Would you give a reference

[LilMisConfused]

You need to be really careful here - I know that in business you are not legally allowed to give a negative reference, if you don't want to give a positive one then you refuse a reference request. Not sure if the same would apply here though with it being social services. I wouldn't be worried about social services breaching your confidentiality - I would have thought they have very strict rules in that regard and if they did breech you would definitely have grounds to take them up on that. I have done a reference for people adopting in the past and it was quite clear that they never saw what I had put.
I would maybe go for ringing the contact from social services and just chatting briefly through it with them without giving any specific details - hopefully they will pick up that you are uncomfortable doing it and offer a helpful solution (as well as maybe reading into why that might be - which to be honest would be a good thing!) I'm sure it won't be the first time they have encountered something like that.
Also, just to mention - it might not be that she wanted you to be a reference, but they have decided to take one from you. The people I did a reference for weren't expecting me to be asked for one, but social services tend to be quite comprehensive when considering who to leave in charge of children in their authorities care. (And rightly so!)

[lizduncan72]

We are currently going through the adoption process and haven't been told what was written in our references, just that they were all ok so hopefully it would be the same for you and she wouldn't find out what you said if you did decide to do it