Adoption (County Court) Rules, 1959
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | SI 1959/480 |
| Year | 1959 |
1959 No. 480 (L. 4)
The Adoption (County Court) Rules, 195919thMarch 1959
1stApril 1959
I, David Viscount Kilmuir, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, in exercise of the powers conferred on me by section 9 of the Adoption Act, 1958(a), hereby make the following rules for carrying that Act into effect so far as it confers jurisdiction upon county courts:—
Commencement of proceedings
1.—(1) An application to a county court for an adoption order shall be made by filing in the office of the appropriate court an originating application in Form 1.
(2) The proposed adopter shall be the applicant and the persons mentioned in Rule 10 shall be the respondents.
(3) Save as provided in Rule 8 no person shall be served with a copy of the application.
(4) The notice to be served on every respondent shall be in Form 2 and a copy shall be served on the guardian ad litem.
(5) A note of service or non-service shall be indorsed on a copy of Form 2.
2. If any person proposing to apply to a county court for an adoption order desires that his identity be kept confidential, he may, before filing an originating application, apply to the registrar for a serial number to be assigned to him for the purposes of the proposed application, and the registrar shall assign a number to him accordingly.
3. Except where the applicant or one of the applicants is the mother or father of the infant or the infant has reached the upper limit of the compulsory school age, every applicant for an adoption order shall file with his application a certificate of a fully registered medical practitioner as to his health; and, if the applicant so desires, Form 3 may be used for the purposes of such certificate.
4.—(1) Any report on the health of the infant which is to be used for the purposes of an application for an adoption order shall be filed with the application.
(2) The report may, if the applicant so desires, be in Form 4.
5.—(1) Any document signifying the consent of any person to the making of an adoption order for the purposes of section 6 of the Act shall be in Form 5 and, if executed before the commencement of the proceedings, shall be filed with the originating application.
(a) 7 & 8 Eliz. 2. c. 5.
(2) If the document is executed outside the United Kingdom, it shall be sufficiently attested for the purposes of subsection (3) of the said section 6 if it is attested by any of the following persons:—
(a) any person for the time being authorised by law in the place where the document is executed to administer an oath for any judicial or other legal purpose;
(b) a British consular officer;
(c) a notary public; or
(d) if the person executing the document is serving in any of the regular armed forces of the Crown, an officer holding a commission in any of those forces.
6. If it appears that the applicant has previously made an application for an adoption order in respect of the same infant to the High Court, a county court or a magistrates' court and that that court, after having heard the case, dismissed the application on its merits, the registrar shall bring the matter to the attention of the judge and shall not proceed with the application unless the judge is satisfied that there has been a substantial change in the circumstances since the previous application.
7. If owing to special circumstances any application appears to the judge to be more fit to be dealt with by the High Court, he may, at any stage of the proceedings, refuse, on that ground expressly, to proceed with the application.
Appointment and functions of guardian ad litem
8.—(1) Subject to the provisions of Rules 6 and 7, the registrar shall, as soon as practicable after the making of an application for an adoption order, appoint a guardian ad litem of the infant and serve on him a copy of the originating application together with the documents attached thereto.
(2) The person to be appointed guardian ad litem shall be—
(a) if the local authority concerned consents, the children's officer of a local authority or an officer or servant of that authority who assists the children's officer in the exercise of his functions;
(b) a probation officer, or
(c) if in any particular case the registrar considers that it is not reasonably practicable or that it would be undesirable to appoint one of the aforesaid persons, some other person who appears to the registrar to be suitably qualified:
Provided that no person shall be appointed guardian ad litem if—
(i) he has the rights and powers of a parent of the infant or has taken part in the arrangements for the adoption of the infant; or
(ii) he is a member, officer or servant of a local authority, adoption society or other body of persons which has the rights and powers of a parent of the infant or which has taken part in the arrangements for the adoption of the infant.
(3) Where the children's officer of a local authority is appointed guardian ad litem, he may carry out his duties and appear before the court personally or by any other officer or servant of that authority who assists the children's officer in the exercise of his functions.
9.—(1) With a view to safeguarding the interests of the infant before the court the guardian ad litem shall, so far as is reasonably practicable—
(a) investigate all circumstances relevant to the proposed adoption, including the matters alleged in the originating application and those specified in the Second Schedule to these Rules; and
(b) perform such other duties as are specified in the said Schedule or as the court may direct.
(2) On completing his investigations the guardian ad litem shall make a confidential report in writing to the court.
(3) With a view to obtaining the directions of the court on any particular matter, the guardian ad litem may at any time make such interim report to the court as appears to him to be necessary.
10. At the time of appointing the guardian ad litem, the registrar shall fix a time for the hearing of the application and shall serve a notice in Form 2 on the following persons:—
(a) every person, not being an applicant, whose consent to the making of the order is required under section 4 (1) of the Act;
(b) any person having the rights and powers of a parent of the infant by virtue of section 75 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933(a), or paragraph 12 (1) of the Fourth Schedule to that Act or section 3 of the Children Act, 1948(b);
(c) any person liable by virtue of any order or agreement to contribute to the maintenance of the infant;
(d) the local authority to whom the applicant has given notice of his intention to apply for an adoption order under section 3 (2) of the Act;
(e) any local authority or adoption society named in the application or in a form of consent as having taken part in the arrangements for the adoption of the infant;
(f) any other person, not being the infant, who in the opinion of the court ought to be served with notice of the hearing of the application;
and any person upon whom a notice is required to be served under this Rule shall be a respondent to the application.
11. Where the guardian ad litem reports to the court that in his opinion the infant is able to understand the nature of an adoption order, the registrar shall serve on the applicant a notice in Form 6.
Attendance of parties and hearing of application
12. The judge shall not make an adoption order or an interim order except after the personal attendance of the applicant before him:
Provided that where the application is made by two spouses jointly, the judge may dispense with the personal attendance of one of the applicants if the originating application is verified by an affidavit sworn by him in accordance with the provisions of section 84 of the County Courts Act, 1934(c) (or, if he is outside the United Kingdom, by a declaration made by him and attested by a person specified in Rule 5 (2) of these Rules).
13. Where the applicant has been served with a notice in Form 6, the judge shall not make an adoption order or an interim order unless—
(a) the infant has attended personally before him or it appears to the judge that there are special circumstances making the infant's attendance unnecessary; and
(b) the judge is satisfied that the infant has been informed of the nature of the order.
14. If a serial number has been assigned to the applicant under Rule 2 of these Rules, the proceedings shall be conducted with a view to securing that he is not seen by or made known to any respondent who is not already aware of his identity, except with his consent.
15.—(1) Where the infant whom the applicant desires to adopt is identified in the originating application by reference to a birth certificate which is the same, or relates to the same entry in the Registers of Births, as a birth certificate exhibited to a form of consent, the infant whom the applicant desires to adopt shall be deemed, unless the contrary appears, to be identical with the infant to whom the form of consent refers.
(2) Where the infant has previously been adopted, the foregoing paragraph of this Rule shall have effect as if for the references to a birth certificate there were substituted references to a certified copy of an entry in the Adopted Children Register and as if for the reference to the Registers of Birth there were substituted a reference to that Register.
16. Every application for an adoption order shall be heard and determined in camera.
17.—(1) An applicant for a provisional adoption order shall provide evidence of the law of adoption in the country in which he is domiciled.
(2) An affidavit as to that law, sworn by a person who is conversant with it and who practises, or has practised, as a barrister or advocate in that country or is a duly accredited representative of the government of that country in the United Kingdom, shall, if filed with the originating application, be admissible without any such...
To continue reading
Request your trial