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This paper focuses on policy implementation and, in particular, the workings of ‘street-level bureaucracy’ in a small, marginalised area of welfare provision, namely post-care adults seeking access to their care records. The work arises from research mapping UK service provision in this area, via questionnaires and interviews with key actors in local authorities and voluntary organisations. The study was prompted by widespread but largely anecdotal evidence that practices and service provision for those seeking to access their care records varied enormously. While post-care adults may seek access to records for reasons similar to those of adopted adults (curiosity, information on birth family, medical information, care histories and experiences, search and reunion), there is a lack of comparable legal framework and service provision, with reliance instead on the 1998 Data Protection Act (DPA). The intersection of data protection and (child) welfare gives rise to a number of important tensions that are explored, such as those surrounding ‘ownership’ of files and their content, between rights to information and (paternalistic) welfare considerations, and whether the handling of requests should constitute an administrative or a social work task. Finally, we consider the findings, their wider contexts and implications for legal reform and policy change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Increasing numbers of adult adopted people are searching for and having reunions with their birth relatives. Although a growing number of studies now exist that have looked at the search and reunion process, few have examined reunion outcomes over the long term. The present study investigated the experiences of 48 adult adopted people who first had contact with their birth mothers at least eight years prior to the survey. Outcomes were examined in terms of the adopted person's evaluation of their own adoption experience, and the frequency of contact, if any, currently occurring between the adopted person and their adoptive and birth mothers. Although over half of adopted people were still in contact with their birth mother eight years or more post reunion, the number still in touch with their adoptive mothers was higher still. Furthermore, of those still in contact with both their adoptive and birth mothers, the frequency of contact was more likely to be higher with the adoptive mother than with the birth mother. The results are discussed in terms of the search for identity, filial relationships, genetic relatedness and affectional bonds formed during childhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]