Some Canadian "Waiting Child" Adoptions Stonewalled

On P.E.I., the government has taken over facilitating the adoption of children from China's Waiting Child Program, with predictable results:

P.E.I. building obstacles to international adoption, families say
New polices on P.E.I. are blocking international adoption, some families are complaining, and they've formed a group to lobby for change.

They're urging the premier to step in and change his government's policies. They fear without a change, they will lose their chance to adopt.

"All of us feel that the province does not support international adoption. That's why we're coming forward," Tammy MacKinnon, spokeswoman for the P.E.I. Adoption Coalition, told CBC News Friday.

"We want to know why it's being made so difficult."

The issue is with China's Waiting Child Program, which places children with medical problems, sometimes very minor ones. Because of the difficulty of successfully placing these children, the Chinese program uses agencies in Canada to help select families. Four P.E.I. children have been adopted under China's Waiting Child Program.

But in 2005, China became part of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. The P.E.I. government believes this requires the province to take a more direct role in the adoptions, and it has cut the Canadian agencies from the process, causing lengthy delays.

The agencies are accredited provincially in Ontario and Quebec. P.E.I. is the only province in Canada that has stopped using the agencies for the Waiting Child Program, because it believes it is illegal to use them.
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