Unethical adoption practises in the UK too
Women pregnant outside marriage forced to give up their babies want apology and inquiry.
The Movement for an Adoption Apology (MAA) seeks recognition and acknowledgement of the pain and grief suffered by many birth parents and their children because of the unethical adoption practices of the past.
We believe that this can only be achieved by a full Parliamentary apology with cross-party support.
For many years, until at least the 1980s, pregnancy outside marriage was severely frowned upon, and frequently young women who found themselves in this situation were given little choice but to give in to the strong pressures which were exerted on them by the authorities to have their babies adopted.
They were not given information about the welfare services, including housing and financial help, which were available at the time.
There was no question of these women being found to be unfit mothers; they were simply prevented from becoming mothers at all.
This experience so traumatised many of these women that they have suffered years of mental and/or physical ill health ever since, and many were unable to have more children.
In some cases, fathers also, even when wishing to help, were refused a say in their child’s future, because the child was classified as illegitimate, and thus these fathers also became unwilling parties to these adoptions.
It is possible that a government inquiry will be needed to reveal the full extent of the unethical practices and the damage suffered by these birth parents.
However we recognise that such an enquiry would take time to set up and therefore we ask for a start to be made now, with a parliamentary statement of intention to examine all the facts.
No woman today would expect to have a baby taken away from her just because she is not married. But this is what happened to thousands of women for about four decades, from the 1950s right up until the 80s.
Those who saw the film ‘Philomena’ may think this only happened in Ireland; but it happened here too in England, as well as Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Advice and support were not given, many women were harshly treated in Mother and Baby homes, and many of us never had any more children because of the stress of this first loss.
We ask everyone who can relate to this grief to sign our petition, so that at last we will get some recognition of what we have gone through, and some acknowledgement of what this did to us.
Many women are still too ashamed to speak out about it, and so continue to suffer in silence and still experience long term post-traumatic stress.
We need the public recognition which a cross-party parliamentary apology would give us.
Please sign our petition.
And support this early day motion (EDM):
EDM 590: ‘That this House recognises the suffering caused by forced child adoptions during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, which took place due to social pressures on women who had children outside of marriage; notes the unacceptable adoption and care practices of the past, such as not giving information about welfare services, including housing and financial help which were available at the time, and not questioning whether women putting their children up for adoption had given informed consent; further recognises the negligence of previous governments with regard to ensuring that the care provided for unmarried mothers was appropriate and that they and their children were not mistreated or discriminated against, resulting in many women suffering traumatising pre and post-natal experiences, and children being denied contact with their birth parents; and calls on the Government to apologise in order to go some way toward helping the parents and children who were victims of these practices.’
Early Day Motions are formal motions submitted for debate in the House of Commons. Although very few are actually debated. EDMs allow MPs to draw attention to an event or cause. MPs register their support by signing individual motions.
So please write to your MP. Click here for a sample letter.
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