Board Member
Marian Hall has had a long career in social work in Family & Child Care within the statutory sector. This has largely been in relation to Children at Risk, Children in Care, Fostering and Adoption. She has a particular interest in Adoption and sat for many years as a member of the Adoption Panel within what was then the Eastern Health & Social Services Board.
Marian also has a long standing interest in legal matters as they relate to children. As a result, she decided to add to her Masters degree in Social Work by undertaking a law degree. She then followed that up by studying for her Bar exams in London. She was subsequently called to the Bar of England and Wales in 2007.
Marian continued with her social work career and felt that her legal qualifications added to her capacity to carry out her role and contribute on legal matters as they impacted on children. She has also used that knowledge by contributing for many years as a visiting lecturer to the QUB undergraduate course in Social Work with respect the Human Rights Act 1998.
Marian joined Family Routes as a Board member in 2018 and hopes that her qualifications and experience have assisted in helping to address the range of issues that have faced the agency since then. She looks forward to Family Routes setting up its own Adoption panel in order to try to help with finding appropriate permanent placements for children.
From a Social Work and legal perspective, Marian is also very interested in the other important functions carried out by Family Routes staff including work with individuals with fertility issues, work with children and young people who have been adopted, work with birth parents and work on the provision of historical records to adult adoptees. She looks forward to Family Routes being able to contribute to this work for many years to come.
