Sunday, February 17, 2008

Pass the parcel

A teenage girl gets pregnant, has the baby but cannot keep it, so it is put up for adoption. In the meantime, it is farmed out to foster parents. Eighteen months and five different sets of foster parents later, the baby is finally with its adoptive parents. Eighteen months! Thirty years ago, adoption would have been achieved within a month. Why this outrageous delay?
Well, according to the report I read, the paperwork and procedures that Social Services go through are byzantine, ostensibly to protect the baby, but in reality to protect the SS's arse and to satisfy the demands of political correctness. Apparently, the baby is an octaroon (not that you can use that term any more) so they have to find a couple who are one-eighth black (not that you can use that term any more). They probably spend a month working out what terms you CAN use.
Secondly, everything has to be approved by the Courts, and it can take up to six months to get a hearing once the SS have completed their arcane paperwork. The Courts, as you know, are very busy these days listening to more important cases, mostly appeals against speeding fines.
Somewhere in all this sh*t, there is a baby being passed around like a parcel in a Beirut post office. Isn't it time we made a stand against this nonsense and demanded a return to good old-fashioned common sense?
Ah, it's nice to be back in grumpy-old-man mode again!

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