Dear Sir or Madam,

Please provide all figures relating to:

(1) how many parents have given prior consent for adoption of their
children versus how many parents objected but still had their
parental rights removed i.e. 'forced adoption';
include figures relating to how many children in each group on a
yearly basis.

(2) how many family members have
committed suicide after losing their children to 'forced adoption'
i.e. where children were taken without the prior consent of the
parents for adoption.

(3) any and all figures where mothers have committed suicide or had
an abortion through fear of losing their children to 'forced
adoption'

Yours faithfully,

S Smith

Dear S Smith

Thank you for your email.

I acknowledge your request for information under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000. Assuming we hold this information, I will endeavour
to supply the data to you as soon as possible but no later than 5th June
2009 (20 working days from date of receipt).

I will advise you as soon as possible if we do not hold this information
or if there are exemptions to be considered and/or any costs for providing
the information. Please quote our reference - FOI/09/504 - in any
communication regarding this particular request.

Best regards

Corporate Access to Information Team, Chief Executive's Department
Kent County Council, Legal & Democratic Services, Room 1.94, Sessions
House, County Hall, Maidstone. ME14 1XQ.
Tel: 01622 696265 or 01622 694261 - Fax: 01622 694383
[1]http://www.kent.gov.uk/council-and-democ...

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Dear Sir or Madam,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of
Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Kent County Council's
handling of my FOI request 'Suicide rates - losing children to '
forced adoption''.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is
available on the Internet at this address:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/su...

Yours sincerely,

S Smith

Dear S Smith

Thank you for your request for information made under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000. Please accept my apologies for the delay in
sending this response to you.

I have been advised that we do not keep such statistics as we are not
required to by government. The Courts or Cafcass might have some insight
into this, as they are the ones who are making the decisions about this
issue. Generally birth parents tend not to give their consent because it
is one way of demonstrating to their birth children that they fought for
them in the process of the care proceedings. Like many things the
process is not straight forward and professionals have a high degree of
understanding for birth parents in this position even when we know that
they clearly cannot care for the child. We have to remember that the
Children Act 1989, starts from the welfare of the child and places the
child's needs in the centre of the planning process.

I would suggest that you apply to the Courts and/or to Cafcass for this
information.

The Council would like to forewarn you that future requests for
information on this subject will be refused. The Council believes that
the volume, extent, frequency and repeated nature of your requests, and
the inevitable follow-on queries and complaint to the response, has now
become such that your correspondence is taking up a disproportionate
amount of time and public resources to respond to. This is manifestly
unreasonable and could be construed as obsessive and a deliberate
attempt to disrupt the Council's operations. The Council has no
obligation to respond to requests that are perceived to be vexatious
under section 14 of FOIA and it is considered that collectively, your
requests are vexatious. Although your requests are not necessarily
"repeated" in the sense that they are requests for the exactly same
information, when taken together they form a pattern of obsessive
requests of a similar nature such that the Council may reasonably regard
as vexatious. Neither the FOIA, nor scarce public resources, are
intended to be used in this way and, accordingly, no further
correspondence will be entered into in response to your requests for
information on these or related topics.

If you are unhappy with this response, and believe KCC has not complied
with legislation, please ask for a review by following our complaints
process; details can be found at this link
http://www.kent.gov.uk/council-and-democ...
s/complaints-procedure.htm#foi on our website. Please quote reference
FOI/09/504.

If you still remain dissatisfied following an internal review, you can
appeal to the Information Commissioner, who oversees compliance with the
Freedom of Information Act 2000. Details of what you need to do, should
you wish to pursue this course of action, are available from the
Information Commissioner's website
http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints/freedom...

Best regards

Michelle Hunt
Access to Information Co-ordinator
Communication & Information Governance
Children, Families & Education Directorate
Kent County Council
Room 2.35, Sessions House
Maidstone, Kent, ME14 1XQ
External: 01622 696692
Internal: 7000 6692
Email: [email address]

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Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you for eventually getting back to me but unfortunately,
after putting in an internal review.

I must forewarn the council that your continual lack of a timely
response will result in more internal reviews needing to be
completed.

Yours sincerely,

S Smith

Thank you for your email. I am out of the office until Monday 22 June.
If your request is urgent please contact Debbie Percival (AM only) on ext
6357 or one of the following:

Sandra Town, KASS Information Governance Co-ordinator on ext 1790
Andrew Swan, CMY Information Governance Officer on ext 1621
Pauline Banks, E&R Information Governance Officer on ext 6915
Caroline Dodge, CED Access to Information Co-ordinator on ext 1652.

If you are sending a Freedom of Information request, please forward your
email to: [Kent County Council request email].

If you are sending a request for access to your personal data, please
forward your email to: [email address].

Otherwise, I will deal with your enquiry as soon as I can on my return.
Thank you.