A 16 per cent fall in adoptions in the area from 2010 drove the borough to hold an information evening for prospective parents last night.
Kensington and Chelsea residents are being encouraged to adopt after a 16 per cent fall in adoptions in the area from 2010.
The Royal Borough held an information evening last night attended by around 50 prospective parents.
A panel gave the attendees information about the process and the need for adoptive parents in the area.
One young women, Josephine, had been adopted as a baby and is using her experiences to help other people.
Josephine was a relinquished baby and was taken in by a couple who already had children of their own but had always wanted to adopt.
She was told from before she could understand that she was adopted.
“It felt so normal to me,” she said.
“I morphed into my family.”
Gwyneth, who has recently adopted two siblings after fostering them for two years said: “The adoption process can be quite intrusive but it’s worth it.
“It’s about the children and making sure you get what’s best for them.”
The Royal Borough holds these evenings twice a year in a push for more adoptive parents.
Cabinet Member for Family and Children’s Services, Cllr Baroness Ritchie, said: “It is a lifelong commitment but adoption is one of the most rewarding things you can do.”
Providing you are over 21 there are very few restrictions on adopting in the borough.
Homosexual and heterosexual single, married and un-married partners are eligible but the process leading to adoption is lengthy and detailed.
The assessment takes up to eight months and is only one of 13 steps to becoming the legal parent.
There has been countrywide push for adoptions after Department of Education figures showed only 60 babies out of 3,050 were adopted last year.
Prime Minister David Cameron spoke out against social workers earlier this month.
He chastised the slow adoption rates and introduced a new drive to encourage adoption.
He criticised the process of adoption saying that people were asked pointless and often intrusive questions calling it a ‘tick-box mentality’.
