The Government has today apologised to families on behalf of the state for its role in the historic forced adoption of tens of thousands of babies of unmarried mothers.
The move comes following a lengthy campaign - spearheaded by birth mothers, adult adoptees and their advocates and underpinned by research and evidence - which resulted in two committee hearings in parliament, sustained media attention and public petitions.
According to Government estimates, around 185,000 mostly young, unmarried girls and women in England and Wales from the late 1940s to the early 1970s had their children removed because of this status alone.
Over the last five years Lancaster University's Dr Michael Lambert, a Lecturer in Medical Humanities, has produced research, provided expert comment and parliamentary briefings and media interviews in relation to the issue of forced adoption as part of his work for the Centre for Child and Family Justice research.
In 2021 he provided evidence to the 2022 Joint Committee on Human Rights inquiry which resulted in the report on 'The Violation of Family Life: Adoption of Children of Unmarried Women 1949-1976'.
And this year, he gave further evidence to the Education Committee which published its report into historic forced adoption in March 2026.
The committee heard evidence from academics, including Dr Lambert, adoption organisations, adoptees and birth mothers as well as the Minister for Children and Families.
The resulting report recognised the urgency to act given the ageing condition of many of those impacted by historic forced adoptions.
Among its conclusions, the Education Committee affirmed the need for the UK Government to issue an 'unqualified, formal apology to all those affected' which would include including unmarried, adult adoptees, unmarried mothers who were able to keep their children, but who were nevertheless subject to cruel practices, punishments and stigma, as well as birth fathers, siblings and other family members. This reiterated a similar recommendation made by the Joint Committee on Human Rights in 2022.
Earlier this month, Dr Lambert also shared unearthed archival evidence from official records of the circumstances surrounding the birth, life and death of Stephen Holt at St Monica's maternity home in Kendal in 1964. The report - also available as a redacted version for the public - formed a key element of a BBC news documentary on mother and baby homes.
On June 17, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson announced the government would provide a full apology to victims of historical forced adoptions in England with the apology being made by the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer on 2 July.
In his statement the Prime Minister described the events as 'a stain on our history'.
He added: "Mothers - many young, vulnerable, and without support - were coerced, bullied or misled into feeling they had no choice but to have their children taken from them."
Dr Lambert said: "This apology is a tentative but vital first step towards truth and justice for the thousands of mothers, adoptees, and their extended families who are affected by this scandal.
"The research clearly shows that notions of choice for mothers placed in such a position was illusory at best, meaningless at worst. As I said to the Education Committee, 'coercion was baked into the entire system'."
Dr Michael Lambert is a Lecturer in Medical Humanities at Lancaster University and a historian of the welfare state, specialising in social and health policy in twentieth-century Britain. His research focuses on inequality, welfare institutions, and the lived impacts of policies, including extensive work on mother and baby homes and historic forced adoption. He has contributed evidence to Parliament and public debates on these issues, bringing historical insight to contemporary policy discussions.
To read the full statement from the PM follow this link.
