue with an adapted adoption system. So the choice fell on the second scenario.
In addition, there will be a so-called ‘expertise centre’ for adopted children. “This center offers adoptees support in tracing their origin and in accessing their adoption files,” said the minister. “Adopted people can also go to the expertise center for psychosocial help and can be referred to more specialist help that pays attention to problems that adoptees may experience in their identity formation.”
Been under fire for years
Adoptions from abroad have been under fire for years due to abuses and last February the previous cabinet decided not to allow new adoptions for the time being. Now they are allowed again, but only through the government. With the rigorous stop, then Minister Dekker (Legal Protection) followed the recommendation of a critical report by a commission of inquiry led by Tjibbe Joustra, former chairman of the Dutch Safety Board (OVV).
The committee looked at adoptions in the years between 1967 and 1998, but concluded that things went wrong before and after that. According to researchers, the system is still susceptible to fraud and abuses still occur to this day. The committee also noted that there were signs of abuses as early as the 1960s. About the forgery of documents, the abuse of poverty among birth mothers and the abandonment of children against payment or coercion.
‘Failed’
Dekker concluded in response to those damning conclusions that the Dutch government had failed “by looking away from abuses for years.” According to him, the government was too passive and failed to intervene when things went wrong. By having adoptions arranged by a government organization from now on, abuses should be prevented from now on.