New platform to give care-experienced and adopted people better access to their records
CoramBAAF and the Archives and Records Association (ARA) are today, Monday 9 March, announcing a partnership to make it easier for adopted and care-experienced people to find and access records relating to their adoption and time in care. The initiative will develop a free, easy to navigate online resource, to be launched later in 2026. The platform will detail the location of adoption and care records in the UK and signpost to organisations who can support those wishing to access their records.
Adoption and care records are an essential part of adopted and care experienced people’s ability to understand their personal history. There is a legislative framework around the retention of these records, however, for many, locating and accessing these records can be a confusing and dispiriting process.
CoramBAAF and ARA will work together to produce the freely accessible online resource detailing the location of adoption and care records, combining data held by both organisations to create the UK’s most comprehensive and searchable database for the location of adoption and care records.
Work has already begun to merge and update existing datasets and there will be further development continuing throughout 2026.
Adopted and care experienced people have consistently highlighted the importance of having access to coherent, comprehensive information about their history and life events. This database will make it easier for adopted and care experienced people to be able to locate and obtain information that is rightfully theirs.
Jane, an adopted person, said: “Until I received information from the adoption records, I have always felt that I have been living in a darkened room - and now someone has switched the light on.”
Simon, a care leaver said: “I was haunted by my childhood and being taken into care at the age of five; I felt it was all my fault. Reading my records altered my whole life understanding and perspectives on myself. It took away my guilt and shame – it was transformational.”
Jane Poore, Adoption Consultant at CoramBAAF, said: “We know how important adoption and care records are to people’s sense of identity, belonging and wellbeing. This project will make it much easier for people to find where their records are held and to begin their search with clarity and confidence. We are delighted to be working with ARA on something that has the potential to make a real difference to people’s lives.”
Sam Johnston Chair of ARA’s Chief Archivists in Local Government Group project group which represents Local Government Archives said: “This has been a long time coming so we’re so pleased that this joint project will provide the much needed freely available and accessible resource to address some of the current challenges and struggles that care-experienced and adopted people encounter to help them find the information to help fill some of the gaps in their lives and find and make contact with birth relatives. For us, this underlines the importance of records and archives both paper and digital and how they can have a very real impact on contemporary lives”.
Professor Elizabeth Lomas, Policy Lead MIRRA (Memory-Identity-Rights in Records-Access) Research Group, University College London, said: “When the state assumes the responsibility of a parent (loco parentis) it should capture a child’s voice, achievements, and life stories making this information easily available through time. However, to date, journeys to access records are complex and problematic. This new tool is essential to make access to records and memories possible. It is long overdue.”
Owen Prendeville, Public Affairs Group Manager at the Information Commissioner’s Office, said: “Access to care records is a fundamental right – they can hold forgotten memories, valuable parts of someone’s identity or difficult answers behind life events. As part of the research for our Better Records Together campaign, we have heard about the systemic challenges people are facing when trying to access their records, such as long delays and unexplained redactions. We are calling for urgent improvements from organisations to make sure these requests are handled with care and compassion.
“Our research suggests that locating records in the first place can also be difficult, especially older records that may have moved places over the years. This new project from CoramBAAF and the Archives and Records Association will be a valuable tool for people with care experience, making it easier to track down their records and begin the process of accessing their story.”
Emily Frith, CEO of Adoption UK, said: “Adoption UK’s Barometer report highlights year after year that access to records is one of the biggest and most challenging issues for adoptees in adulthood. Records are too often incomplete, heavily redacted, inaccurate or missing. More than half of adoptees last year told us they didn’t have all the information they needed about their early lives and their adoption, and the majority disagreed it was easy to access their records.
“This announcement by CoramBAAF and ARA of a freely accessible database for the location of adoption and online records is therefore welcome. We hope this is just the beginning of further work in this area, and call on government to ensure more robust standards for accessing records and stronger support measures are in place to help adoptees as they access vital information about their past.”
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