MCC , Middlesex County Council x Middlesex County Council

The Children's Department of the Middlesex County Council was set up under the Children Act 1948 which embodied the findings of the Curtis Report of 1945-1946. The Act took effect on 5 July 1948; the first meeting of the newly formed Children's Committee took place on the next day, taking over from the Interim Children's Committee, formed of the members of the thereafter defunct Children's Care Sub-Committee of the Education Committee. The first Children's Officer, Mr Ainscow, had in fact been appointed in anticipation, with effect from 1 May 1948. The duties of the Department had previously been distributed across several County Council departments (the Public Assistance, Public Health and Education Departments), as well as bodies (education authorities outside the MCC and the County Maternity and Child Welfare authorities) not part of the County Council at all.

The activities of the Children's Department may be summarised as follows:
i) Care and welfare: this comprised of the provision of care for a) children under the age of 17 if they had no parents or guardians; if they were abandoned or lost; of if their parents were unable to provide for their proper upbringing, provided that such care was in the child's best interests: and b) children committed by a court to the care of the County Council under a Fit Person order. This involved inter alia the running of homes and nurseries, the maintenance of the boarding out system for foster homes, and in some cases the assumption of full parental rights until the child should attain majority. The Department also undertook the care of children as delegated by the Welfare Department when dealing with problem or evicted families.

ii) Child Life Protection: this was a long standing local authority responsibility. After the passing of the Children Act 1948 its effect was to render it an offence for any person other than the parent, legal guardian or a relative to undertake for reward (whether or not for profit) the care of a child below school leaving age (15 in 1948) without notifying the County Council as a welfare authority. The Children's Department publicised the legal obligations upon such persons, supervised placements, inspected and regulated foster homes and so on. After the Adoption Act 1950, a similar duty to notify the Council rested upon anyone placing a child in another's care (with the same exceptions as above).

iii) Approved schools and remand homes: a child could be committed by the courts into the care of the Council either by a Fit Person Order, the effect of which was to put the child into the care of the Children's Department or by an Approved School Order, which placed the child under the care of managers at an Approved School. It should be noted that placements were made under the aegis of the Home Office nationwide, and that although the Council, through sub-committees of the Children's Committees, ran two approved schools, by no means all Middlesex children would be allocated places there. The Committee also ran two remand homes. The Children's Department were involved in briefing judges on cases: sometimes in bringing themselves in order to gain the powers by which to afford children under threat the care and protection they needed; and as the executive arm of the County Council on receipt of Fit Person Orders. Staff were also responsible for the supervision and after-care of "licensed" Middlesex children.

iv) Under the Adoption Act 1926, the County Council had since 1943 to oversee the compulsory registration of adoption societies in the county (not an onerous duty: two were registered in of which only one, the Homeless Children's Aid and Adoption Society, continued for any length of time). Compulsory notification to the County Council of all adoptions in the county was not introduced until the Adoption Act 1950. Also, from that point of view the Council had to supervise every prospective third party adoption in its area, whether or not involved in any other capacity. After the 1958 Act the Council had the power to place children for adoption even if those children were not in its care. Its powers of supervision were widened to include all adoptions in the county.

Health areas of the County of Middlesex, also used as administrative areas by the MCC Children's Department: Area 1 Enfield and Edmonton; Area 2 Southgate, Potters Bar, Wood Green and Friern Barnet; Area 3 Hornsey and Tottenham; Area 4 Finchley and Hendon; Area 5 Harrow; Area 6 Wembley and Willesden; Area 7 Ealing and Acton; Area 8 Ruislip-Northwood, Uxbridge, Hayes and Harlington, Yiewsley and West Drayton; Area 9 Heston and Isleworth, Southall and Area 10 Feltham, Staines, Twickenham, Sunbury.

Adoption:

Until the Adoption Act 1926 legal adoption did not exist in English law. The 1926 Act gave no specific powers to local authorities, but the County Council was frequently, in its capacity as a local education authority, asked to act as a Guardian Ad Litem (that is to protect the child's rights before the law). When so requested, the County Council delegated this function to the officers of the Education Department. Other local education authorities could be approached instead in cases within their areas, or the Court's own probation officer might be appointed.

The Adoption of Children Regulation Act 1939 was designed to rectify some of the abuses of the 1926 Act and specifically, required adoption services to be approved and registered with local authorities. There were in fact only three such services in Middlesex in 1943 when the Act was finally implemented and only one, the Homeless Children's Aid and Adoption Society, remained in operation for any length of time thereafter. Also from 1943 certain duties of supervision of private adoptions were placed upon the welfare authorities, of which the MCC was one.

The duties of the Education Department relating to adoptions passed to the newly created Children's Department in 1948. In the next year was passed the Adoption of Children Act 1949, which was immediately consolidated with the previous legislation as the Adoption Act 1950. This Act made significant changes to adoption procedures: that which most particularly affected the County Council was the requirement that no adoption order could be made unless at least three months notice of intention to adopt had been given to the welfare authority, i.e. the County Council. Therefore from 1950 the County Council was notified of every intended adoption within the County, regardless of who the guardian ad litem was. Further, on receipt of a notice of an intended third party adoption (that is to say an adoption placement made by a third party, not a registered adoption society or local authority; adoptions by parents of their own children - very commonly done by women with illegitimate children and subsequently married) an officer of the Children's Department would commence supervision of the child or children either until the granting of the Court Order, or, if the supervision revealed the prospective adopters as unsuitable, until the end of the statutory period. The Adoption Act 1958 extended the powers of supervision to all adoptions and from this date the County Council had, in theory, some record of every adoption that took place in the County. The Act also enabled local authorities to act as adoption agencies in their own right.