Adoptive parents tried to reduce an adoption order. They asserted an essential error induced by innocent misrepresentations made by those acting for the natural mother; it was averred by the pursuers that they had been incorrectly assured that a satisfactory medical report existed in relation to the child. The child had suffered brain injury at birth. Secondly, they contended that statutory requiremnts had not been carried out; the adoption petition was presented less than three months from the date when the child was placed in the care of the adoptive parents, contrary to the Act.
Held: Adoption involves unpredictable risks as to the development of the child, and that therefore there should be no possibility of going back. Moreover, adoption affects status in a peculiarly fundamental manner; it creates a relationship whose paradigm is the relationship of natural parent and natural child, a relationship which, apart from the statutory possibility of adoption, is obviously wholly irrevocable and unbreakable. The Act ‘made a serious invasion upon the common law by introducing a novel institution which cannot easily be fitted into its setting’. An adoption order is sui generis; consequently the inherent power of the Court of Session to reduce decrees in absence and in foro should not apply. Essential error was not a valid ground for reduction of an adoption order.
Citations:
1948 SC 636
Statutes:
Adoption of Children (Scotland) Act 1930
Jurisdiction:
Scotland
Cited by:
Cited – Alexander Cameron (Ap) v Ian Macintyre Gibson, As Executor Dative of the Late Dugald Macintyre and Another SCS 2-Dec-2003
An adoption order had been made, but at the time, the adopted child was over the maximum age. Application was made to set it aside.
Held: Adoption orders could not be set aside save for where some fraud could be demonstrated to have been . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Adoption
Updated: 05 December 2022; Ref: scu.194024