By Zoey
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has delivered a formal apology on behalf of the United Kingdom for the state’s role in the forced separation of tens of thousands of unmarried mothers from their babies, acknowledging decades of suffering caused by policies and practices that remained in place until the 1970s.
Speaking before Parliament on Thursday, Starmer described the chapter as one of the darkest periods in modern British social history, offering what he called a sincere and heartfelt apology to the women, children, and families whose lives were permanently changed by the practice.
“We are deeply and profoundly sorry,” Starmer told lawmakers, describing the forced adoptions as “a stain on our history.”
The apology represents a major milestone in a campaign that has lasted for years, with survivors and advocacy groups demanding official recognition of the trauma inflicted on mothers who say they were pressured, manipulated, and intimidated into surrendering their newborn children.
Government records estimate that around 185,000 babies born to unmarried mothers in England and Wales were adopted between 1949 and 1976. During those decades, strong social stigma surrounding unmarried pregnancy often led women to maternity homes or institutions, where many were told they had little or no choice but to allow their children to be adopted by married couples.
Before addressing Parliament, Starmer met privately with campaigners who have spent years fighting for justice and recognition. Many of those campaigners later watched his statement from the public gallery of the House of Commons as the apology was delivered.
In his address, Starmer acknowledged that countless women had been denied meaningful choices and instead faced enormous pressure from public authorities, healthcare professionals, religious organizations, and social services.
He said many mothers were “coerced, bullied or misled” into believing they had no alternative but to surrender their babies.
The prime minister also reflected on the lasting emotional damage suffered by the children involved, many of whom grew up believing they had been abandoned or unwanted.
He noted that mothers were frequently told their babies would enjoy better lives without them, while children spent years unaware of the circumstances surrounding their adoption.
“To each and every one of those affected, we say a deep and heartfelt sorry,” Starmer declared.
The apology comes during the closing weeks of Starmer’s tenure as Britain’s prime minister and is expected to become one of the defining moments of his time in office.
Alongside the formal apology, the government announced several measures intended to assist those affected by historic forced adoptions. These include improving access to adoption records to help reunite separated families where possible, expanding mental health support for mothers, adoptees, and relatives, and providing additional assistance to people seeking information about their family histories.
The issue has gathered increasing attention in recent years as survivors have spoken publicly about the lifelong emotional impact of being separated from their children or growing up without knowing their biological families.
Following Starmer’s statement, several Members of Parliament shared deeply personal stories during an emotional debate in the House of Commons.
Sarah Pochin of Reform UK became visibly emotional as she revealed that her own mother had been pressured into giving up a baby for adoption through a church-run process.
She explained that her mother never spoke publicly about the experience and carried the secret throughout her life.
Pochin said she only discovered the truth after her mother’s death and later managed, after years of searching, to locate and establish contact with the brother she had never known.
Former Health Minister Ann Keen, who was forced to surrender her baby for adoption in 1966 when she was only 17 years old, welcomed the government’s apology as an important step toward healing decades of pain.
She said the apology represented freedom from years of shame that many mothers had unfairly carried.
According to Keen, women had long been wrongly portrayed as willingly giving away their children when, in reality, many had been denied any meaningful choice.
Campaigners have argued for years that the British government should formally acknowledge its responsibility for policies that enabled forced adoptions to occur.
Their efforts gained significant momentum after Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights concluded in 2022 that the British state should apologize for the pain and suffering caused by public institutions and government employees that steered vulnerable mothers toward unwanted adoptions.
Although the governments of Scotland and Wales each issued official apologies in 2023, the Conservative government then in power at Westminster declined to do the same, arguing that the British state had not directly supported the practices.
Starmer rejected that position, saying responsibility extended beyond individual institutions because the systems allowing forced adoptions had been funded, regulated, and legitimized by the state.
He said the practices were deeply embedded across local government authorities, healthcare services, social care agencies, and religious organizations.
“The state bears responsibility for the systems it funded and legitimized which enabled these practices to occur,” the prime minister told Parliament.
The government’s apology also follows a separate acknowledgment issued just two weeks earlier by the Church of England, which accepted responsibility for its historical role in facilitating forced adoptions through church-affiliated homes.
The church’s apology recognized the profound pain, trauma, and lasting stigma experienced by mothers, children, and families affected by past adoption practices, while acknowledging that many survivors continue to live with the emotional consequences decades later.
Britain is not alone in confronting this painful chapter of history.
Several countries have undertaken similar examinations of historic adoption practices that targeted unmarried mothers following the Second World War.
In the United States, historians describe the period between 1945 and 1973 as the “Baby Scoop Era,” during which more than 1.5 million infants were placed for adoption. Many unmarried pregnant women were sent to maternity homes, where social pressure and institutional practices frequently influenced decisions to surrender their children.
Australia formally addressed its own history in 2013, when then-Prime Minister Julia Gillard delivered a landmark national apology to victims of forced adoption policies, acknowledging the lifelong pain and suffering experienced by mothers, children, and families.
Ireland has also spent years examining the legacy of its mother-and-baby homes, many of which were operated by the Catholic Church. A major inquiry published in 2021 concluded that approximately 9,000 children died in 18 such institutions during the twentieth century. Following the findings, Prime Minister Micheál Martin issued a national apology, describing the treatment of mothers and their children as a profound injustice that affected generations of Irish families.
For many survivors in Britain, Thursday’s apology marks a long-awaited acknowledgment of decades of grief, secrecy, and loss. While campaigners say further work remains to ensure continued support and access to historical records, they believe the government’s recognition represents an important step toward justice for thousands of families whose lives were forever altered by forced adoption policies.
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