The parentless don’t need cheap pity

We often act out of pity when we should calculate our resources. As a result, we have to stop halfway and turn back. We want to change our life for the better, but we are often unable to appreciate what we already have. We often promise what we can never fulfill. Very few of us are ready to give a part of our effort, time, and kindness to those who are in trouble, especially to parentless children. Their number in Ukraine keeps growing year after year: according to official statistics, ten years ago there were slightly over 80,000 orphans in Ukraine; as of June 1, 2007 there were more than 103,000.

Each political party running for parliament promised to raise the one-time childbirth allowance. The Regions Party announced its plan to pay UAH 11,700 [$1 = UAH 5.05 – A.B.] for the first baby, UAH 25,000 for the second, and UAH 50,000 for each subsequent one. The Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc promised 8,000, 15,000, and 25,000 respectively. Aside from the question of the country’s financial resources to bear such expenses, there is the problem of a sharply increasing number of children abandoned by their single mothers who only want to earn their childbirth allowance. Viktoria Velychko, chairperson of the public organization Society of Equal Opportunities, writes in her article “Defend Children!” that the number of such cases more than tripled since the government began to pay childbirth allowances three years ago. She also maintains that the widely advertised and promoted campaign for developing foster homes and family-type children’s homes has a reverse side – numerous abuses by money-seeking foster parents. She stresses that the financial aspect, however important, should be secondary to the priority direction – national child adoption.

Did the childbirth allowances provoke women to earn money this way and thus increase the number of parentless children? Which forms of child adoption are the most socially adequate and financially optimal? What should authorities, mass media, and the public do to solve the problems of parentless children?

These and other related questions were raised during a roundtable meeting at the ZN editorial office. Participating were Valentyna HLUSHCHENKO, first assistant director of the State Department for Child Adoption and Rights; Yulia SKRYPNIKOVA, chief of the department’s division for guardianship, foster families, and family-type children’s homes; Lyudmyla VOLYNETS, co-chairperson of the All-Ukraine public organization Child Protection Service; Valentyna BEREZINA, chief of the Kyiv municipal department for child adoption and guardianship; Mykola KULEBA, chief of the Kyiv municipal juvenile affairs service; Artur GORIN, director of the social service for family, children, and youth at the Ministry of Family, Youth, and Sports; as well as Yevhenia TKACHENKO, director general of the Magnolia TV company.

Regrettably, Viktoria Velychko declined the insistent invitations to the round table. Perhaps, she simply did not feel competent enough to confront opponents in an open discussion.

Prophylactic Plans

ZN: Does the UAH 8,500 childbirth bonus, which is supposed to raise the birthrate in the country, increase the number of abandoned children?

V.H.: I wouldn’t say that the childbirth allowance provokes some asocial women to abandon their newborns once they have received their childbirth allowance. This problem is broader and it lies in poverty as a social and demographic phenomenon. The number of abandoned children is growing, but no one seems to be concerned about the responsibility of their parents.

In the past year we have registered more adoptable children. A large number of them are former inmates of boarding schools and children’s homes. They are 15 or 16 now. Since their legal status was unidentified, they had no documents, but it was not the fault of the educational authorities that were charged with such children. It was because of our inadequate regulatory frameworks. Now that the juvenile affairs services have taken over this responsibility, each district service has its own office with two staff members. And we can already see early positive results.

L.V.: The UAH 8,500 bonus was announced in early April of 2005, which means that the first “encouraged” mothers should have had their babies in January of 2006 and not a month earlier. Let’s look up the statistics of children’s homes: in 2005 there were 2,606 parentless children. In 2006 the number dropped down to 2,485. 121 children are not many, but we see a certain tendency.

Of course, there are mothers who abandon their newborns, but it’s wrong to approach this problem so radically: either we give them this 8,500 and thus stimulate orphanhood or stop paying this money and don’t stimulate orphanhood. There have always been asocial mothers and there have always been abandoned newborns. About two thousand babies are abandoned in this country every year – with or without that childbirth bonus.

The government set a clear procedure for receiving this 8,500 and charged special offices with control over the payments. The problem is there are too many controllers: guardianship agencies, labor and welfare offices, juvenile affairs services, and sundry social services. Everybody knows that too many cooks spoil the broth. That’s why I say that tighter control is the only effective way to prevent such “stimulation”.

Yu.S.: According to our data, about seven thousand children lacked official ‘parentless’ status, but now this figure has been halved.

ZN: Do you mean that parentless children are registered better or that more mothers abandon their babies?

L.V.: An inspection of children’s homes and boarding schools in 2005 showed that some 25 percent of Ukrainian children had no documents to certify their parentless status. Because of that, they are deprived of support from the government, and that’s a gross violation of the rights of a child. In May the President requested the Prosecutor General Office to check how parentless children were granted their status. I attribute the larger figure to better protection of the rights of a child.

ZN: As a rule, the tighter the control over the money payable to young mothers, the higher the level of bribery and other abuses.

L.V.: Of course, it’s difficult to tell whether a woman really wants to have a baby and needs money to rear it or she wants nothing else but this money. For more than four years we have been developing a network of consulting points at maternity hospitals where social workers contact mothers who give up their newborns. It would be good to join all our structures into one on the basis of such consulting points and develop a special procedure for determining the degree of a mother’s potential danger to her child. There may be a million criteria – from the absence of a dwelling to drinking. Most child abandonment cases are connected with psychic disorders in mothers, extramarital pregnancy, incest, or rape. Under the Family Code, alcohol and drug addiction is a reason for depriving a parent of his or her rights.

There have been 458,000 births since the government began to pay the childbirth allowance and those two thousand asocial mothers compromise all other honest mothers.

V.B.: There is another category of women who abandon their children: those whose babies have congenital malformations or mental deficiencies that were not detected during the pregnancy.

M.K.: 30 babies are born with the Down syndrome every year. It’s quite a large number. Very often doctors try to dissuade the mothers who want to take such babies home or tell them that the baby is dead. And during regular status checkups we find such mothers and they are surprised to know that the baby is alive and kept in a special institution.

As far as the parentless status is concerned, the number of such children has really increased since the registration became orderly. However, the general number of parentless children in Kyiv has decreased by 160 this year alone.

I can’t say if the Kyiv data reflect the overall picture in Ukraine because many women from other parts of the country deliver in the capital city, but three times fewer newborn babies have been abandoned this year. I don’t think anyone can say if it happens due to the childbirth bonus or the consulting points, but it’s a fact that fewer mothers leave their newborns in maternity hospitals.

ZN: How realistic is the childbirth bonus rise announced by the political parties in their election programs?

V.H.: Last week we received a copy of the draft bill on amendments to the law on childbirth and childcare allowances. When the parliament adopts this bill, the one-time childbirth allowances will be raised up to UAH 11,700, 25,000, and 50,000 per first, second, and each next newborn respectively.

ZN: Everybody agrees that it is necessary to create a single national databank of parentless children. So far, only the Lviv region has such a databank. What’s the problem with the others?

V.H.: The President and the Cabinet of Ministers set the deadline for creating the national databank at October 1. Now we have it in the electronic format. The state department is interviewing chiefs of regional services for juvenile affairs, social service centers, and senior staffers of regional administrations. Our first interview was with the Lviv region officials.

ZN: The question is not only about the database of parentless children, but also of potential step-parents, foster parents, and guardians.

V.H.: Here we have some problems – from shortage of material resources like computer equipment and Internet connection to shortage of qualified personnel. The immediate task was to draw up a register of parentless children and we have practically coped with it. In the register we enter data on every child – the date of birth, personal data on parents and other close relatives, health condition, place of residence, education status, etc.

ZN: Your database contains information on children that may be adopted by foreign families. Are you sure it won’t open the way to more serious violations and abuses?

Yu.S.: A Ukrainian child may be adopted by a foreign family only after all adoption measures within Ukraine have been exhausted. Why don’t we talk about the problem of returning children to their biological families? That must be the primary task for central and local authorities. It’s only if we can’t preserve the biological family that we may offer a child for adoption. Guardianship, under which relationships are preserved, should come second. That should be followed by foster families or family-type children’s homes, and only after all these can a child be adopted by a foreign family.

“Take a Child into Your Family” or “A Family for Every Child”?

ZN: Some experts maintain that by encouraging the development of family-type children’s homes (through simplified formalities and substantial material support) the government is neglecting the primary task: the development of national child adoption.

M.K.: Many families that want to raise a child don’t understand the legal status and meaning of guardianship, adoption, foster family, or FTCH. It’s very important for them to consult a specialist who would evaluate their resources for accepting this or that child and would offer advice as to the most optimal form. If the potential parents are aware of their future role in raising a child and have professional skills, then they could be a foster family or run a family-type home.

The number of Ukrainian foster parents in Kyiv has doubled since last year. Any family who applies to a district service is immediately directed to a special center for evaluation and professional consultation. At the same time, the number of family-type homes has dropped as that model is not suitable for Kyiv. The number of foster families hasn’t changed.

L.V.: I have to admit that in the initial period we had cases of what I call “altered adoption”. People came to adopt a child and unqualified staffers told them, “You don’t need it! There are other forms of raising children. You could even get more money…” There were such cases, but I wouldn’t say they’ve become a widespread practice in Ukraine.

There is one thing I know for sure: those who are obsessed with the idea of adopting a child make very bad foster parents. Adopting a child and rearing a child are different things, because there are different psychological factors and motives. As a rule, those who adopt children have no children of their own. Foster families and family-type homes are created when the parents already have children and are willing and able to give something to parentless children.

I am concerned about the unprofessional discussions fanned by the mass media that counterpose adoption to foster family and present the sad cases dated between 1996 and 2003 that prompted the reform of the childcare system as consequences of this reform.

Some very respectable authors write peremptorily that foster families and family-type children’s homes are just another form of hidden commerce and that those people only seek money and privileges.

Ukraine has an effective system of control over foster families and family-type children’s homes. Now, after a decade, we see that yard-long receipts from food stores are not the best form of accounting. A receipt for a pound of sausage doesn’t necessarily mean that the child ate that sausage.

The presidential decree of 2005 canceled cashless settlements with family-type homes, because there had been cases when money was transferred directly to stores, foodstuffs were delivered to such homes like to kindergartens, and the grownups were not allowed to eat at the same table with the kids. Something like that happened in one of the first family-type homes run by Valentyna Leonova. By now she has raised 58 children. If someone wants to discuss possible abuses, I’d advise them to talk to the people who were raised in such homes. They’d hardly say that everything was perfect. Not a single child raised in a biological family would say that. But their stories and opinions would be more true to life.

We think that there is a more effective system of control over family-type children’s homes and foster families: each year the parents report how each child feels; the teacher gives a professional review; the district militia officer reports offenses (if there have been any); the physician reports the child’s health condition, paying particular attention to the absence (or presence) of neglected diseases; the social worker who supervises the family draws up a summary report; the juvenile affairs service collects all these reports and anaylzes them for any abuse or violations.

There are problems with the quality of social monitoring. Social workers as well as foster parents have a lot yet to learn, but it’s wrong to call almost three thousand families “corrupt”.

Only 26 percent of 102,000 parentless children are adoptable. The rest are not, and foster families and family-type homes are meant for such children. By the way, only 10 percent of those 26 percent are at the age desirable for potential adopters. And what if a child lost his or her parents at the age of 10 or 12? There is one more thing. The children who are raised in foster families and family-type homes and are still in the database of adoptable children may be adopted by Ukrainian citizens.

ZN: Alternative forms of childcare need specially trained social workers. How are things going in this area?

A.G.: Since 2006 the Center of Family and Youth Social Services has been training potential foster parents and guardians as well as social workers. Last year we trained 1,616 foster parents and candidates for adoptive parents. It’s a new kind of education. There is a broad variety of new training programs. Of course, there are some flaws. Our task today is to train foster parents and guardians for a concrete child. Every year we delete a number of foster families and family-type children’s homes from our register because the children are adopted either by their foster parents or other people.

Of course, most of the problems that concern us are connected with poverty. Parents often can’t afford a decent future for their children. Many parents decided to raise step-children when they heard that they would receive some additional allowance (almost UAH 2,000). Still, if one really means to adopt a child, he will do so, sooner or later.

The government spends UAH 3,000 a year on one inmate of a boarding school or an orphanage, one thousand on a child who is raised in a foster family, and nothing on a child who is raised together with consanguine children. We need a national program of support to all Ukrainian families.

We have trained 610 social workers for district and municipal family and youth service centers. We have also drafted regulations for foster families and family-type children’s homes with detailed description of all procedures.

ZN: Is it right for a child who is raised in a family-type home and is actually living with that family to be taken away for adoption?

V.H.: Everywhere in the world such homes and foster families are regarded as a temporary solution.

Yu.S.: This problem is acute. Our foster families and family-type homes are anything but “temporary”: children live there for ten years and longer. Unfortunately, we have more children than parents who are willing and ready to raise them. However, last year and this year we noted a good tendency: the foster parents eventually adopt the children they raise. This year we have 50 adoptions in foster families and family-type homes.

ZN: If a child is raised in a foster family or a family-type home and someone wants to adopt him or her, do the foster parents have the priority?

Yu.S.: Surely, they do. Perhaps, that’s what encourages them to adopt children, because they know that going to another family would be a certain psychological barrier for a child.

M.K. – Nobody decides for the child where he or she should go. When adopters come to foster family or family-type home they should become acquainted with a child and get into contact with him/her. Here, everything depends on how strong the child’s emotional contacts within the foster family or family-type home are. We have had such situations before. We can explain the situation to the potential adopter, but we can’t forbid the adoption of such children. There is, certainly, a problem here. The foster parents and parents-guardians, who have been trained earlier, do not realize that they are just the educators hired by the state.

Anyway, the final decision depends on the social worker that supervises the family, and on the child’s opinion. The child’s interest should be considered first of all.

ZN – Are there enough competent social workers to track all this in our country?

A.G. – Considering that there should be one social worker responsible for seven families, we need 4200 trained specialists and have only 610. Yes, we are short of qualified specialists. Especially in rural areas. For instance, there is no social service centre in Mukachev region while there are a lot of home-type children’s homes there. But this is the local authorities’ policy which, alas, should be taken into consideration.

ZN – We have heard stories about people eager to adopt a child which were refused because their housing conditions were not good enough. Isn’t it better for a parentless child to find a family even if this family’s housing is several square meters smaller than is required?

V.B. – It is possible to solve such questions through the courts. As a rule, this is not a reason for refusal.

Yu.S. – Such questions are decided by custody and guardianship departments of regional state administrations. It is not necessary to go to the court for this.

L.V. – Ukrainian legislature on child adoption doesn’t state anything about private property and so on. There just should be an act about housing conditions of adoptive family. And it can be a rented apartment or a room in a lodging house. Although, it is clear that if the family lives in “three square meters” and wants to adopt three children then they should solve their housing problem first.

National Adopting and its Secrets

ZN – Let’s talk about what should be done to encourage Ukrainians to adopt more. And about secrecy of adopting.

Ye.T. – There is no doubt that national adopting is the best form of adopting and it should be popularized. Television can help here very much. I can say that television has become more socially responsible today. Most TV channels are ready to support national adoption even without any state financing. But are the directors of boarding schools ready to cooperate?

Magnolia TV has a long-standing experience of dealing with boarding schools, and I can say that most of the directors of boarding schools treat the children like their property: “If I want to – I will let you show a child on TV, if I don’t – I won’t let you.” A word combination “secrecy of adoption”, which most of people don’t understand, is almost a State secret in average citizen’s opinion. When a journalist from some small provincial newspaper or TV channel comes to such boarding school and offers to make a program about parentless children the director pronounces this word combination. In this situation Magnolia TV asks counter-questions: “Is it a secret that this girl’s name is Masha? Is it a secret that she is five years old, she lives in your institution and is waiting for parents?” It turns out that no its not a secret. Unfortunately, our less experienced colleagues are faced with such resistance in Kyiv, the resistence is clearly worse in the provinces.

L.V. – Today our citizens and mass media very often express the following opinion: if a person wants to adopt a child let him or her do this. But it is a mistake to think that anybody is able to be a parent to the child, to which someone else has given birth, which has been raised by somebody else for several months or years and which shows some strange way of behaving. Not every person can understand this. That’s why people say that parentless children have bad genes, they are spoiled and so on. According to my experience, I can say that about 40% of the couples “drop out” after training to be foster parents or guardians. But this doesn’t mean that they are bad.

Unfortunately, Ukrainian legislation prohibits adopting children younger than two months. This is one of the causes of the unsuccessful creation of adoptive families and the subsequent returning of children because even two months spent in conditions of unclear relationships affect the child’s behavior in the future. When adopting a child people should be ready for all possible types of behavior.

The situation with adopters is difficult – to train them or not and what is the best way to train them, as the secrecy of adopting classifies not only the facts of adoption but the procedure of adoption also.

ZN – Are you sure that every Ukrainian citizen understands the word combination “the secrecy of adoption”?

L.V. – No, this is a point. Unfortunately, we are still living with ideas that a child is our property. The secrecy of adopting is a priority of adult’s interests over the child’s interests. But it is considered that we protect the child with this secret. And I can be 100% sure that our MPs will not support the law on secrecy of adoption cancellation as they are the part of our society.

I think that it would be possible to make the process of secrecy of adoption cancellation less painful if the project law on national adopters support, drafted by Child Protection Service, is passed. This project offers to exempt the adopters from income tax, land tax and tax on automobile. If they want to keep the secrecy of adoption then they should refuse all the benefits. I think that with the help of all this benefits it would be easier to convince them to refuse the secrecy of adoption.

According to our survey, many people say that they are ready to adopt a child but they are not sure about their future because they are afraid to lose their jobs. That’s why the above project of the law also proposes to pay one minimum living wage for every adopted child.

M.K. – Actually, it is very seldom for families to come and say that they want to adopt a child straight away. Usually, they say that have desire to take a child in their family. And we have a full right to send them to the Family, Children and Youth Centre where a professional consultant will work with them and will evaluate their possibilities. It becomes a secret only when all necessary documents are gathered. According to our experience, such parents are very glad that there is a consultant working with them. By the way, after this work they don’t usually speak for the secrecy of adoption. They are ready to refuse from that in order to have the possibility to turn to the specialists with different problems.

ZN – What rights do journalists have to say about parentless children? And can we oblige the people in charge of these children to give us this information?

Ye.T – According to Ukrainian legislature, there is only one limitation: if a child is a criminal or is a victim of a crime then the journalists don’t have the right to make this information known. But there are no other limitations concerning the issue of parentless children. So it is a good deed, in my opinion, to talk about these children and show them on TV in order to popularize the adoption in our country.

L.V. – It is forbidden to talk about state of health, about situation with parents and about the date of registration.

Ye.T. – It is not forbidden but it is better not to mention these facts.

“Lost” Children

ZN – Let’s talk about problems with international adoption…

L.V. – What can we say about this issue? I would like to quote from Power of Money magazine from October 4. Interview with Minister for Family, Youth, and Sports, Korzh: “We are against international adoption…” I hope that the journalists have got this wrong or cut from the context…

ZN – The “turmoil” is usually caused by “lost” children and missing reports from the parents…

V.H. – Some time ago international adoption was suspended because of the missing reports; there was a moratorium on international adoption.

According to the lastest (summer) information from Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we are missing 700 reports. Most of them are regarding the children adopted by US citizens. Last year, the total number of children which could be adopted by foreign citizens, including US citizens, was reduced. That decision caused a storm of emotions and indignation. But today’s position of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stays the same – the number of children available for adoption by foreign citizens should be limited.

ZN – Why should national adoption have priority over international adoption?

L.V. – Article 21 of UNO Convention talks about priority for national adoption and family-types of children’s homes. Unfortunately, there is a widespread opinion among judges that if there is no national adopter then there certainly should be a foreign adopter. But international adoption is a very painful breaking for the child –traditions, culture, language, climate…

I think that today’s problem is not about the number of reports received. The problem is in the quality of these reports. Pedophile Kruger, who had adopted three children from Kherson, was sending reports saying that the children were OK with him in the USA.

We should consider our state’s relations with the countries, citizens of which adopt our children. We should maintain contact with their social services and custody agencies. Their state bodies of power should be responsible.

Yu. S – We have a whole lot of problems here as in any other form of adopting children in Ukraine today. And it is necessary to solve them taking the children’s interests into consideration first of all.